How have courts interpreted attorney-client privilege?

People v. Gutierrez (2009) 45 Cal.4th 789 is controlling. In that case, defendant argued that the trial court violated his Sixth Amendment right to counsel by admitting into evidence documents seized from his prison cell that he asserted were protected by the attorney-client privilege. The court rejected his claimed privilege on the ground that the documents had not been transmitted to his attorney. The court noted that "the intent to show a document to a lawyer does not transform a document into one covered by the attorney-client privilege." (Id. at p. 817.) The court continued, "An attorney-client privileged communication is defined as 'information transmitted between a client and his or her lawyer in the course of that relationship and in confidence by a means which, so far as the client is aware, discloses the information to no third persons other than those who are present to further the interest of the client. . . .' [Citation.] Thus, a client's intent to communicate with his or her lawyer does not render the subject of that communication privileged; the rule requires that 'information [be] transmitted.'" (Id. at p. 817.)