It’s as secretive as it is controversial.

California prosecutors keep a list of cops they say have credibility issues which, if brought up during court testimony, could damage a criminal case.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/09/...t.html#storylink=cpy

Putting police officers on Brady lists certainly sounds like the easy and righteous thing to do. But these can be remarkably thorny issues. I've had to deal with a few of these situations. None have been easy. Anyone else?

If we ever put officers on this list, it's pretty apparent and normally comes from the agency first.

At the same time- we don't have a secret "list". There's just a e-mail sent out and we disclose this to defense attorneys.

Perhaps it is an issue in bigger counties only?

In smaller counties it seems like everybody knows these things.

I'm not sure what you mean by "Brady List" but it seems to me that a cop with credibility issues should consider some other line of work.

A few years back there were two SAPD cops who got convicted of something... can't remember what exactly... but the bottom line was that it tainted everything they were a part of because they had manipulated evidence to get convictions or something along those lines.

On the case summary sheets that we worked up in our intake division, we had a heading that said "Brady" and a box with each cop's name. If we came across a police report or an investigation that had their name anywhere on it, we checked the box so that everyone who came across the file knew that we had to disclose to the defense that these two cops had been a part of the case.

We have a few cops that have credibility issues way back in their past, and it still causes trouble. Some of what we know is privileged by the agency - we always refer counsel to those agencies for open records requests. I have had defense counsel tell me that certain cops have issues, and they want me to do a Brady disclosure. That's always fun. "You are hereby given notice under [Brady]of what you told me".