The .40-caliber pistol prosecutors leaned on at the Delphi trial came out of the search of Richard Allen's home. If three judges at the Indiana Court of Appeals rule that search was unconstitutional, the gun is gone. Permanently. The State cannot go back in time and undo it. The fruits of an illegal search are inadmissible by law — in this case and in any retrial.

That single appellate ruling has the power to take the State's central piece of physical evidence out of this case for good.

And the search warrant is the one issue in the appeal that gets de novo review. The appellate panel owes no deference to the trial court on it. No deference to Judge Fran Gull. No deference to anyone. They look at the warrant fresh. They look at whether investigators omitted or altered key facts in the probable cause affidavit. They look at whether eyewitness Betsy Blair's description of the man on the bridge actually matched Richard Allen — and whether a reasonable judge being asked to sign that warrant would have signed it knowing the full picture.

Defense attorney Bob Motta joins Tony Brueski for Part Three of a three-part panel on the Delphi appeal. They walk through the de novo geometry sitting in front of the panel. They get into the motion for oral arguments — filed by the defense, ignored by the State — and what that says about confidence on the written record. And they sit with the strategic landmine: if the panel agrees with the defense on the warrant, the State's strongest piece of physical evidence ceases to exist as legal evidence in any future proceeding.

Three judges. One warrant. The gun in the balance.

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