Surname 4 Memorandum To: From: Date: Subject: Disclosure of Past Misconduct by Officers One of the dilemmas that face the courts today is what a prosecutor should do if he or she is aware of the past misconduct of a police officer involved in the case. In other words, is the prosecutor obliged to disclose such past misconducts or dishonesty by the officer who is involved in a pending case to the defendant? However, the answer to the question is that it is not an obligation and the prosecution may sometimes disclose such issues (Welty, 1). More importantly, the dishonesty or misconduct of the officer serves as a tool for impeachment in the ongoing case. The cases of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972) and the United States v. Agurs, 427 U. S. 97 (1976) are used here to analyze the subject. Noteworthy, a number of factors determine whether the misconduct or dishonesty by an officer is important in the pending case. First, the case must take into consideration how long ago the dishonesty or misconduct took place. For that matter, the more recent the misconduct the higher the chances that it will be considered valuable to the pending case. Furthermore, the case considers how serious the misconduct by the officer was. Therefore, more serious acts will obviously be considered material to the case. In addition, consideration must be given to how conclusively the case of the misconduct was established. The information will thus be material only if it is more likely that the officer engaged in the misconduct. In certain situations, the dishonesty may have resulted in a fact pattern similar to the current case. For instance, an officer may falsify a search warrant in both former case and current case and as such, the information is considered material. More importantly, it must be considered whether the role of the officer in question is key to the current case or just peripheral. In addition, the case must determine whether the defendant in the case is planning to present his/her case based on the dishonesty or misconduct of the officer. If an officer plays a key role in the case, the information concerning misconduct will be vital. Similarly, if the defendant plans to use the dishonesty or misconduct information by the officer to present the case, the information is regarded as important. Finally, the judges consider whether the misconduct evidence is found in personnel records or in some less private sources. Information from personnel records is more reliable as they are subject to privacy. In the Brady v. Maryland case, the Supreme Court ruled that for the defendant to have a fair trial, his/her attorney must be allowed access to exculpatory meant to demonstrate innocence. John Brady and Charles Boblit were accused of robbing and killing (Bass, 121). They were tried separately upon arrest and convicted for murder. However, Brady wanted to avoid death penalty and hence he admitted to have particip.