Nelson v. Tucker Ellis LLP CA1/3

Filed 11/24/15 Nelson v. Tucker Ellis LLP CA1/3 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION THREE

EVAN C. NELSON, Plaintiff and Respondent, A142731 v. TUCKER ELLIS LLP, (City & County of San Francisco Super. Ct. No. CGC-13-535453) Defendant and Appellant.

Defendant Tucker Ellis LLP (Tucker Ellis) appeals from an order filed on June 6, 2014, which denied its special motion to strike the complaint as a strategic lawsuit against public participation pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure,1 section 425.16 (hereafter also referred to as the SLAPP statute or the anti-SLAPP statute). On appeal, Tucker Ellis contends that the superior court erred when it denied its motion. Having reviewed the record and the briefs submitted by the parties, and for the reasons more fully explained below, we conclude, as did the superior court, that the complaint here is not a SLAPP suit. Accordingly, we affirm.

1 All further unspecified statutory references are to the Code of Civil Procedure.

1

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND2 From November 2007 to November 2011, Evan C. Nelson (Nelson) was employed as an attorney at the San Francisco office of the law firm of Tucker Ellis, a Delaware limited liability partnership. Two years later, on November 13, 2013, Nelson commenced this lawsuit against Tucker Ellis, alleging causes of action of negligence, negligent and intentional interference with contract, negligent and intentional inference with prospective economic advantage, intentional invasion of privacy through public disclosure of private information, and conversion, and seeking compensatory and punitive damages, attorney fees, costs of suit, and interest as allowed by law. The gravamen of the lawsuit is Nelson’s allegations that before he left the employ of Tucker Ellis, the law firm received a subpoena requesting certain material in an unrelated lawsuit. Tucker Ellis management, including its managing partner Joe Morford and firm counsel Harry Cornett, discussed the subpoena with Nelson. Morford and Cornett only identified a few non-privileged documents as those that Tucker Ellis would produce in response to the subpoena. Nelson was not told that Tucker Ellis intended to produce his attorney work product. However, according to Nelson, Tucker Ellis later responded to the subpoena by producing both Nelson’s attorney work product and other documents created by Nelson that were not responsive to the subpoena. When Nelson learned of Tucker Ellis’s production of the privileged material, Nelson informed the law firm in writing that the materials were privileged, and directed that Tucker Ellis recover and sequester the material, but Tucker Ellis took no action. It was further alleged that as a consequence of Tucker Ellis’s disclosures of privileged communications, Nelson’s attorney work product was widely disseminated on the Internet, he was terminated from his employment at a new law firm, and he has not been able to secure adequate replacement employment of a type and quality similar to his previous employment.