Cite as: 514 U. S. 419 (1995)
Opinion of the Court
photograph of the scene showed Kyles's car in the background. It would also have lent support to an argument that the police were irresponsible in relying on inconsistent statements made by Beanie. Pp. 450-451. (d) Although not every item of the State's case would have been directly undercut if the foregoing Brady evidence had been disclosed, it is significant that the physical evidence remaining unscathed would, by the State's own admission, hardly have amounted to overwhelming proof that Kyles was the murderer. While the inconclusiveness of that evidence does not prove Kyles's innocence, and the jury might have found the unimpeached eyewitness testimony sufficient to convict, confidence that the verdict would have been the same cannot survive a recap of the suppressed evidence and its significance for the prosecution. Pp. 451-454. 5 F. 3d 806, reversed and remanded.
Souter, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Stevens, O'Connor, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined. Stevens, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which Ginsburg and Breyer, JJ., joined, post, p. 454. Scalia, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Rehnquist, C. J., and Kennedy and Thomas, JJ., joined, post, p. 456.
James S. Liebman argued the cause for petitioner. On the briefs were George W. Healy III, Nicholas J. Trenticosta, Denise Leboeuf, and Gerard A. Rault, Jr.
Jack Peebles argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Harry F. Connick.
Justice Souter delivered the opinion of the Court. After his first trial in 1984 ended in a hung jury, petitioner Curtis Lee Kyles was tried again, convicted of first-degree murder, and sentenced to death. On habeas review, we follow the established rule that the state's obligation under Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83 (1963), to disclose evidence favorable to the defense, turns on the cumulative effect of all such evidence suppressed by the government, and we hold that the prosecutor remains responsible for gauging that effect regardless of any failure by the police to bring favorable evidence to the prosecutor's attention. Because the net effect of the evidence withheld by the State in this case raises
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