## Facts

- Richard Lee Lines was charged with murdering his aunt, Rose Ethyl Hunt, and pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of insanity.
- Lines went to a police station and reported he had shot his aunt; police recovered a revolver and found Hunt dead from multiple gunshot wounds.
- Lines gave a recorded statement after Miranda warnings describing his mental state and events leading to the shooting.
- On defense motion, the trial court appointed Dr. Markman to examine Lines’s mental condition to assist defense counsel in preparing the case.
- After the insanity plea, the court appointed additional mental health experts for the sanity determination and reappointed Dr. Markman in that statutory role.
- During the sanity phase, the prosecution called Dr. Markman to testify regarding Lines’s mental condition.
- Lines objected that Dr. Markman’s testimony was barred by the attorney–client privilege because Markman initially served as a defense consulting expert.
- The trial court overruled the objection; Markman’s testimony supported a finding of sanity and was similar to other prosecution psychiatric evidence.
- The jury found Lines guilty of second-degree murder and sane at the time of the offense; Lines appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the attorney–client privilege protects communications and opinions of a psychiatrist appointed at the defense’s request to assist counsel in preparing an insanity defense.
2. Whether the privilege is waived or lost when the same psychiatrist is later reappointed by the court to examine the defendant under insanity-plea procedures.

## Decision

- The California Supreme Court held it was error to admit testimony from the psychiatrist who initially examined Lines at defense request to aid counsel.
- The Court held the later court reappointment did not eliminate the privilege attached to the defense-oriented examination and resulting opinions.
- The Court found the error prejudicial given the importance of psychiatric evidence to the sanity determination.
- The Court reversed the conviction and remanded for a new trial.

## Legal Principles

- The attorney–client privilege covers confidential communications made to agents reasonably necessary to accomplish the purpose of representation, including mental health experts engaged to assist defense counsel.
- A psychiatrist appointed on defense motion to help prepare an insanity defense functions as an agent of counsel; the prosecution may not use that expert’s testimony or derived opinions over a proper privilege objection.
- Entering an insanity plea and submitting to statutory sanity examinations does not, without a knowing and intentional waiver, broadly waive the privilege for prior defense-initiated psychiatric consultations.
- A subsequent court appointment of the same psychiatrist for statutory purposes does not retroactively convert an earlier defense-consulting examination into a nonprivileged evaluation.

## Conclusion

The court reversed because the prosecution was permitted to present, over privilege objection, psychiatric testimony from an expert who initially served as a defense agent to assist counsel, and the later court reappointment did not remove the attorney–client privilege protecting that defense consultation.


People v. Lines, 531 P.2d 793 (Cal. 1975)