The Justice Department has asked the judge overseeing its antitrust case against Google to sanction the company for allegedly training employees to “camouflage” business documents from being revealed by legal disputes, per a brief filed Monday.

Driving the news: The DOJ writes in its brief that Google teaches employees to request advice from counsel around sensitive business communications, thereby shielding documents from discovery in legal situations.

• Once counsel is involved, the company can treat the documents as protected under attorney-client privilege.

What they’re saying: “Google has explicitly and repeatedly instructed its employees to shield important business communications from discovery by using false requests for legal advice,” DOJ attorneys wrote in the brief, asking U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta to sanction Google and compel the disclosure of more documents.

• After DOJ prodding, “Google’s outside counsel eventually deprivileged tens of th