Brady v. Maryland
1963 United States Supreme Court case
Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), is a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision holding that under the Due Process Clause of the Constitution of the United States, the prosecution must turn over to a criminal defendant any significant evidence in its possession that suggests the defendant is not guilty (exculpatory evidence).
Background
On June 27, 1958, a 25-year-old Maryland man named John Leo Brady and his 24-year-old companion Charles Donald Boblit murdered 53-year-old acquaintance William Brooks. Both men were convicted and sentenced to death. Brady admitted to being involved in the murder, but he claimed that Boblit had done the actual killing and that they had stolen Brooks' car ahead of a planned bank robbery but had not planned to kill him. The prosecution had withheld a written statement by Boblit (the men were tried separately), confessing that he had committed the act of killing by himself. The Maryland Court of Appeals had affirmed the conviction and remanded the case for a retrial only on the question of punishment. Brady's lawyer, E. Clinton Bamberger Jr., appealed the case to the Supreme Court, hoping for a new trial.
Decision
The Supreme Court held that withholding exculpatory evidence violates due process "where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment". The Court determined that under Maryland law, the withheld evidence could not have exculpated the defendant but was material to his level of punishment.
“Brady v. Maryland” enters the record as 1963 United States Supreme Court case. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Brady, Maryland and United can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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