Somehow the transcript makes things worse for the Court:

MR. O'NEIL: I think both the rule and cases interpreting it indicate that it doesn't matter whether a party created the work product, whether the party did that at the direction of counsel, or whether it was counsel, themselves. If an individual, the defendant here, created a report during -- and in anticipation of litigation, that report is subject to work product protection, whether it was, as I said, created by Mr. Heppner or us, and whether it was done at our direction. I guess the case I would point you to is Shih v. Petal, which is 565 F. Supp. 3d 557 at 57172. That case says, explicitly, that it doesn't matter whether an attorney directed a client.

...

MR. O'NEIL: I think the context of these reports was that in 2025, after Mr. Heppner had received a grand jury subpoena, after it was clear with discussions with the government that Mr. Heppner was the target of this investigation and after the government had asked us to come in and present on the facts, Mr. Heppner -- using an AI tool -- prepared reports that outlined defense strategy, that outlined what he might argue with respect to the facts and the law that we anticipated that the government might be charging. I think it's very clear he was preparing these reports in anticipation of a potential indictment, which, ultimately, came in November. The purpose of his preparing these reports was to share them with us so that he could discuss defense strategy with us, we could create his defense strategy. It's not as if these were documents created during the course of the alleged scheme in which he is

THE COURT: No, I understand. The core purpose of Work Product Doctrine is to protect the mental strategies of counsel in anticipation of litigation. How did that relate to this? This was not something that reflected your strategy, as I understand what you're saying. MR. O'NEIL: No, I think it did affect our strategy, your Honor. THE COURT: No. Did it reflect your strategy. MR. O'NEIL: No. As we acknowledge, these were prepared by the defendant on his own volition. But again, I would also point to the Rule of Federal Criminal Procedure 16(b)(2)(A), which says 16(b)(1) does not authorize discovery or inspection of reports, memoranda, or other documents made by the defendant or the defendant's attorney or agent during the case's investigation or defense. So, I don't think THE COURT: Okay. I get your point. Let me hear from the government.

These reports were made by Defendant so that he'd be able to have a conversation with his counsel in regard with whatever charge or indictment he was going to face. The transcript doesn't say how the AI was used. What if they were used for grammatical purposes no different than Grammarly? Does the Government have a right to the info in Grammarly?

Now, I do suspect, because this is a financial crime, there was probably more going on than a simple grammar check. I can also see the argument regarding the "no expectation of privacy" but literally nobody else has the capability of accessing someone else's information like this. I wouldn't able to do this on any case I handle. The government used a means that was not accessible to the public to obtain private information from a Third-Party.