Third District Confirms That a Judgment Debtor’s Former Law Firm Cannot Hide Behind a Blanket Attorney-Client Privilege to Defeat Post-Judgment Asset Discovery: Sasha Investments v. Staghorn Development
A judgment is only as good as the creditor’s ability to collect on it. Florida law accordingly affords judgment creditors expansive post-judgment discovery rights, including the right to obtain discovery from non-parties who may have information about the debtor’s assets. Those rights are routinely tested when the non-party in possession of the relevant information is the debtor’s former counsel, who responds to the subpoena by raising the attorney-client privilege. The Third District Court of Appeal’s decision in Sasha Investments LLC v. Staghorn Development, LLC, No. 3D25-2231 (Fla. 3d DCA June 10, 2026), confirms that a former law firm cannot defeat that discovery by asserting a blanket privilege without document-specific objections, and that the trial court cannot ratify such an assertion without conducting an in-camera review.
The facts of Sasha Investments illustrate why post-judgment discovery from former counsel is sometimes necessary. The judgment creditor obtained a default final judgment against a group of corporate and individual defendants and then served them with a fact information sheet pursuant to Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.560(b). The defendants did not complete the sheet. They were held in civil contempt. Their former law firm, which had also served as registered agent for two of the corporate defendants, withdrew from the representation and resigned its agency at roughly the same time. The judgment creditor then served the law firm with a subpoena duces tecum and notice of deposition in aid of execution, seeking non-privileged documents relating to the debtors’ assets and financial transactions.
The law firm moved to quash the subpoena and asserted a blanket attorney-client privilege over all documents in its possession. It did not provide a privilege log. It did not raise document-specific objections. It did not segregate communications from transactional records. It simply asserted the privilege globally and, in the alternative, asked that the trial court conduct an in-camera review before compelling production of anything. The trial court denied the in-camera review and entered an order prohibiting the discovery of all documents other than those the law firm had acquired in its capacity as registered agent. The judgment creditor petitioned for a writ of certiorari.
The Third District granted the petition and quashed the orders below. The court’s analysis proceeds in three steps worth understanding in their own right. The first step addresses irreparable harm. Ordinarily, the denial of discovery does not support certiorari jurisdiction because the prejudice can be remedied on plenary appeal. The court recognized, however, a narrow exception for orders that effectively eviscerate a party’s ability to prosecute or defend a claim. Where the evidence sought, or its equivalent, can be obtained only through the denied discovery, irreparable harm is established. The court held that the petitioner had made that showing because the law firm’s failure to file a privilege log, coupled with the trial court’s refusal to conduct an in-camera review, made it impossible for any reviewing court to determine whether the documents withheld were actually privileged or material to collection of the judgment. Given the procedural history, the court also observed that further delay carried a real risk of asset dissipation.
The second step addresses the scope of post-judgment discovery. The court reaffirmed that Florida law authorizes broad post-judgment discovery into a debtor’s assets, including discovery from non-parties, under Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.560(a) and Section 56.29, Florida Statutes. The right extends to any assets the debtor may have that are subject to levy or execution, and to any assets the debtor may have recently transferred. The court was careful to qualify this principle. Non-party discovery is not a license for fishing expeditions into the assets of persons unrelated to the debtor. A judgment creditor seeking discovery from a non-party must establish a good reason and a close link between the non-party and the debtor. That is a meaningful constraint, and the court’s reaffirmation of it is a reminder that aggressive subpoenas without a demonstrable connection to the debtor will continue to draw judicial scrutiny.
The third step is the one most worth quoting at a partners’ meeting. Asset-related information in the possession of a law firm is not automatically shielded by attorney-client privilege. Trust account wire receipts reflecting payments into and out of a law firm’s trust account on behalf of a client are not privileged. Billing and payment records are not privileged. Payments are underlying facts that establish the existence of the attorney-client relationship rather than confidential communications protected by it. None of this is new doctrine, but the consolidation of these principles in a single opinion gives judgment creditors a clean authority to cite when the inevitable privilege objection arrives.
The practical lessons cut in three directions. For judgment creditors, the decision is a reminder that the path to collecting on a judgment often runs through the debtor’s former counsel, particularly where the debtor has been held in contempt or has otherwise demonstrated an unwillingness to participate honestly in post-judgment discovery. Subpoenas to former counsel should be narrowly drafted to seek non-privileged asset and transactional information rather than communications, and the creditor should be prepared to articulate a good reason and a close link showing the court reaffirmed. When the privilege objection arrives, the creditor should insist on an in-camera review and on document-specific objections rather than accepting a blanket assertion.
For law firms responding to such subpoenas, the decision is a caution. A blanket assertion of privilege, made without a privilege log and without document-specific objections, is now formally inadequate in this circuit. The firm that asserts privilege has the obligation to identify which documents are privileged and on what basis, and to allow the trial court to make that determination through an in-camera review. Chief Judge Scales’s concurrence underscores the point, encouraging trial courts to explain their reasoning on the record or in the rendered discovery order when adjudicating a non-party law firm’s privilege objections. The convenience of a global objection is not worth the procedural exposure it now creates.
The broader point worth taking from the decision is the symmetry of the rules. Florida’s expansive post-judgment discovery rights are not absolute, and neither is the attorney-client privilege sometimes invoked to defeat them. The in-camera review is the mechanism by which the competing interests are judicially supervised. A trial court that omits that review and accepts a blanket privilege assertion on its face departs from the essential requirements of the law, and the resulting order will not survive certiorari review.
Rosenthal Law Group represents clients in commercial litigation, post-judgment collection, and appellate matters throughout Florida. This commentary is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. If you are a judgment creditor pursuing collection or a non-party responding to post-judgment discovery, contact our office at 954-384-9200 or www.rosenthalcounsel.com to discuss your options.