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Appeals court hears dispute over excluded Department of Children's Services records in Harper appeal
Summary
At oral argument, defense counsel Ben Russ told the panel the trial court erred by excluding Department of Children's Services records as untimely and irrelevant; the state urged affirmation, saying the records were not shown to be probative and any error was harmless given confessions and forensic evidence.
An appellate panel heard competing arguments over whether the trial court improperly excluded Department of Children's Services (DCS) records in the appeal of Miss Harper's sexual-assault conviction.
Ben Russ, attorney for the defendant Miss Harper, told the court he planned to reserve three minutes of rebuttal and focused his argument on two issues: whether the trial court erred by treating DCS materials as untimely under Rule 4.12 and whether the records were improperly excluded as irrelevant under Rule 401. "She didn't have access to this information 10 days prior to trial," Russ said, arguing the records were delivered to the trial court under seal and that defense counsel therefore could not meet the ordinary pretrial…
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