ABC News

Defense attorneys who represent inmates at a privately run federal prison in Kansas were livid after learning that their meetings with clients had been recorded on video, despite repeated assurances from the penitentiary that the conversations were private.

The recordings that came to light this month had no audio, but the complaints raise the question of whether nonverbal interactions such as body language or the exchange of legal documents are protected under attorney-client privilege.

"We never had any idea we were being recorded," said Laine Cardarella, a federal public defender in Missouri whose clients include detainees at the Leavenworth prison. "This has had a chilling effect."

A federal judge said the recordings might have violated the Sixth Amendment rights of hundreds of inmates and ordered them stopped.

The company that runs the prison, Corrections Corporation of America, insists that silent video recordings of inmate-attorney meetings "are a standard practice" throughout the country and are used solely to enhance the prison's safety and security.

Unlike prisons controlled by the federal Bureau of Prisons, which generally forbids any recording in attorney-client meeting rooms, private facilities set their own standards.

Concerns about prison recordings of attorney-client conversations are not necessarily new, but nobody has a real grasp of the extent of the problem, said Barry Pollack, president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

"I certainly hope that this sheds light on a situation that has not gotten sufficient attention and is an impetus for change," Pollack said. "Criminal defense attorneys have been aware of this problem for years, but it's a difficult one to address." [MORE]