Pro Se Litigant Can’t Assert Work Product Protection
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December 4, 2025The plaintiff in Harrison v. Whole Foods Market, Inc., 2025 WL 3089961 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 5, 2025), was pro se. Plaintiff sued for alleged discrimination. Defendant propounded discovery. In part, Plaintiff raised a work product objection and withheld documents.
The court wrote that: “Plaintiff is correct that work product protection is not limited to documents prepared by attorneys, but she misunderstands what courts mean by that.”
The court explained that work product “shelters the mental processes of the attorney….” It also protects “material prepared by agents for the attorney as well as those prepared by the attorney himself,” quoting United States v. Nobles, 422 U.S. 225, 238-39 (1975).
The court concluded: “Here, with no attorney in the picture, Plaintiff has not established that she, or anyone else, prepared the documents on her privilege log as agents for an attorney. Accordingly she has failed to establish the applicability of the work product doctrine. The Court therefore OVERRULES her claim of privilege and ORDERS Plaintiff to produce the withheld documents within 30 days.”
