Cornish v. State

Summary

The Delaware Supreme Court affirmed the Superior Court’s denial of Brooks Cornish’s motion to modify his sentence following violations of probation. The Court held that the State’s disclosure concerning misconduct at the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner did not establish a Brady violation because there was no indication that evidence related to Cornish had been compromised and the violation-of-probation hearing was not a proceeding to convict him of drug dealing. The Court also held that the trial court did not abuse its discretion by considering the detective’s testimony or by imposing the challenged sentence.

Holdings

1. The State's nondisclosure did not establish a Brady violation because there was no indication that evidence used against Cornish had been compromised, and there was no reasonable probability that disclosure of the OCME investigation would have changed the outcome of the violation-of-probation proceeding.
2. The Superior Court did not abuse its discretion in relying on the detective's testimony because the testimony had more than a minimal indicium of reliability and was corroborated by circumstances including the controlled purchase, identification of Cornish, field testing of the substance as heroin, and Cornish's admission that he had sold heroin previously.
3. The Superior Court did not abuse its discretion by imposing six years of Level V incarceration for the probation violations, even though the sentence exceeded the applicable SENTAC guideline range, because the court had authority to require service of the original sentence or any lesser sentence and Cornish had eighteen years of Level V time remaining.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the State's failure to disclose the OCME investigation and possible compromise of drug evidence violated Brady v. Maryland or otherwise deprived Cornish of a fair opportunity to defend against the probation violations.
2. Whether the Superior Court abused its discretion by relying on allegedly inconsistent and unreliable detective testimony in denying Cornish's Rule 35(b) motion and modifying his probation-violation sentence.
3. Whether the sentence imposed for the probation violations was improper because it exceeded the Delaware Sentencing Accountability Commission guidelines.

Disposition

affirmed