The Appellate Division held today that the Attorney General properly denied a request for the names of State employees who sought legal representation or indemnification in connection with the Bridgegate investigations. North Jersey Media v. State Dept. of Law and Public Safety. The opinion is unpublished, even though no court has previously addressed the issue of whether OPRA requires disclosure of the identity of a government attorney’s client.

The court held that this information is confidential under the attorney-client privilege as well as the Rules of Professional Conduct. Communications between State employees and the Attorney General’s Office concerning legal representation matters are covered by the attorney-client privilege. Also, the court said that the OPRA request was properly denied because R.P.C. 1.6 provides that client identity is confidential.

The Appellate Division also reversed the trial court’s award of attorney fees to the requestor. The court ruled that although the Attorney General’s Office had provided certain other records to the requestor, the release of these records was not caused by the OPRA suit.

The attorney fee ruling is notable only with regard to the amount of fees involved–over $57,000 for the trial court litigation alone. This shows, as I’ve previously discussed, that OPRA matters can potentially generate substantial attorney fee awards against public bodies.