Prosecutor May Be Fired for Ordering Secret Jail Recordings

A veteran prosecutor in Alameda County, Calif., has been put on administrative leave while a potential violation of attorney-client privilege is probed (secret jail recordings), as first reported in the Oakland Tribune. It was revealed in a court hearing that Danielle London, who has been with the office a decade, had ordered sheriff’s deputies to secretly record a jailhouse conversation between a murder defendant and a defense expert, the Oakland Tribune reports.

“It is a felony to record the conversation between an inmate and her attorney or others who are presumed to maintain confidentiality on the inmate’s behalf,” according to California Public Defender Diane Bellas. Attorney Jo Ann Kingston represents the murder defendant and is calling for a probe of the sheriff’s department as well as London. “It’s so blatantly illegal it’s beyond pale,” said Kingston, who at the same time stated that she thought London must wrongly have believed that she could legally record the conversation. “I feel strongly that there should be an independent investigation done.”

Sadly, this story does not surprise me one bit. I have previously written about jail and prison inmates needing to be very careful when talking on the phone due to the fact that everything is recorded by the jail and all recordings are routinely monitored by prosecutors (see my prior Florida Sentinel article entitled “A Criminal Defendant, the Government and a Telephone”). In fact, I go so far as to routinely instruct clients that they should not even talk to their attorneys on the phone unless a private, secure phone call is arranged in advance. The police and prosecutor are not supposed to knowingly listen to an inmate talk to his or her attorney, however, I never assume that they will exercise such self-restraint. In all of my cases, I assume that all police and all prosecutors will listen to my client speak to me as an attorney and attempt to get evidence against my client by doing so. I know that it is not always true, however, I take this approach for the benefit of my client.

Judging by the report above and the veteran prosecutor ordering secret jail tape recordings, I think that I might be on to something!