Donald F. Manno v. Christopher J. Christie

The government (defendant) executed a warrant authorizing a search of the law offices of Donald Manno (plaintiff) for 16 categories of documents pertaining to 43 individuals or entities. The executing agents inspected files on Manno’s computers, copied six hard drives and external storage devices, and seized three laptops. Manno filed a complaint and moved to preliminarily enjoin the government from reading the seized electronic files, direct the government to return the originals and any copies of the files, and require the government to disclose the names or labels on the files the government inspected. Manno alleged that the search and seizure violated the attorney-client privilege and was overbroad because the agents rifled through files and seized drives containing information relating to clients other than those named in the warrant. The government maintained it seized the drives so computer specialists could search for authorized material and retrieve, analyze, and authenticate the data. The government proposed the following review procedures: a designated privilege agent would conduct a preliminary review to identify files within the warrant’s scope; a designated privilege prosecutor would review those files for privilege; the prosecutor would turn over to a separate prosecution team any material deemed not to be privileged; if a file could be privileged, the prosecutor would consider whether a privilege exception applied or the privilege had been waived and then meet and confer with Manno or anyone with a claim of privilege; and if the parties could not agree, the prosecutor would seek a judicial determination on the privilege issue.