Using company email for personal matters can result in disastrous consequences as illustrated in the recent New York case of Peerenboom v. Marvel Entertainment. The case involved Perenboom's subpoena of Marvel for its CEO's Isaac Perlmutter’s work emails relating to a private dispute between Peerenboom and Perlmutter over the management of their tennis club. Perlmutter objected to the subpoena because some of the emails were between him and his attorneys and therefore were protected by attorney-client privilege. Peerenboom countered that the attorney-client privilege had been waived since all emails sent by Marvel employees through the Marvel server were subject to monitoring.
Siding with Peerenboom, the court considered a number of factors in deciding whether privilege had been waived, including: (1) Marvel's email policy banned personal email use; and (2) Marvel monitored the use of the employee email and put all employees on notice that their email was being monitored. The court held that since these policies allowed third parties to access emails between Perlmutter and his attorneys, Perlmutter could not assert the privilege to prevent their discovery.
Waiver of attorney-client privilege may be an extreme result but it demonstrates the importance of transparent email policies. If an employer is going to monitor employee email usage, employees should be made aware of the policy.in a clear and unambiguous manner. In so doing, employers can ensure that employees know that company email is for company business only.
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Siding with Peerenboom, the court considered a number of factors in deciding whether privilege had been waived, including: (1) Marvel's email policy banned personal email use; and (2) Marvel monitored the use of the employee email and put all employees on notice that their email was being monitored. The court held that since these policies allowed third parties to access emails between Perlmutter and his attorneys, Perlmutter could not assert the privilege to prevent their discovery.
Waiver of attorney-client privilege may be an extreme result but it demonstrates the importance of transparent email policies. If an employer is going to monitor employee email usage, employees should be made aware of the policy.in a clear and unambiguous manner. In so doing, employers can ensure that employees know that company email is for company business only.
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