A judge recently called out the Ramsey County attorney’s office for problems with the way it treats evidence that prosecutors are required by federal law to turn over to the defense.

In the order issued earlier this month, Ramsey County District Judge Patrick Diamond went so far as to call the county attorney office’s conduct a violation of the Minnesota Rules of Criminal Procedure.

The Ramsey County attorney’s office maintains the policy is consistent with state law as well as that of other counties, including Hennepin County.

But the office would “welcome clarity” on the issue from a higher court, according to a statement released by office spokesman Dennis Gerhardstein.

FAILURE TO REPORT ALLEGATIONS AGAINST OFFICERS ALARMED DEFENSE

Diamond’s comments came in regard to a second-degree assault case against David Peguse.

A jury convicted Peguse in May, but shortly afterward his defense attorney, Cat Turner, asked a judge to grant him a new trial because she learned that the two officers who arrested Peguse and served as the state’s key witnesses against him at trial had recently been fired from the St. Paul Police Department for alleged misconduct on a different case.

The men — Nicholas Grundei and Jordan Wild — were among five officers who were accused of failing to intervene when they saw a former St. Paul police officer assault a patron outside a St. Paul bar last year. They reportedly turned their body cameras away from the scene and later lied about it, court documents say.

The officers dispute the allegations and are appealing their terminations.

Turner maintains that the Ramsey County attorney’s office should have told her about the allegations before the officers testified against Peguse. She argues that the failure to do so violated federal law.

Known as Brady/Giglio from a U.S. court case it stems from, the law requires the prosecution to turn over evidence in its possession that could be considered favorable to the defense, even if it could hurt the state’s case.

In Peguse’s assault case, Turner found out about the allegations along with the rest of the public when St. Paul Police Chief Todd Axtell announced the firing of the officers in June, according to a motion she filed with the court seeking a new trial for her client.

The prosecution’s inaction amounted to a missed opportunity for her client, Turner argued, because she could have used the information to challenge the officers’ credibility when they testified against Peguse.

PROSECUTION DEFENDS POLICY AND EVIDENCE HANDLING

The Ramsey County attorney’s office defended both its policy and its handling of Peguse’s case in its own recent court filings as well as in arguments before Diamond.

Chief among its arguments is that the county attorney’s office couldn’t have disclosed the information about the allegations because it also didn’t know about them while Peguse’s case was underway.

That’s because its Brady policy doesn’t require law enforcement to turn over information regarding complaints against officers until the complaints are substantiated, which can take months as officers have the right to grieve disciplinary decisions.

It’s written that way for good reason, Assistant Ramsey County Attorney Ryan Flynn told Diamond. It’s intended to protect officers and the court system from getting bogged down by erroneous complaints, and more importantly, to comply with the Minnesota Data Practices Act, which mandates such information be protected until a final disposition is reached, according to Flynn.

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Man, 38, dies of apparent natural causes at Ramsey County jail So even though the police department determined internally that Grundei and Wild acted in bad faith, it had no obligation to tell the county attorney’s office about it because the officers are still appealing their discipline, according to the county attorney’s office.

“Brady requires that prosecutors disclose a finding of misconduct. Under Minnesota law, a finding of misconduct is only made following an investigation that is protected by the Data Practices Act. The Act precluded us from knowing about the details of the internal affairs investigation,” Gerhardstein said in a prepared statement. He added that his office is “still in the dark” about the basis for the officers’ misconduct.

JUDGE: STATE LAW CAN’T TRUMP FEDERAL LAW

Both the prosecution and police are expected to work as partners, Diamond wrote.

“The prosecutor’s duty to disclose is inescapable and cannot be modified by an agreement that the prosecution shall be informed of only certain evidence that is subject to disclosure any more than the prosecution and the police can agree to recognize only certain constitutional rights of defendants,” Diamond wrote.

Further, federal law protecting due process rights “cannot be constrained by the Minnesota legislature through the Minnesota Data Practices Act. … That is true, even if the prosecutor and police wish the circumstances were otherwise,” Diamond continued.

He added that while he respects the state data practices act intent to protect government employees’ rights to employment, “they cannot trump a defendant’s right to a fair criminal trial where liberty is at stake.”

VIOLATION NOT ENOUGH TO WARRANT NEW TRIAL, JUDGE FINDS

Still, Diamond found that the state’s Brady violation didn’t amount to an unfair trial for Peguse because the jury was able to lean on other evidence to convict him that was independent of the officers’ testimony.

That evidence included squad car video, some of Peguse’s own testimony and the testimony of a third officer who responded to the scene.

Peguse was sentenced following the ruling to about 2½ years in prison.

A jury convicted him of injuring a man he angrily struck with an SUV in St. Paul’s Heritage Park in the fall of 2018.

Peguse testified that the man jumped in front of his vehicle as Peguse was trying to protect a woman with the victim from harm.

‘THAT FINAL BULWARK’

Chief Ramsey County Public Defender Jim Fleming declined to comment on Diamond’s ruling but has been critical of the county’s Brady policy and called for its revision in the past.

Fleming said he expects the defense will appeal Diamond’s decision to deny Peguse a new trial.

JaneAnne Murray, an attorney who teaches about the rules of criminal procedure at the University of Minnesota Law School, said Peguse has a strong case to bring to the higher court.

She called the county attorney’s office’s failure to disclose the alleged misconduct as well as the office policy it’s using to defend its decision “deeply troubling,” and a clear violation of Brady.

And Brady, she said, is vital to a fair criminal justice system because it “reflects the understanding that there is an asymmetry of information in our criminal justice system where prosecutors have most of the information and the defense is frequently operating in the dark.” Related Articles Minneapolis man pleads guilty to torching University Avenue business during May unrest

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With most cases ending up in a guilty plea without any adversarial testing of evidence presented against the defendant, the system (relies) “on the prosecutors and the police officers to make sure that these convictions are reliable and trustworthy and supported by sufficient evidence, Murray continued.

“Brady is that final bulwark,” she added, “and when we see (it) violated, it strikes at the heart of our criminal justice system because we entrust so much discretion and power to law enforcement and we expect them to act with integrity.”