United States v. Lentz

Jay Lentz (defendant) called his attorney, Frank Salvato, on a recorded jailhouse line, evidently to ask about hiring a hit man to kill key witnesses and one or both prosecutors in Lentz’s case. Lentz had been convicted of murdering his ex-wife, but the appellate court reversed and remanded for a new trial. Before retrial, the prosecution (plaintiff) filed a sealed motion stating that another inmate, Christopher Jackmon, was prepared to testify that Lentz had solicited Jackmon’s help in a murder-for-hire plot. The prosecution had obtained recordings of three calls Lentz made to Salvato from jail. All outgoing inmate calls were subject to recording, with a pre-recorded message at the beginning of every call informing both parties of that fact. During the calls, Lentz pressed Salvato to confirm what he knew about “a guy named Ridley [who] got murdered at the Springfield mall.” Evidently Lentz was trying to determine if Jackmon was telling the truth about getting out of prison soon because a hit man had murdered a key witness in Jackmon’s case. Lentz said Jackmon could help “in case [Lentz] need[ed] something like that to happen in [his] case.” Lentz asked to be called by an alias during the calls. Salvato repeatedly asked if Lentz was kidding, and Lentz said he didn’t joke at that hour. In one call, Salvato reminded Lentz all inmate calls were recorded. In the third call, Salvato said “this is a privileged call, but they’re all recorded.” When the government disclosed a copy of the motion to Salvato, he moved to suppress the calls as protected by attorney-client privilege and inadmissible for any purpose.