California Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals (pic­tured) dis­qual­i­fied the entire Orange County District Attorney’s Office from pros­e­cut­ing a death penal­ty case after find­ing that pros­e­cu­tors had engaged in a sys­temic pat­tern of police and pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct involv­ing the delib­er­ate, but undis­closed, use of prison infor­mants to obtain incrim­i­nat­ing state­ments from defen­dants. None of the 250 pros­e­cu­tors in the office are now per­mit­ted to par­tic­i­pate in the case. Attorneys for the defen­dant, Scott Dekraai, say that after he had invoked his right to coun­sel, he was delib­er­ate­ly placed near a repeat jail­house infor­mant who had been giv­en instruc­tions to try to elic­it a con­fes­sion from him. Such a prac­tice is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al because the infor­mant in a cell­mate inter­ac­tion orches­trat­ed by pros­e­cu­tors or police is in effect an agent of the police, and the inter­ac­tion is too much like an inter­ro­ga­tion. Defense attor­neys also dis­cov­ered that the Orange County Sheriff’s Department had main­tained a secret record-keep­ing sys­tem for more than 25 years that detailed its sys­temic sur­rep­ti­tious use of prison infor­mants. That sys­tem con­tained poten­tial­ly excul­pa­to­ry infor­ma­tion, but offi­cials denied its exis­tence and refused to turn over records to defense coun­sel, in vio­la­tion of the law. California Attorney General Kamala Harris has appealed Judge Geothals’ rul­ing, but said her office will inves­ti­gate the allegations.

(D. Lithwick, ​“You’re All Out,” Slate, May 28, 2015.) See California.

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