The immune system.

• Author: Peters, Charles
• Position: TILTING at windmills - On prosecutors' immunity - Brief article

Did you know that, according to Adam Liptak of the New York Times, "prosecutors cannot be sued for anything they do during a trial including knowingly submitting false evidence"? I was trained as a lawyer and practiced in criminal courts for three years, bur I was still shocked to learn about prosecutors' immunity.

In one of the cases currently before the U.S. Supreme Court that occasioned Liptak's article, the issue is whether prosecutors can be held liable for pretrial conduct even if it includes "coaching and coercing a witness into giving false testimony." The case is being brought against Iowa prosecutors by two former prisoners who had been freed by the Iowa Supreme Court when it concluded that same witness was "a liar and a...