The Right of the Defendant's Awareness of the Exculpatory Evidence in the Prosecutor's Possession

Assistant professor at Payam Noor University he right of the defendant’s awareness of the exculpatory evidence in the hand of the prosecutor is of requisites for fair trial. The prosecutor’s duty is to reveal the exculpatory evidence in his hand to the defendant. For the first time, the simple pattern of the Supreme Court of the United States indicating the recognition of this right and its importance to some extent that the non-disclosure of the exculpatory evidence leads to exonerate or tend to exonerate the defendant of guilt (the non-disclosure of the exculpatory evidence goes towards negating a defendant’s guilt). But at international level, the collection and disclosure of the exculpatory evidence in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is permitted to a certain degree that it does not establish obstacles in the
collaboration of the data sources of this evidence with the prosecutor. From this view, the secrecy of the sources of the exculpatory evidence is located at the first stage and the accused’s rights at second stage. But this condition has been promoted in the International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCT) to a great extent. The prosecutor is required to
disclose the exculpatory evidences to the accused. Even though the other contradictory obligations are accepted in this ground, according to it, the secondary duties do not reduce the prosecutor’s responsibility for the disclosure of the exculpatory evidence.