"Death row inmate may get new trial," is the AP report via the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
Prosecutors and defense attorneys have filed documents asking for a new trial for death row inmate Michael Toney, saying the state's lead prosecutor improperly withheld evidence in his 1999 trial.
Toney was sentenced to death in the killings of three people in the bombing of a mobile home near Lake Worth in 1985.
In court documents filed Thursday, the two sides said Toney's trial attorneys weren't given at least 14 pieces of evidence that could have discredited state witnesses or pointed to other suspects.
"I want a new trial so that the truth can be exposed and so that I can be exonerated," Toney said in an e-mail statement, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported in its online edition. "I do not have any hard feelings toward anyone, but I do believe that prosecutors such as Mike Parrish should be held accountable. He has caused me more than a quarter of my life and taxpayers millions."
The state denies it knowingly sponsored misleading testimony and denies Toney is innocent. It said it agreed with the defense that he was entitled to a new trial.
"There's no question about the fact that some documents were not disclosed that should have been disclosed. That's why we agreed those are the facts," said Alan Levy, chief of the district attorney's criminal division. "It's doesn't matter whose fault it is or if the dog ate the homework. The law is if it was not disclosed, it doesn't matter. We accept it was not disclosed."
If the judge supports the attorneys' findings, he will send his recommendation to the Court of Criminal Appeals, which could order a new trial.
Defense attorneys don't expect Toney to be tried again.
"As we see it, no credible evidence remains against Mr. Toney, but it will be up to state whether to retry it," said Rebecca Bauer Kahan, a San Francisco attorney on his defense team.
Levy said it is too soon to say whether Toney will be retried.
The responsibility of the state to provide exculpatory evidence to the defense was articulated in the 1963 Supreme Court ruling in Brady v. Maryland. More information is here, via Oyez.
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