Law Commons^™

The Local Rules Revolution In Criminal Discovery, Daniel S. Mcconkie Jr.

College of Law Faculty Publications

Over the last few decades, federal district court judges throughout the country have used local rules to greatly expand pretrial criminal disclosure obligations, especially for prosecutors. These local criminal discovery rules both incentivize prosecutors to act as ministers of justice and empower judges to manage prosecutorial disclosures. This quiet revolution is now well underway, and the time has come to amend the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure to bring these innovations to all the districts. Commentators have long recognized that neither the Supreme Court precedent nor the Federal Rules effectively require prosecutors to provide the defense with enough discovery to …