Ethical Issues for Prosecutors

Описание: Prosecutors do not serve an individual client; rather, their client is the system or society itself, and their mission is justice. On the other hand, prosecutors want to win and so they are influenced by this desire.

As the second line of decision makers in the system, prosecutors have extremely broad powers of discretion. The prosecutor acts like a strainer; he or she collects some cases for formal prosecution while eliminating a great many others. Prosecuting every case is impossible. Resources are limited, and sometimes evidence is weak, making it unlikely to win a conviction. Early diversion of such cases saves taxpayers money and saves individuals trouble and expense.

Just as the defense attorney is at times overly zealous in defense of clients, prosecutors may be overly ambitious to attain a conviction. The prosecutor, in preparing a case, is putting together a puzzle, and each fact or bit of evidence is a piece of that puzzle. Evidence that doesn’t fit the puzzle is sometimes conveniently ignored. The problem is that this type of evidence may be exculpatory, and the prosecutor has a duty to provide it to the defense.

Both defense attorneys and prosecutors sometimes engage in tactics such as using witnesses with less than credible reasons for testifying, preparing witnesses (both in appearance and testimony), and “shopping” for experts.