Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California
Can an attorney be sued personally for libel or invasion of privacy in their conduct defending their client?
4 Answers from Attorneys
Yes, but such a lawsuit could only succeed in very unusual situations. Without knowing the facts of your case, I can't assess your chances.
Perhaps. It depends on the forum in which the defamation and invasion of privacy occurred. If it occurred within the context of court proceedings and related matters (documents filed, depositions, etc.), such a lawsuit could be subject to an anti-SLAPP motion which, if the attorney prevails, could result in the losing side having to pay substantial attorney's fees to the other side.
Neither an attorney nor anyone else can normally be sued for things that are said in a courtroom or in legal papers. If an attorney were foolish enough to defame someone, or invade their privacy, outside of the judicial arena, they can be sued like anyone else.
Civil Code section 47 confers an absolute privilege against a liable action conduct in the course of a judicial proceeding. Case law has interpreted that section VERY broadly to cover anything to do with the reasonable conduct of a case for a client. And by "reasonable" they mean basically an argument can be made that it is connected. Invasion of privacy is not a single tort, but rather a broad lable for a number of wrongful acts. For example, using a person's image for commercial purposes without consent is a form of invasion of privacy. In fact what most lay people would call "invasion of privacy" has nothing to do with what the law uses that label for. It is very hard to imagine how a true legal "invasion of privacy" could arrise out of defending a client, but I suppose it is theoretically possible. Extremely unlikely though.