Munger Tolles Fights Sex Abuse Data Release for Client Privacy

Munger Tolles & Olson is seeking to protect communications with an exclusive boarding school it investigated for sexual abuse, saying disclosure would discourage such organizations from seeking probes.

The law firm co-founded by the late Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett’s 60-year business partner, investigated its client The Thacher School in Ojai, California, and in a report made public in 2021 verified past sexual abuse there.

A student who went to Thacher from 1982 to 1984 then sued the school, claiming sex abuse by former headmaster Willard Wyman and an unidentified school nurse. A California state judge ruled Thacher must give the plaintiff records tied to allegations across 25 years—including what the law firm says were private communications and summaries of witness interviews during the investigation.

The disclosure fight shines a spotlight on a potential risk for large corporate law firms that handle high-profile investigations for clients. An order such as the one in the Thacher case risks exposing the inner workings of private investigations, normally shielded by attorney-client privileges, Munger Tolles claims in court.

Munger Tolles and a lawyer for Thacher did not respond to requests for comment.

Students paid $74,530 to attend Thacher this year on 540 acres northwest of Los Angeles in Ventura County. The co-ed high school has 229 boarding students, accepted 13% of new applicants last fall and has a $206 million endowment—and 120 horses on campus, according to its website.

Holding ‘Accountable’

The former Thacher student in 2022 brought a civil complaint thanks to a California law that temporarily lifted the statute of limitations for adults who were alleged victims of child sex abuse.

“We’re trying to hold Thacher accountable,” said Christina Cheung, an attorney for the firm founded by prominent plaintiffs’ lawyer Gloria Allred, who represents the former student identified as Jane Doe.

The lawsuit came after Munger Tolles co-managing partner Hailyn Chen and trial lawyer Robyn Bacon, a former federal prosecutor, produced the firm’s first report on the Thacher allegations. The school publicly disclosed the findings in June 2021.

The lawyers named four former faculty and administrators, including Wyman, “for whom we received firsthand, credible reports of sexual misconduct,” all of which took place 20 years ago or more. They also named two others who failed “to maintain appropriate boundaries.”

Wyman, who served as headmaster from 1975 to 1992, told offensive sex jokes to faculty, made comments about the bodies of female members and touched adult women inappropriately, according to the report. The headmaster, who died in 2014, also inappropriately touched and commented to students, the report said.

Records Fight

Cheung and other lawyers for Jane Doe have sought a broad range of records purportedly produced during Munger Tolles’ probe. Those include documents about school investigations into sexual abuse complaints and actions Thacher took in response, according to court records.

A superior court last August ordered Thacher to disclose all documents from the investigation that related to Jane Doe’s claims.

Munger Tolles and Thacher have fought the order all the way to the California Supreme Court. They cite attorney-client privilege, which they claim a superior court—and later an appeals court—failed to address in their decisions ordering disclosure.

In its June 7 petition for review, Munger Tolles claims that if the order stands, it would implicate its protected work product during the course of the investigation and have a “chilling effect” on organizations’ willingess to engage in such inquiries.

Jane Doe’s attorneys have previously said the privilege claims from Munger Tolles are invalid because the firm was never in an attorney-client relationship with the school, according to the petition. The plaintiff has also alleged that the public release of two summaries on Munger Tolles’ investigation waived any work product and privilege claims.

Along with the civil lawsuit, Thacher has faced scrutiny from the local sheriff’s and district attorney’s offices. The offices, however, said in a 2022 statement that they would end their investigation without bringing any criminal charges.

The authorities cited the statute of limitations and the Munger Tolles report as obstacles in their inquiry. The public report made it more difficult for possible suspects to agree to be interviewed, the offices said.