Settlement Privilege + Related Court Actions

When a party has filed separate Court Actions for multiple incidents causing indivisible injuries and one of these Actions has settled, the records from the settled Action are generally protected by settlement privilege and not producible. However, if the injuries are intertwined or there is a potential for double recovery, another party may be granted access to privileged records from the settled Action to rely upon in the remaining active litigation.

An individual involved in two motor vehicle collisions, 2018 and 2020, incurred significant overlapping injuries, filed separate Court Actions, and had settled the Action relating to the second collision. The defendant to the Action relating to the first collision sought to compel production of settlement records from the second action, however, the Plaintiff refused relying upon the doctrine of settlement privilege.