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Character witnesses in a weapons possession trial?

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clsgilles

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Minnesota.

My brother has been charged with possession of a weapon by unauthorized person in the state of MN. He goes to trial on October 11th.

He was told by his public defender that he cannot call character witnesses to testify for him as this would open the courts to discuss his previous criminal record. Won't they do this anyway?

The PD office also has not requested finger prints from the weapon in question, and said that they generally do not request prints if a police officer says they saw the suspect throw the gun in broad daylight and there were no other suspects around?

If someone is pleading not guilty and they say that fingerprinting could exhonerate them, don't they have to order prints?
 


CdwJava

Senior Member
My brother has been charged with possession of a weapon by unauthorized person in the state of MN. He goes to trial on October 11th.

He was told by his public defender that he cannot call character witnesses to testify for him as this would open the courts to discuss his previous criminal record. Won't they do this anyway?
A character witness would be irrelevant at this point, anyway. Unless this character witness is also a witness to the actual event, the prosecution would be remiss if they allowed the testimony as the person would not be a witness at all.

Usually, character witnesses are brought in after a conviction and prior to sentencing, or, to try and counter characterizations made by the prosecution such as he is an evil person with no friends, etc.

And depending on the situation, his prior criminal history may not be brought up at trial. If he is being charged with being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, yes, the prior record will be important. But, if it is not relevant to the offense, it may not be allowed to be brought up at all.

The PD office also has not requested finger prints from the weapon in question, and said that they generally do not request prints if a police officer says they saw the suspect throw the gun in broad daylight and there were no other suspects around?
Prints would have helped, and the defense can certainly try to raise that as an issue of reasonable doubt, but that darn eyewitness testimony by the officer is going to be tough to beat. Of course, nothing prevents the defense from sending it off to have it printed in an attempt to show that the defendant's prints are NOT on the gun, right? But ... uh ... they are potentially present on it, right?

If someone is pleading not guilty and they say that fingerprinting could exhonerate them, don't they have to order prints?
They can get it printed if they want. But, really, the lack of any discernible print on the gun just shows that there is no identifiable print on the gun, not that he was not in possession. He could very well have been in possession and not left prints.
 

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