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Criminal Procedure • Exclusionary Rule
CRIMPRO#005
Legal Definition
If unconstitutional evidence is admitted at trial, a conviction will not be reversed on appeal if the error was harmless. The government bears the burden of showing the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
Plain English Explanation
Sometimes, despite the various safety measures built into the system, a person will be convicted even though some of the evidence from the trial was unconstitutional. While it may seem like such scenarios would result in the conviction being reversed, like most things in the legal world: it depends. Specifically, it depends on whether the unconstitutional evidence was harmless to the overall result of the trial.
In other words, trials generally involve a lot of evidence. Physical evidence, testimony, witnesses, etc. Not all evidence has an impact on the outcome of a trial. Thus, where a piece of evidence should not have been admitted into trial, but did not impact the outcome of the trial, then its admission is harmless and the conviction will stand. Note that the burden is on the government to prove that the wrongfully admitted evidence didn't have an impact on the outcome, and they must prove this beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a pretty high bar.
In other words, trials generally involve a lot of evidence. Physical evidence, testimony, witnesses, etc. Not all evidence has an impact on the outcome of a trial. Thus, where a piece of evidence should not have been admitted into trial, but did not impact the outcome of the trial, then its admission is harmless and the conviction will stand. Note that the burden is on the government to prove that the wrongfully admitted evidence didn't have an impact on the outcome, and they must prove this beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a pretty high bar.
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