In his Sept. 20 op-ed contribution, columnist Peter Goodman questioned why County Attorney Nelson Goodin and I are not releasing certain documents from investigators looking into various allegations regarding policies and personnel at the Doña Ana County Detention Center. The reason is quite simple: The documents we’ve identified are attorney-client privileged and should not be divulged. The attorney-client privilege encourages clients to disclose to their attorneys all pertinent information in legal matters by protecting such disclosures from discovery. One of the oldest recognized and practiced privileges in law, which has been around since the days of Elizabethan England, the Attorney-Client privilege has preserved the confidentiality of communications between lawyers and their clients. It should be noted that the privilege does not apply to communications between an attorney and a client that are made in furtherance of a fraud or other crime. So all the innuendo about us not releasing documents to hide or protect an employee who has committed a crime are not only completely untrue but ludicrous.
Neither Mr. Goodin nor I were on staff with Doña Ana County the first two times these same allegations were investigated, so we had no input into past decisions. It does appear, however, that past legal counsel and past county managers have consistently determined that attorney-client privilege applies to the documents in question.
Mr. Goodman goes on to speculate that a court motion is likely to be filed challenging the grounds upon which the documents are being withheld. In the paragraph where he makes this assertion, he also cites an anonymous someone who says I am a liar. This seems to be the result of an attempt of one of the investigators to twist my comment that we will cooperate with the investigation to the extent we are able to do so, into meaning that we would waive the attorney-client privilege. The absurdity of the allegation and the anonymity of the source notwithstanding, I am perfectly confident of the position we have taken, and I’m prepared to address the court about the matter if asked to do so.
Mr. Goodman consistently paints Doña Ana County with a broad brush of near-libelous scorn based on the outcomes of a couple of civil lawsuits whose roots far precede my tenure. Moreover, the fact that I may not agree with the verdicts in the lawsuits does not mean that I’m unmindful of them. We are looking at policies and procedures as well as training, best practices and effective management tools. Most importantly I tell employees that they cannot let these court decisions paralyze them or stop them from doing their jobs in a professional and above board manner. To shake off the jokes or insinuation that being a County employee is somehow second class. I am working with the Board of Commissioners and the leadership team to change the organizational culture. Such evolution takes time, but we’re already seeing results and we’re still moving forward. In an organization as large as this one, there will be bad apples. I’ve thrown a few of those off the tree, and will continue to do so as I identify them. We’re serious about being the local governmental entity that others emulate in terms of professionalism, ethical conduct and transparency.
Mr. Goodman’s potshots and speculations make for salacious reading, but he is far-removed from the actual facts of the matters about which he writes, and I advise his readers always to have several grains of salt nearby with which to take his assertions.