This column examines the process of requiring prosecutors to provide favorable information to defense counsel as required by Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963). This case requires the prosecutor to turn over to defense counsel any information the prosecutor has that may affect the charging of a person with a criminal offense or affect the severity of the sentence. Since the date of that decision, there have been several hundred cases where exculpatory Brady material should have been turned over to the defense at the time of trial, and the defendants were improperly convicted. Many of these cases involved evidence that was finally produced years after trial and after the defendants had served years of a prison sentence.