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: Prosecutor Postscript

By Sarena Straus, Esq.

My Answer?Sorry if the suspense was killing you and that it?s taken so long for me to post my take on one of the hypotheticals I posed a couple of weeks ago. In case you did not see it, the hypothetical was as follows:Lets say that you have a one witness case that you are about to take to trial. It is a case where you believe in the defendant's guilt and where proof beyond a reasonable doubt is possible. Without that one witness, however, you cannot prove the case. The morning that you are about to start trial, you get a call that your witness died. You go to the courtroom, but before you can tell the judge that you have to dismiss the case, the defense attorney says that his client wants to plead guilty. Do you take the plea or do you tell him your witness is dead and that you have to dismiss the case?This question was posed to me during my first interview with the DA?s office and, as I understand it, most of my colleagues were asked the same question...continue to full post

Full post as published by Prosecutor Postscript on March 15, 2007 (boomark / email).