Opinion ID: 2590797
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Police Corruption in the Uintah Basin

Text: ¶ 34 Pinder next claims that the State was obligated to disclose information about an FBI investigation into allegations of police corruption in the Uintah Basin. At trial, the defense advanced the theory that Ruiz killed Flood and Tanner. Pinder testified that he was not present when the murders occurred and that he only helped destroy evidence due to his fear of Ruiz and his belief that he could not go to the authorities because he didn't trust the Duchesne County Police. According to Pinder, if the State had disclosed evidence of an FBI investigation into allegations of police corruption, the defense would have been able to use that evidence to give credence to Pinder's testimony. ¶ 35 However, as with Pinder's first Brady claim, the defense was well aware of allegations of police corruption in the Uintah Basin and, in fact, investigated those allegations prior to trial. Pinder has identified no information in the supposedly suppressed reports that he could not have discovered through his own investigation. ¶ 36 Additionally, as with the documents underlying Pinder's first Brady claim, Pinder stipulated that documentation of the FBI investigation was never in the possession of the prosecution team from the Utah Attorney General's Office or the Duchesne County Attorney's Office [4] and that he obtained the documents from another source. Because Pinder reasonably could have known about the information he now alleges was suppressed, his Brady claim fails. ¶ 37 Even if the evidence in question had been suppressed, its disclosure prior to the conclusion of Pinder's trial would have had minimal impact, if any, on the proceedings. The jury heard testimony regarding the allegations of police corruption from U.S. Customs Special Agent Thomas D'Leon, and it is unlikely that information gleaned from the FBI reports concerning specific allegations, especially when no charges were ever filed in relation to those allegations, would have impacted the jury in any significant manner. As the trial court concluded, evidence of the federal investigation is tangential and of little relevance. Such evidence is not material for the purposes of Brady.