Defendants convicted, Jackson County, Alabama Circuit Court, April 8, 1931; affirmed in part, 141 So. 201 (Ala. 1932); rehearing denied, Supreme Court of Alabama, April 9, 1932; cert. granted, 286U.S. 540(1932).
Subsequent
Supreme Court of Alabama reversed
Holding
Under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, a state must inform illiterate defendants charged with a capital crime that they have a right to be represented by counsel and must appoint counsel for defendants who cannot afford to hire a lawyer and give counsel adequate time to prepare for trial.
Powell v. Alabama, 287 U.S. 45 (1932), was a landmark United States Supreme Court decision in which the Court reversed the convictions of nine young black men for allegedly raping two white women on a freight train near Scottsboro, Alabama. The majority of the Court reasoned that the right to retain and be represented by a lawyer was fundamental to a fair trial and that at least in some circumstances, the trial judge must inform a defendant of this right. In addition, if the defendant cannot afford a lawyer, the court must appoint one sufficiently far in advance of trial to permit the lawyer to prepare adequately for the trial.
Powell was the first time the Court had reversed a state criminal conviction for a violation of a criminal procedural provision of the United States Bill of Rights.[1] In effect, it held that the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause included at least part of the right to counsel referred to in the Sixth Amendment, making that much of the Bill of Rights binding on the states. Before Powell, the Court had reversed state criminal convictions only for racial discrimination in jury selection — a practice that violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.[1] Powell has been praised by legal scholars for upholding the American adversarial system in respect to criminal law since the system "relies upon attorneys to hold the state to its burden" which is harder to maintain if the defendants have ineffective assistance of counsel.[2]
Background of the case
In March 1931, nine black men—Charlie Weems, Ozie Powell, Clarence Norris, Olen Montgomery, Willie Roberson, Haywood Patterson, Andrew (Andy) Wright, Leroy (Roy) Wright and Eugene Williams, later known as the Scottsboro Boys—were accused of raping two young white women, Ruby Bates and Victoria Price.
The group of young black men were on a freight train with seven white men and two women. A fight broke out, and all of the white men were thrown from the train. The women accused the black men of rape, although one woman later retracted her claim. All the defendants, except for 13-year-old Roy Wright, were sentenced to death in a series of three one-day trials. The defendants, who were under military guard to protect them from any mob violence, were not told they could hire lawyers or even contact their families. They had no access to a lawyer until shortly before trial, leaving little or no time to plan the defense. They appealed their convictions on the grounds that the group was not provided adequate legal counsel. The Alabama Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that the trial was fair. Chief JusticeJohn C. Anderson wrote a strongly worded dissenting opinion. The defendants appealed the Alabama Supreme Court's ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Supreme Court opinion
The Supreme Court reversed and remanded, holding that due process had been violated. Writing for himself and six other Justices, Justice Sutherland explained the Court's ruling as follows:
In the light of the ... ignorance and illiteracy of the defendants, their youth, the circumstances of public hostility, the imprisonment and the close surveillance of the defendants by the military forces, the fact that their friends and families were all in other states and communication with them necessarily difficult, and above all that they stood in deadly peril of their lives—we think the failure of the trial court to give them reasonable time and opportunity to secure counsel was a clear denial of due process. But passing that, and assuming their inability, even if opportunity had been given, to employ counsel, ... under the circumstances just stated, the necessity of counsel was so vital and imperative that the failure of the trial court to make an effective appointment of counsel was likewise a denial of due process within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The Court's holding was quite limited. Justice Sutherland cautioned that
Whether this would be so in other criminal prosecutions, or under other circumstances, we need not determine. All that it is necessary now to decide, as we do decide, is that in a capital case, where the defendant is unable to employ counsel, and is incapable adequately of making his own defense because of ignorance, feeble-mindedness, illiteracy, or the like, it is the duty of the court, whether requested or not, to assign counsel for him as a necessary requisite of due process of law; and that duty is not discharged by an assignment at such a time or under such circumstances as to preclude the giving of effective aid in the preparation and trial of the case. ... In a case such as this, whatever may be the rule in other cases, the right to have counsel appointed, when necessary, is a logical corollary from the constitutional right to be heard by counsel.
Subsequent jurisprudence
Whether Powell v. Alabama applied to non-capital cases sparked heated debate. Betts v. Brady initially decided that, unless there were special circumstances such as illiteracy or a complicated trial, there was no need for a court-appointed attorney. That decision was ultimately overturned in Gideon v. Wainwright, which established the right of an indigent felony defendant to be provided a trial attorney. Later Supreme Court cases have considered how early in the criminal process this right attaches, whether it applies to misdemeanors, and whether it applies to appeals from convictions.
In the United States, the Miranda warning is a type of notification customarily given by police to criminal suspects in police custody advising them of their right to silence and, in effect, protection from self-incrimination; that is, their right to refuse to answer questions or provide information to law enforcement or other officials. Named for the U.S. Supreme Court's 1966 decision Miranda v. Arizona, these rights are often referred to as Miranda rights. The purpose of such notification is to preserve the admissibility of their statements made during custodial interrogation in later criminal proceedings. The idea came from law professor Yale Kamisar, who subsequently was dubbed "the father of Miranda."
The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution sets forth rights related to criminal prosecutions. It was ratified in 1791 as part of the United States Bill of Rights. The Supreme Court has applied all but one of this amendment's protections to the states through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963), was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in which the Court ruled that the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution requires U.S. states to provide attorneys to criminal defendants who are unable to afford their own. The case extended the right to counsel, which had been found under the Fifth and Sixth Amendments to impose requirements on the federal government, by imposing those requirements upon the states as well.
The Scottsboro Boys were nine African American male teenagers accused in Alabama of raping two white women in 1931. The landmark set of legal cases from this incident dealt with racism and the right to a fair trial. The cases included a lynch mob before the suspects had been indicted, all-white juries, rushed trials, and disruptive mobs. It is commonly cited as an example of a legal injustice in the United States legal system.
Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455 (1942), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case that denied counsel to indigent defendants prosecuted by a state. The reinforcement that such a case is not to be reckoned as denial of fundamental due process was famously overruled by Gideon v. Wainwright. In the dissent, Justice Hugo Black famously opined that "A practice cannot be reconciled with "common and fundamental ideas of fairness and right which subjects innocent men to increased dangers of conviction merely because of their poverty."
In American procedural law, a continuance is the postponement of a hearing, trial, or other scheduled court proceeding at the request of either or both parties in the dispute, or by the judge sua sponte. In response to delays in bringing cases to trial, some states have adopted "fast-track" rules that sharply limit the ability of judges to grant continuances. However, a motion for continuance may be granted when necessitated by unforeseeable events, or for other reasonable cause articulated by the movant, especially when the court deems it necessary and prudent in the "interest of justice."
In criminal law, the right to counsel means a defendant has a legal right to have the assistance of counsel and, if the defendant cannot afford a lawyer, requires that the government appoint one or pay the defendant's legal expenses. The right to counsel is generally regarded as a constituent of the right to a fair trial. Historically, however, not all countries have always recognized the right to counsel. The right is often included in national constitutions. Of the 194 constitutions currently in force, 153 have language to this effect.
Samuel Simon Leibowitz was a Romanian-born American criminal defense attorney. He was best known for representing the Scottsboro Boys, and later became a justice of the New York State Supreme Court.
Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201 (1964), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits the government from eliciting statements from the defendant about themselves after the point that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel attaches.
Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), was a landmark Supreme Court case that established the standard for determining when a criminal defendant's Sixth Amendment right to counsel is violated by that counsel's inadequate performance.
Racial discrimination in jury selection is specifically prohibited by law in many jurisdictions throughout the world. In the United States, it has been defined through a series of judicial decisions. However, juries composed solely of one racial group are legal in the United States and other countries. While the racial composition of juries is not dictated by law, racial discrimination in the selection of jurors is specifically prohibited. Depending on context, the phrases "all-white jury" or "all-black jury" can raise the expectation that deliberations may be unfair.
North v. Russell, 427 U.S. 328 (1976), is a United States Supreme Court case which held that a non-lawyer jurist can constitutionally sit in a jail-carrying criminal case provided that the defendant has an opportunity through an appeal to obtain a second trial before a judge who is a lawyer.
The United States Constitution contains several provisions regarding the law of criminal procedure.
The Assistance of Counsel Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right...to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence."
Patterson v. Alabama, 294 U.S. 600 (1935), was a United States Supreme Court case which held that an African-American defendant is denied due process rights if the jury pool excludes African-Americans.
Norris v. Alabama, 294 U.S. 587 (1935), was one of the cases decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that arose out of the trial of the Scottsboro Boys, who were nine African-American teenagers falsely accused of raping two white women in 1931. The Scottsboro trial jury had no African-American members. Several cases were brought to the Supreme Court to debate the constitutionality of all-white juries. Norris v. Alabama centered around Clarence Norris, one of the Scottsboro Boys, and his claim that the jury selection had systematically excluded black members due to racial prejudice.
North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711 (1969), is a United States Supreme Court case that forbids judicial “vindictiveness” from playing a role in the increased sentence a defendant receives after a new trial. In sum, due process requires that a defendant be “free of apprehension” of judicial vindictiveness. Time served for a new conviction of the same offense must be “fully credited,” and a trial judge seeking to impose a greater sentence on retrial must affirmatively state the reasons for imposing such a sentence.
In the United States, a public defender is a lawyer appointed by the courts and provided by the state or federal governments to represent and advise those who cannot afford to hire a private attorney. Public defenders are full-time attorneys employed by the state or federal governments. The public defender program is one of several types of criminal legal aid in the United States.
Lafler v. Cooper, 566 U.S. 156 (2012), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court clarified the Sixth Amendment standard for reversing convictions due to ineffective assistance of counsel during plea bargaining. The Court ruled that when a lawyer's ineffective assistance leads to the rejection of a plea agreement, a defendant is entitled to relief if the outcome of the plea process would have been different with competent advice. In such cases, the Court ruled that the Sixth Amendment requires the trial judge to exercise discretion to determine an appropriate remedy.
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