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Article: Toward a more independent grand jury: Recasting and enforcing the prosecutor's duty to disclose excuplatory evidence
- Article from:
- The Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics
- Article date:
- April 1, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright Georgetown University Law Center Spring 2000. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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INTRODUCTION
The bromide that "a grand jury would indict a ham sandwich if the prosecutor asked it to" reflects a generally accurate belief that the prosecutor exerts primary control over the flow of information before the grand jury. Notwithstanding this almost universal recognition that
a prosecutor wields great power before the grand jury, it would probably surprise most lay persons to learn that in the federal system a prosecutor has no enforceable duty to present before the grand jury evidence which exonerates the target of the investigation. The debate over a prosecutor's grand jury disclosure obligations, apparently laid to rest for the federal courts by the Supreme Court's 1992 ...