Press Releases

This case asks whether law enforcement may permissibly use trickery and deception to obtain consent for a search and/or induce a confession. This case has important implications for Minnesotans’ constitutional rights to be free from unreasonable searches and compelled self-incrimination.

A Texas statute requires “the state” to turn over certain information to criminal defendants as part of discovery. In 2024, in a case called State v. Heath, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals interpreted the term “state” broadly to mean the entire state of Texas, including prosectors and law enforcement. Now, just two years after Heath, the State Prosecuting Attorney is asking the Court to revisit its decision and adopt a narrower interpretation of “the state”—one that would limit prosecutors’ statutory disclosure obligations. The outcome of this case, which centers on whether a recorded jail call should have been disclosed, has significant implications for the rights of criminal defendants throughout Texas to discover evidence relevant to their cases.

Return of the zombie idea that software vulnerabilities can be reserved for good actors