What is the prosecution’s duty to disclose?

The prosecution’s ‘duty to disclose’ has been recognized in one form or another throughout the history of Canadian criminal law. Some aspects of that duty were statutorily codified; others were developed by the common law. In Stinchcombe v. The Queen, 1991 CanLII 45 (SCC), [1991] 3 S.C.R. 326 (‘Stinchcombe’), the court ‘constitutionalized’ the prosecution’s duty to disclose as part of the Charter, s.7 right. The prosecution was fixed with impressive new legal and ethical responsibilities to disclose to the accused all relevant information in its possession.