Title: What Is a Brady Violation?
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What Is a Brady Violation?
What Is a Brady Violation?
American Bar Association Weighs into Brady
Favorable, Not Necessarily Admissible
Evidence Not Disclosed
Has Confidence in Outcome Been Undermined?
Preservation of Evidence
Defense Must Request Discovery/Brady Immediately
Federal Criminal Discovery
Jencks Act
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Content: The first component of this element, is that “a defendant need not have requested the information to argue that its suppression caused prejudice,” says the ABA. The second component is probably the most significant—that the materiality test does not equate to either a sufficiency of evidence” or a “harmless error” test. The court should not look beyond the suppressed evidence to find there was other sufficient evidence to convict, nor should the court indulge the notion that it was “more likely than not” that the verdict would not have been any different even if the Brady information had been disclosed. The only question the court should decide, as the ABA says, is this: Has “confidence in the outcome” of the trial been undermined? That question can only be answered through a “detailed analysis of the factual record.” Preservation of Evidence
As a caveat here, it should be noted that the Supreme Court in 1984 with California v. Trombetta held that the government has a limited duty to preserve evidence. Due process requires preservation of evidence “that might be expected to play a significant role in the suspect’s defense.” There are two components to this limited duty to preserve: A) the evidence must “possess an exculpatory va