Court Opinion

ID: 9788866
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:21:12.479254+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:16.914980
License: Public Domain

NEHRING, Justice,
concurring and concurring in the result:
¶ 37 I concur in parts I.A. and I.B. and concur in the result of part I.C. I disagree, however, with the assumption that a defendant whose confidences we presume were impermissibly shared may not obtain relief unless he can show prejudice. This view would place a defendant whose confidences were presumed shared in the untenable position of being required to prove what confidences were disclosed and why the outcome of his trial would have been more favorable had the confidences not been disclosed. The presumption that confidential information was shared when a defendant’s attorney joins the office of the prosecutor is necessary because the prosecutor is the only party who knows whether confidential information was in fact disclosed. Additionally, where the presumption is unrebutted, it logically follows that all confidences are presumed shared. Likewise, only the prosecutor knows if confidential information was used against the defendant. When the presumption is unrebutted, the defendant is as limited in his knowledge of whether confidential information was used against him as he is regarding whether confidential information was disclosed. Thus, I believe that it is *964inconsistent to relieve the defendant of the burden of proving a confidence was shared and then saddle him with the burden of showing that the confidences were used against him and that such use was prejudicial. I am simply unable to harmonize the notion that confidences can be impermissibly shared with the concept that while the sharing was wrongful, it may not have mattered. I would therefore hold that an unrebutted presumption of wrongfully shared confidences results in an unrebuttable presumption of prejudice.
¶ 38 Justice PARRISH concurs in Justice NEHRING’s concurring opinion.