Cite as: 540 U. S. 668 (2004)
Syllabus
cution suggested, indicated that he had been open and honest in every way. The State did not disclose that Farr was the paid informant who told Deputy Huff about the Dallas trip. The judge sentenced Banks to death.
Through Banks's direct appeal, the State continued to hold secret Farr's and Cook's links to the police. In a 1992 state-court postconviction motion, Banks alleged for the first time that the prosecution knowingly failed to turn over exculpatory evidence that would have revealed Farr as a police informant and Banks's arrest as a "set-up." Banks also alleged that during the trial's guilt phase, the State deliberately withheld information of a deal prosecutors made with Cook, which would have been critical to the jury's assessment of Cook's credibility. Banks asserted that the State's actions violated Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83, 87, which held that the prosecution's suppression of evidence requested by and favorable to an accused violates due process where the evidence is material to either guilt or punishment, irrespective of the prosecution's good or bad faith. The State denied Banks's allegations, and the state postconviction court rejected his claims.
In 1996, Banks filed the instant federal habeas petition, alleging, as relevant, that the State had withheld material exculpatory evidence revealing Farr to be a police informant and Banks' arrest as a "set-up." Banks further alleged that the State had concealed Cook's incentive to testify in a manner favorable to the prosecution. Banks attached affidavits from Farr and Cook to a February 1999 motion seeking discovery and an evidentiary hearing. Farr's declaration stated that he had agreed to help Deputy Huff with the murder investigation out of fear Huff would arrest him on drug charges; that Huff had paid him $200; and that Farr had "set [Banks] up" by convincing him to drive to Dallas to retrieve Banks's gun. Cook recalled that he had participated in practice sessions before the Banks trial at which prosecutors told him he must either testify as they wanted or spend the rest of his life in prison. In response to the Magistrate Judge's disclosure order in the federal habeas proceeding, the prosecution gave Banks a transcript of a September 1980 pretrial interrogation of Cook by police and prosecutors. This transcript provided compelling evidence that Cook's testimony had been tutored, but did not bear on whether Cook had a deal with the prosecution. At the federal evidentiary hearing Huff acknowledged, for the first time, that Farr was an informant paid for his involvement in Banks's case. A Banks trial prosecutor testified, however, that no deal had been offered to gain Cook's testimony. The Magistrate Judge recommended a writ of habeas corpus with respect to Banks's death sentence based on, inter alia, the State's failure to disclose Farr's informant status. The judge did not recommend disturbing the guilt-phase ver-
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