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District Attorney Says His Office Doesn't Fulfill Discovery Requests

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  • 08-09-2012, 04:27 PM
    FuelForThought
    District Attorney Says His Office Doesn't Fulfill Discovery Requests
    My question involves traffic court in the State of California, County of San Mateo.

    Ticket issued by CHP officer on 3/15/12 for VR-22349(a), 80+mph on I-280 Freeway.

    Sent informal request for discovery to DA on 6/16/12. I have attached their reply verbatim. Sorry, can't post attachments yet.

    RE: Traffic Case Citation Number XXXXX
    We are in receipt of your discovery request. The District Attorney's Office does not
    appear in traffic court, as is allowed by law. See: People v Marcroft (1992) 6 Cal.App.4th Supp.
    1, at pp. 3-4. Under local court rules, discovery requests made by a person cited for a traffic
    violation are governed by Rule 9.9:

    An informal discovery request can be made anytime after a case is filed.
    1. The defendant or his/her attorney must make this request in writing and the original is to be filed
    with the police agency that issued the citation.
    2. The citing police agency has 15 days to respond and provide the requested material and information.
    3. A copy of the informal request shall be filed with the District Attorney’s Office who in turn will
    provide the Court Clerk’s office Traffic Division with a copy of the request.
    4. If the police agency does not respond to the request within 15 days of service, the defendant may
    seek a court order to compel Discovery.
    5. The motion to compel discovery must be filed at the earliest possible date and at least five court days
    prior to the trial date. Written notice must be served on all parties at least five court days prior to the
    hearing. The original written motion to compel discovery and the proposed order should be filed in
    the Court Clerk’s office Traffic Division with a copy served on the police agency that issued the
    citation and the District Attorney’s Office. The motion should indicate a hearing date that is before
    the trial date.

    This office will stamp your discovery request as received and will then forward it to the
    appropriate branch of the traffic court, as per the local court rules. Any further questions or
    filings regarding your case should be made directly to the traffic court.
    Very truly yours,
    STEPHEN M. WAGSTAFFE,
    DISTRICT ATTORNEY


    In my initial reading of it, I understood that the DA had forwarded the request to the CHP. Now, I am not so sure anymore. What do the experts think?

    Thank you all,
    Max
  • 08-09-2012, 04:39 PM
    free9man
    Re: Please help me interpret Letter from DA
    Nope, they sent it to the traffic court. You need to serve CHP with it.
  • 08-10-2012, 01:47 PM
    That Guy
    Re: Please help me interpret Letter from DA
    Quote:

    Quoting FuelForThought
    View Post
    In my initial reading of it, I understood that the DA had forwarded the request to the CHP. Now, I am not so sure anymore. What do the experts think?

    While I have heard of instances where the D.A. has made the effort to forward a request on to the law enforcement agency issuing the citation, I agree with Free9man that they are simply advising you to serve the request on your own.

    I have to also thank you for posting this. I realize that this is San Mateo County, I realize that it is part of their local rules, but I also know that much to the dismay and disappointment of many who come and go, this is the procedure that I and a few others have been recommending for years now as a means to avoiding the discovery headaches and in spite of the fact that it eliminates any presumption that "discovery violations by the D.A." equal "dismissal possibilities".

    This is not because I or anyone else wants it this way; instead, it is because this is how the courts have opted to handle these matters. You don't like it? Don't agree with it? Don't think its right? Be my guest, challenge it, take your case to appeal and resolve it for all of us once and for all. The caveat that comes along with this though is that if at the end of the day you were provided with the items in your discovery, and you were given ample and reasonable opportunity to review such material, then you really have no grounds to appeal anything that is discovery related, do you? So again, you have no recourse, you have no reason to complain... Why work yourself up and act all dramatic? (Not you personally, I'm talking to some of the people who come here arguing these issues as if they had just discovered Mars).

    So once again, thank you very much for sharing!

    Oh, and Edited To Add:

    By the way, for future reference, your ability to post attachments is not restricted. Well, actually, the restriction applies to all of us, I suppose! To post an image, you have to upload it to a host site (ex: I use photobucket.com) and then you can either provide the links or you can click on the image button above the dialog window to add the [IMG]www. IMAGE LINK .com[/IMG] tags around the link.

    Example (from California Rules of Court, the Superior Court of California, County of San Mateo, Local Court Rules (Effective July 1, 2012) :

    http://i1086.photobucket.com/albums/...covery-2-1.jpg
  • 08-10-2012, 02:58 PM
    FuelForThought
    Re: Please help me interpret Letter from DA
    Thanks for the replies!

    I had followed the "directions" of http://www.helpigotaticket.com/proc/discover.html blindly and served the discovery request to the DA and the court. Turns out I was missing the most important recipient! At least I have the letter ready and only need to send it again (with certified mail, return receipt and P.O.S.). On the downside, my TBD deadline is Monday and I don't even know if the LEO used radar or pacing.

    @ThatGuy: the notes in red should serve to update the website I reference above.
  • 08-11-2012, 01:05 AM
    That Guy
    Re: Please help me interpret Letter from DA
    Quote:

    Quoting FuelForThought
    View Post
    On the downside, my TBD deadline is Monday and I don't even know if the LEO used radar or pacing.

    Well, with a 22349, and 15mph over, how much difference would it have made anyway? If I were to guess, I would say that the "80+" is an indication he paced you. had it been radar, he would have cited a more accurate number. Then again, it could have been radar and he opted to give you a break by citing you for the lowest speed bracket with the lowest fine (o to 15mph).

    Quote:

    Quoting FuelForThought
    View Post
    @ThatGuy: the notes in red should serve to update the website I reference above.

    Well, knowing Geo McCalip's philosophy on the topic, (and unless its changed recently) he would only serve the D.A., get nothing, go to court with a motion to dismiss, knowing it would get him nowhere, argue that and get overruled, and instead receive copies of the docs he requested just prior to trial... Instead of serving the L.E.A. That is one likely reason why his website never seems to get any updates or changes... he used to change the color of the background for a bunch of different reason, I don't know if he still does... haven't been to that site in ages.

    I actually never thought that any contribution I might make would involve or have any effect on that site. Never actually met the guy, but we did have a sort of a discussion through a third person., and let me just say that we simply agreed to disagree on several issues! So while I (obviously) wholeheartedly agree with you about which method is more beneficial, I think it would be best if we leave the edit where it is, and leave it up to each defendant to pick the method to use. Who knows, some people might prefer to have a choice than to have discovery.

    You would be surprised that some people actually request discovery hoping it'll get ignored, so they can argue dismissal seriously believing it will actually work! Thread dated July 28, 2012: Do You Restart Discovery After Requesting a Trial De Novo
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