(Monday, May 13, 1963) — The U.S. Supreme Court, in Brady v. Maryland, upheld today, 7-2, a lower court decision overturning the death sentence (but not the conviction) of John L. Brady for murder because the prosecution had withheld from the defense a statement by a separately tried accomplice, Charles D. Boblit, that he’d actually carried out the 1958 killing of William Brooks during a robbery.

Brady spent years in prison in legal limbo, declining his right to another sentencing hearing; he was eventually paroled. Boblit, 79, remains imprisoned in Maryland.