Criminal defense pretrial motion to sever two or more criminal defendants from being tried together by the same court and jury due to the potential for prejudice
Motion to sever the criminal case can be brought by either the state or defense counsel and requests that one or more of the co-defendants be given separate trials based on the fact there are separate charges for each defendant.
Although a motion to sever is rarely granted, it requests the trial court to sever the trials of defendants whenever necessary to promote a fair determination of the guilt or innocence of one or more of the defendants.
Note: Motions to sever are also used in civil claims
