State ex rel. Olander v. French

Although the issue of privilege between state agencies and their in-house counsel is not before this court, our decision on whether to award Olander attorney fees is necessarily made in the context of that issue. Since we find that the OEPA and its counsel were reasonable in their position that OEPA’s communications with its in-house counsel were privileged, and because the public benefit gained by the success of Olander’s mandamus action was not significant enough to itself merit an award of attorney fees, we find that the court of appeals did not abuse its discretion in declining to award…