State v. Howard

Citations

• 2022 Ohio 2159

Syllabus

CRIM.R. 33 – BRADY V. MARYLAND: The trial court erred by denying defendant's 2020 Crim.R. 33(B) motion for leave to file a new-trial motion on the basis of newly discovered evidence and prosecutorial misconduct where the court, considering the new-trial motion and finding it to be meritless, used that conclusion as its basis for denying the Crim.R. 33(B) motion for leave: the merits of a delayed motion for a new trial are not properly before the trial court until that court first grants leave to file the new-trial motion, and further, leave to file a new-trial motion on the basis of newly discovered evidence or prosecutorial misconduct may only be granted where the trial court finds that defendant, using reasonable diligence, was unavoidably prevented from timely discovering that evidence or timely filing a new-trial motion, respectively. The trial court erred by denying defendant's 2019 Crim.R. 33(B) motion for leave to file a new-trial motion without first holding an evidentiary hearing where defendant's new-trial motion asserted a Brady claim, see Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963), and where defendant presented evidence tending to show that the state had suppressed the evidence: (1) an evidentiary hearing is required on a Crim.R. 33(B) motion for leave to file a new-trial motion where evidence is presented that defendant was unavoidably prevented from discovering the evidence on which he now relies and (2) in a delayed motion for a new trial that asserts a Brady violation, a defendant is not required to show that he could not have discovered the suppressed evidence by exercising reasonable diligence but instead satisfies Crim.R. 33(B)'s unavoidable-prevention requirement by establishing that the state suppressed the evidence on which defendant now relies. State v. Bethel, Slip Opinion No. 2022-Ohio-783.