326.325. Work product, property of licensee--consent of client necessary for disclosure. - Missouri Statutes

Work product, property of licensee--consent of client necessaryfor disclosure.

326.325. 1. Subject to the provisions of section 326.322, allstatements, records, schedules, working papers and memoranda made by alicensee or a partner, shareholder, officer, director, member, manager oremployee of a licensee, incident to, or in the course of, renderingservices to a client while a licensee, except the reports submitted by thelicensee to the client and except for records that are part of the client'srecords, shall be and remain the property of the licensee in the absence ofan express agreement between the licensee and the client to the contrary.No statement, record, schedule, working paper or memorandum shall be sold,transferred or bequeathed without the consent of the client or the client'spersonal representative or assignee to anyone other than one or moresurviving partners, stockholders, members or new partners, new stockholdersor new members of the licensee, or any combined or merged firm or successorin interest to the licensee. Nothing in this section should be construedas prohibiting any temporary transfer of workpapers or other materialnecessary in the course of carrying out peer reviews or as otherwiseinterfering with the disclosure of information pursuant to section 326.322.

2. A licensee shall furnish to a client or former client, uponrequest and reasonable notice:

(1) A copy of the licensee's working papers to the extent that theworking papers include records that would ordinarily constitute part of theclient's records and are not otherwise available to the client; and

(2) Any accounting or other records belonging to, or obtained from oron behalf of, the client that the licensee removed from the client'spremises or received for the client's account. The licensee may make andretain copies of such documents of the client when they form the basis forwork done by the licensee.

3. Nothing in this section shall require a licensee to keep anypaperwork beyond the period prescribed in any other applicable statute, norshall it prohibit a licensee from charging a reasonable fee for furnishingthe requested materials.

4. Notwithstanding the provisions of this chapter to the contrary,documents otherwise subject to lawful discovery in a court proceedingpursuant to the Missouri rules of civil procedure prior to August 28, 2001,shall remain subject to such lawful discovery.

(L. 2001 H.B. 567)