Bruton Redaction-Fail Severance
Severance motion when a co-defendant's statement implicates your client and cannot be adequately redacted for a joint trial. Bruton v. United States doctrine.
Severance motion when a co-defendant's statement implicates your client and cannot be adequately redacted for a joint trial. Bruton v. United States doctrine.
Severance motion for joint-trial prejudice when co-defendants advance mutually antagonistic defenses or when mass-conspiracy evidence will spill over onto a minor participant. Zafiro v. United States doctrine.
The math: $97/mo gets you 3 briefs/mo (any combo of Sentencing Snapshot, JSIN Exclusion Brief, or Forensic Foundation Pack templates). At ~$177/hr CJA rate, that’s one billable hour to recover an entire month of brief work.
CJA panel rate cited: $177/hr (2026 non-capital schedule, effective 2026-01-01). Source: uscourts.gov.
Working on the model now. Drop your email if you want first access.
Per motion: a prejudice-theory analysis (~150 words), pre-drafted motion language (~250 words editable by counsel), the lead authority's verbatim holding (Bruton or Zafiro) with source URL, attaching-precedent citations (Richardson, Gray, Zafiro), a reply-brief framework anticipating the government's joinder-preference opposition, and a circuit-specific prejudice-standard overlay.
No. The templates are pre-trial litigation aids modeled on the published constitutional authority for federal severance motions. Counsel of record adapts the motion language to the controlling circuit and the facts of the case before filing.
A solo CD in a multi-defendant case writes some version of one of these motions on every joint-trial assignment. Drafting the motion with the reply-brief points anticipating the government's preference for joint trials typically eats 2-4 hours at a CJA panel rate (~$177/hr). Recovered billable: $354-$708 per case. The template is priced under 30% of the lower bound.
Buying both motions singly would be $194. The bundle is $147 — saves $47 plus the cross-cite consistency across the two theories (Bruton and Zafiro are often filed as companion motions in the same multi-defendant case).
Bruton applies when a co-defendant's out-of-court statement implicates your client and cannot be adequately redacted for a joint trial. Zafiro applies when the prejudice theory is mutually antagonistic defenses or spillover prejudice on a minor participant buried in mass-conspiracy evidence. Both templates ship with the prejudice-standard circuit overlay so the right threshold is already in the brief.
The Bruton argument does. Bruton v. United States (391 U.S. 123) is a Sixth Amendment Confrontation Clause holding that binds every state court, so the redaction-fail severance theory is available in any joint trial where a co-defendant's statement implicates your client. The motion document itself is drafted for federal practice — it moves for severance under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 14 — so counsel substitutes the state joinder/severance rule (for example Fla. R. Crim. P. 3.152) and adapts the procedural language before filing. The Zafiro template is built on FRCP 14 in the same way. The constitutional argument is the same in every court; the motion's procedural frame is federal and you adapt it to your forum.
7-day full refund on every motion, single or bundle. No questions asked.
CJA panel rate cited: $177/hr (2026 non-capital schedule, effective 2026-01-01). Source: uscourts.gov.