Travelers Ins. Companies v. Superior Court

Petitioners seek a writ of mandamus or, in the alternative, a writ of prohibition directing the San Francisco Superior Court to vacate its order requiring production of certain documents in the possession of Travelers Insurance Company and Phoenix Insurance Company and ordering one John Williams, or any other witness designated by those companies, to answer certain deposition questions.

We agree that the order should be vacated and direct issuance of a peremptory writ of mandate accordingly.

Statement of Facts

Travelers and Phoenix (hereafter Travelers) are the malpractice insurance carriers for Attorney Rodney Klein and his associated professional corpora tions. All are defendants below in a suit brought by real party, Elnora Becknell and we refer to them collectively as petitioners.

In her complaint, she alleges that Klein negligently failed to bring a medical malpractice action (Becknell v. Jarach) to trial within five years pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 583, subdivision (b), thereby breaching his retainer agreement with her. In addition, she alleges that Klein breached his fiduciary duty to her by failing to inform her of the status of the Jarach…