Co-defendant confesses to crime and exonerates the other accused; how long to release?

Hello,

Quick one: I have a story going where 3 people are accused of a heist.

One of them confesses and provides evidence - and a witness - that implicates himself and one of the other two defendants. He's had it with the guilt, he doesn't want to go to trial but rather plead guilty and be done with it.

The third defendant, who is currently jailed, is shown to be innocent based on the confession and the evidence provided by this guy who comes clean. There is no doubt of the evidence.

I guess there would be a hearing to get his testimony and investigate the information provided. Once it was confirmed to be legitimate how long until that wrongfully accused defendant would have the charges dropped by the state, and to subsequently be released? I'm guessing it would take a week to sort it all out?

This is pretrial. The innocent person was previously bailed out but violated her bail (involved in self-defense shooting) and is now in prison awaiting the trial, which makes it trickier.

I think the crux of the issue here is that prosecution and defense will confirm the other defendant's confession was valid, then examine the evidence and the innocent person can be released in a week - but there's still the bail violation to contend with. Somehow I don't see the court saying "Well, since the original charges weren't valid, your bail violation goes away and you're scott-free. See ya!" It seems to me that the best route is that she gets the original charges dismissed and is released from prison under the admonition not to leave the state; they are still investigating the self-defense shooting; they will file charges as appropriate so she's free for now but can be arrested at any time. Then the self-defense shooting is deemed justified weeks later and it's a happy ending for the defendant.

jclarkdawe said:

Is this pretrial or after conviction? There's a vast difference here.

If this is pretrial and defendant is in custody pending trial, prosecutor and defense counsel do a joint motion to reduce bail to get the person out quickly. Then the prosecutor will drop charges in a few days.

If post-trial, then it gets complicated. Prosecutor does a motion to set aside verdict, with supporting evidence. Judge will probably want a hearing. You're talking anywhere from a week to months or years. Judges have been known to reject the determination of both the prosecutor and the defense counsel that the person should be released.

You need to understand that the further into the process that you go, the harder it is to convince a prosecutor of this. Co-defendant's statement counts for diddly-squat. Co-defendants lie. The other witness and other evidence will need to support this very strongly.

Anywhere from a week to never are good time ranges.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

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