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by Alan M. Dershowitz • April 14,
2018 at 11:00 am
Under
current law, non-privileged material can be seized and examined by
FBI agents and prosecutors, but it is often comingled with
privileged information. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
The raid on President Trump's lawyer dramatically
demonstrates the need for new legislation to assure that no FBI
agents or US attorneys ever get to read privileged communications
between a lawyer and a client, a doctor and a patient, a priest and
penitent, or a husband and a wife.
Under current law, confidential material is read or
listened to by a taint team comprised of FBI agents and
prosecutors. The taint team then sends over to prosecutors all
non-privileged material. But a number of FBI agents and prosecutors
have already read and listened to the privileged material. They
must be trusted not to leak it or misuse it in any way. Even if
they don't, the very fact that government agents have been given
access to the most confidential and sacred materials should trouble
every American, because the government does have the right to seize
material that is not privileged, and such material may be comingled
with privileged material.
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