Vega v. Commissioner of Correction

── Vega v. Commissioner of Correction ── Court: Supreme Court of Connecticut Date: April 21, 2026 Author: Mullins Category: General ************************************************ The “officially released” date that appears near the beginning of an opinion is the date the opinion will be published in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it is released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the beginning of all time periods for the filing of postopinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecti- cut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying an opinion that appear in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced or distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publications, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. ************************************************  Vega v. Commissioner of Correction MIGUEL VEGA v. COMMISSIONER OF CORRECTION (SC 21017) Mullins, C. J., and McDonald, D’Auria, Ecker, Alexander, Dannehy and Bright, Js. Syllabus The petitioner appealed, on the granting of certification, to this court from the judgment of the Appellate Court, which had dismissed his appeal from, inter alia, the habeas court’s denial of his habeas petition. The petitioner, who had been convicted of murder, among other crimes, claimed in his habeas petition that he had been deprived of his right to a fair trial when the prosecutor at his criminal trial failed to disclose that one of the state’s witness at that trial, P, had previously provided false testimony at a trial in another, unrelated case that was handled by another state’s attorney who worked, along with the prosecutor, in the state’s attorney’s office in the New London judicial district. After the petitioner was sentenced in his criminal case, the Appellate Court reversed the conviction of the defendant in the unre- lated case, concluding that the state’s failure to correct P’s false testimony in that case violated Brady v. Maryland (373 U.S. 83). In dismissing the petitioner’s appeal from the habeas court’s judgment, the Appellate Court concluded, inter alia, that the prosecutor in the petitioner’s criminal case had no obligation to review the file in the unrelated case for impeachment material concerning P in the absence of a specific request for such material by the defense. On appeal to this court, the petitioner claimed, inter alia, that, contrary to the Appellate Court’s conclusion, the prosecutor in his criminal case had an obligation to seek out and to disclose to the defense the fact that P had previously given false testimony in the unrelated case. Held: Although the Appellate Court incorrectly concluded that the prosecutor in the petitioner’s criminal trial had no responsibility to seek out and to disclose to the defense evidence of P’s false testimony at the unrelated trial, this court upheld the Appellate Court’s dismissal of the petitioner’s appeal on the alternative ground that the prosecutor’s failure to disclose that evidence was immaterial for purposes of Brady. The state’s attorney’s office for the New London judicial district is a single entity that speaks for the state on criminal matters in that district, and, therefore, the state’s attorney in that district prosecuting the petitioner’s criminal trial was not relieved