In Baltimore, a long-simmering fight over prosecutors’ “do‑not‑call” roster of police officers has boiled into a very public clash between State’s Attorney Ivan Bates and the Office of the Public Defender. The list names officers prosecutors say they will not rely on because of credibility concerns. Bates says his office has been notifying defense lawyers when it adds names, while defenders and transparency advocates insist those notices and the office’s broader disclosure practices still leave defendants without full, usable information.
In an interview with FOX45, Bates pointed to emails from the last year that he said show prosecutors gave public defenders advance notice when officers were added to the roster. He said those messages reflect an effort to coordinate discovery with defense counsel, while still protecting active investigations and the integrity of upcoming trials.
Defense lawyers say the email alerts are better than nothing but still fall short. They want the underlying investigatory records and clear criteria for how an officer ends up on the list so defense teams can fully evaluate impeachment material. Deborah Katz Levi, chief of strategic litigation for the Maryland Office of the Public Defender, told The Baltimore Banner, “We cannot emphasize enough their responsibility to seek this information and disclose it without the need for costly litigation in every single case.” Public‑interest attorneys say piecemeal notices leave judges and defense teams scrambling for records that should arrive as part of routine discovery…