## Facts

- Thomas Rhodes’s wife disappeared overboard during a late-night boating trip; the State charged Rhodes with her murder.
- To prove motive, the State offered evidence that Rhodes had an extramarital affair and had recently ended it.
- The State also offered testimony from attorney C. Andrew Johnson about a meeting with Rhodes and his wife concerning possible divorce, custody, and financial consequences.
- Johnson testified that Rhodes alone was his client and that no joint attorney-client relationship with both spouses existed.
- Over privilege objections, the trial court allowed Johnson to testify about discussions held in the wife’s presence, including child-support calculations indicating Rhodes would owe roughly $650 or $742 per month from about $2,400 monthly income if the wife obtained custody.
- Rhodes was convicted of murder in district court.

## Issues

1. Whether the trial court erred by finding that the divorce-consultation attorney represented Rhodes alone rather than both spouses as joint clients.
2. Whether, given that finding, the attorney-client privilege barred the attorney’s testimony about communications made by Rhodes in the wife’s presence during the consultation.

## Decision

- The Minnesota Supreme Court affirmed the conviction.
- The court upheld the trial court’s determination that Johnson’s client was Rhodes alone, not both spouses jointly.
- Because there was no joint-client relationship, the attorney-client privilege did not exclude testimony about communications made in the wife’s presence during the consultation.

## Legal Principles

- Attorney-client privilege applies only to confidential communications between attorney and client made for obtaining or providing legal advice.
- In assessing privilege, courts may determine the identity of the client as a factual/legal question; that determination controls whether a communication is privileged.
- If a person is not a client, that person’s presence during attorney-client communications generally defeats confidentiality as to communications made in that person’s presence, absent an applicable exception.
- A joint-client (co-client) relationship can preserve privilege against outsiders for communications made in joint representation; without joint representation, a party cannot invoke joint-client privilege to block the lawyer’s testimony.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed Rhodes’s murder conviction, holding that the divorce-consultation attorney represented Rhodes alone and that communications made in the wife’s presence were not protected by a joint-client attorney-client privilege that would bar the attorney’s motive-related testimony at trial.


State v. Rhodes, 627 N.W.2d 74 (Minn. 2001)