(160a) Oh No! the Worst Has Happened – Leveraging Privilege in Incident Investigations

An incident has many stakeholders. External parties, such as government agencies, are often owed facts, findings, and corrective action plans. This information is usually not protected by legal privilege. However, an organization often develops additional information that it wants to protect, such as gap and potential liability analyses and information involving trade secrets. This presentation will provide an overview of the decision-making process faced by organizations when evaluating how to structure and perform both privileged and non-privileged internal investigations. We will discuss the benefits and drawbacks of both investigative methods, including how to accomplish “dual-track” investigations when additional confidentiality and privilege may be needed. We will also give the perspective of legal counsel balanced with the support of the chemical engineer to discuss how various levels of the organization can work together to get to the right root causes and corrective actions, meet its obligations to stakeholders, and legally protect sensitive information following incidents.