Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson has prepared a lawsuit asking the Sacramento Superior Court to prevent the city from releasing emails he exchanged with his private attorney dealing with his involvement in the National Conference of Black Mayors.

In a legal document dated for filing in Sacramento Superior Court on Thursday, Johnson says City Attorney James Sanchez plans to release his communications with his private law firm Ballard Spahr of Philadelphia. The documents are scheduled to be released Monday, his lawsuit says.

Johnson served as president of the NCBM from May 2013 to May 2014. His tenure was marked by litigation and conflict. Records from Fulton County Superior Court in Atlanta reviewed by The Sacramento Bee, along with city emails previously obtained through the Public Records Act, show that Johnson went to great lengths to take control of NCBM in one of the most vivid examples of his national ambitions. Several members of his mayoral staff worked on NCBM.

Johnson testified in court in December 2013 that he tasked six people on his City Hall staff or employees of organizations he is affiliated with to work on business for NCBM, a historic group born of the civil rights movement that had lost much of its credibility and clout thanks to years of corrupt leadership and money mismanagement, as detailed by court documents and a federal criminal investigation of the group’s former president.