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In This Episode:

I pull back the curtain on Prosecutorial Misconduct.  Recently a Texas Judge was disbarred, sentenced to 10 days in jail and 500 hours of community service for criminal contempt.  He was accused of lying to a judge in 1987 while he was a prosecutor trying the murder case of Michael Morton.  Mr. Morton spent 25 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. After DNA tests exonerated him of the crime, his lawyers obtained the original files which showed that the detective and the prosecutor had in their possession witness statements which tended to show Mr. Morton’s innocence and they failed to turn those over to the defense. Beyond that breach of ethical duty, the prosecutor was accused of lying to the Judge about the existence of these statements just before the original trial.  This is just one recent example of the system being corrupted by a corrupt prosecutor. What sets this case apart is not the egregiousness of the conduct (unfortunately such conduct is not rare) but that the prosecutor was actually punished for this conduct.

We will explore the Brady Rule and the new proposals that are being set forth to try to prevent these gross and deliberate miscarriages of justice. For a look at some other examples of prosecutorial misconduct see the following: 

The Untouchables: America’s Misbehaving Prosecutors and the System that Protects Them

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