From MynewsLA.com

A veteran Orange County prosecutor accused of illegally withholding evidence from a defense attorney should have her law license suspended for at least a year, the state bar recommended in a ruling released Wednesday.

Deputy District Attorney Sandra Lee Nassar should also be placed on three years of probation and show proof of “her rehabilitation, fitness to practice and present learning and ability in the general law,” according to the recommendation, which was made Tuesday.

The state bar recommended Nassar complete a program of classes on ethics and pass a test. If she clears probation she can avoid another year of suspension.

Nassar can appeal to the state Bar of California, and if that fails then she can appeal to the state Supreme Court, which has the final say.

Nassar was found to have committed misconduct by Orange County Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals in 2013 when she withheld evidence of letters two defendants wrote to each other while in custody about a child-abuse case.

Lori Louisa Pincus took a plea deal from prosecutors admitting she tried to help her boyfriend, Carmen William Iacullo II, avoid legal trouble for abusing her 5-year-old son with beatings, stabbings and burning him with cigarettes. She was sentenced to two years behind bars that she had already served in the case.

Iacullo eventually took a 12-year prison sentence to avoid a life sentence, his defense attorney Joe Dane said.

But as his client was facing trial, Dane suspected Pincus had made a plea deal so he began asking for evidence related to the plea bargain, but Nassar did not respond, according to the state bar.

Nassar argued that Iacullo should have already been aware of the letters since they were sent to him, so she did not have to release to the defense. Also, she argued, there was only one letter she deemed potentially exculpatory.

Nassar acknowledged during testimony in an evidentiary hearing that she did not turn over the letters to Dane because “it relates to trial strategy.”

Hat tip coolcrosby. (Mike Frisch)