DaRosa v. City of New Bedford

Property owners sued the City of New Bedford seeking damages arising from soil contamination around a site that the City had operated as an unrestricted ash dump. The City retained a consultant at TRC Environmental Corporation (TRC) to prepare documents to assist the city solicitor in advising the City as to the potential litigation. The City then filed a third-party complaint alleging cost recovery claims against various third-party defendants. During discovery, some third-party defendants moved to compel production of the TRC documents. The motion judge allowed the motion, thus rejecting the City’s claim that the TRC work product was protected by the attorney-client privilege and the work product doctrine. The Supreme Judicial Court vacated the judge’s order, holding (1) “opinion” work product and “fact” work product that was prepared in anticipation of litigation generally falls outside the definition of “public records” under Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 4, 7(26); and (2) where work product is exempted from disclosure under the public records act, it is protected from disclosure in discovery to the extent provided by Mass. R. Civ. P. 26. View "DaRosa v. City of New Bedford" on Justia Law