Post-Conviction Relief. Post-Conviction Relief: Fill & Download for Free

Yes; there are numerous cases in US law where someone has received post-conviction relief after they have died. This includes, but is not limited to, an overturned guilty verdict (acquittal), pardons, and commutations.

This varies wildly. Documents and other such things are often held indefinitely with the court file, whereas physical objects (e.g. guns, drugs) are usually held by the police in evidence lockers. Those police will have internal regulations dealing with the preservation of evidence, as will (usually) the State.At a basic level, as far as I'm aware, all places have to maintain physical evidence pending any appeal/immediate post-conviction relief.

My Public Defender won't use a video that could exonerate me in an assault started by the presumed victim caught on the video do I bring this up before or at trial and to whom in either situation?Thomas Dalton already gave a decent answer. Let me expand upon it.Most of the public defenders I know are pretty bright people. If they have evidence that makes a case a slam dunk acquittal, they will definitely use it to defend a client. So, you either have a stupid PD, or the video doesn’t exonerate you. My guess is the latter.You state that the “presumed victim” started the fight, and the video shows that. Well, what else does it show? Did you exercise the duty to retreat to a safe place? Or, did you retaliate by beating the living crap out of the “presumed victim?” Again, what does the video show?Bear in mind that the law in most jurisdictions requires a person to retreat to a safe place, if it’s reasonable to do so, before they are justified in using physical force. In addition, one is only allowed to use enough force to stop the attack and retreat to a safe place. In other words, the fact that someone may have assaulted you doesn’t give you a license to assault them in retaliation.Let me take a wild assed guess, based on nothing but 41 years practicing law (mostly in criminal law.) The video in question shows the other guy starting a fight and you went way overboard in retaliation, beating the living crap out of him. Am I close? Do I sound like your Public Defender?About 27 years ago I represented a guy named Ben. He was charged with several crimes including a burglary on Christmas Day. He turned down the plea offer and went to trial. He was acquitted on some charges and convicted on others, including the Christmas burglary. Years later, he made a motion for post conviction relief, claiming that I failed to render “effective assistance of counsel” as required by the constitution.Ben’s chief claim was that I had not investigated the case. Had I done so, I would have unearthed alibi witnesses who would have exonerated him. Unfortunately for him, I had done an investigation. My investigator had found several alibi witnesses who would have helped if Ben had been indicted for the robberies the cops had charged him with committing. There was only one alibi witness who could address the burglary charges, and only one of those burglaries, the one on Christmas. That witness would have told the jury that Ben was at his home on December 25th. So, why didn’t I call him to the stand? Simple. The Christmas burglary was across the street from Ben’s residence! He would have inculpated, not exculpated, my client.Your Public Defender knows more about the law than you do. Exactly what is on that video, and how is it exculpatory? Perhaps you’re like Ben, wanting your lawyer to rely on evidence that hurts more than it helps.