"She reiterated to Mr. Pacheco that it was cut and dry, the investigator had prepared a false report." Under the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Brady v Maryland decision, prosecutors have a duty to disclose evidence helpful to the accused, including the credibility of a witness. Hunt said Pacheco told her not to disclose anything to defense attorneys in the unidentified case. Pacheco said there was a system set up in 2006, when Trask was district attorney, to review possible Brady violations and she did not follow that policy, he said. Hunt said in her lawsuit she did not know at the time that the same investigator was the subject of similar allegations in a case that was under review by the FBI and the U.S. attorney's office.
Cached
Nye Frank on 08 Jul 10These elementary principles establish the government's obligation to provide medical care for those whom it is punishing by incarceration. An inmate must rely on prison authorities to treat his medical needs; if the authorities fail to do so, those needs will not be met. In the worst cases, such a failure may actually produce physical "torture or a lingering death," In re Kemmler, supra, the evils of most immediate concern to the drafters of the Amendment. In less serious cases, denial of medical care may result in pain and suffering which no one suggests would serve any penological purpose. Cf. Gregg v. Georgia, supra, at 173, 96 S.Ct. at 2924-25 (joint opinion). The infliction of such unnecessary suffering is inconsistent with contemporary standards of decency as manifested in modern legislation8 codifying the commonlaw view that "(i)t is but just that the public be required to care for the prisoner, who cannot by reason of the deprivation of his liberty, care for himself."9
