Real Crime/Paranormal/Conspiracy Theories Book III

Gideon v. Wainwright

Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S.335 (1963), is a landmark United States Supreme Court case in whichthe Court unanimously held that in criminal cases states are requiredunder the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution to provide anattorney to defendants who are unable to afford their own attorneys.The case extended the right to counsel, which had been found underthe Fifth and Sixth Amendments to impose requirements on the federalgovernment, by imposing those requirements upon the states as well.

Background

Between midnight and 8:00 a.m. on June3, 1961, a burglary occurred at the Bay Harbor Pool Room in PanamaCity, Florida. An unknown person broke a door, smashed a cigarettemachine and a record player, and stole money from a cash register.Later that day, a witness reported that he had seen Clarence EarlGideon in the poolroom at around 5:30 that morning, leaving with awine bottle, Coke, and change in his pockets. Based on thisaccusation alone, the police arrested Gideon and charged him withbreaking and entering with intent to commit petty larceny.

Gideon appeared in court alone as hewas too poor to afford counsel, whereupon the following conversationtook place:

The COURT: Mr. Gideon, I am sorry,but I cannot appoint counsel to represent you in this case. Under thelaws of the State of Florida, the only time the court can appointcounsel to represent a defendant is when that person is charged witha capital offense. I am sorry, but I will have to deny your requestto appoint counsel to defend you in this case.

GIDEON: The United States SupremeCourt says I am entitled to be represented by counsel.

The court declined to appoint counselfor Gideon. As a result, he was forced to act as his own counsel andconduct his own defense in court, emphasizing his innocence in thecase. At the conclusion of the trial, the jury returned a guiltyverdict. The court sentenced Gideon to serve five years in the stateprison.

Gideon first filed a petition for awrit of habeas corpus in the Supreme Court of Florida. In hispetition, he claimed his Sixth Amendment right had been violatedbecause the judge refused to appoint counsel. The Florida SupremeCourt denied Gideon's petition. Later, from his cell at theFlorida State Prison in Raiford, making use of the prison library andwriting in pencil on prison stationery, Gideon appealed to the UnitedStates Supreme Court in a suit against the Secretary of the FloridaDepartment of Corrections, H. G. Cochran. Cochran retired and wasreplaced by Louie L. Wainwright before the Supreme Court heard thecase. Gideon argued in his appeal that he had been denied counsel andtherefore that his Sixth Amendment rights, as applied to the statesby the Fourteenth Amendment, had been violated.

The Supreme Court assigned Gideon aprominent Washington, D.C., attorney, future Supreme Court justiceAbe Fortas of the law firm Arnold, Fortas & Porter. Bruce Jacob,who later became Dean of the Mercer University School of Law and Deanof Stetson University College of Law, argued the case for Florida. Fortas was assisted by longtime Arnold, Fortas & Porter partnerAbe Krash and future famed legal scholar John Hart Ely, then athird-year student at Yale Law School.

During oral arguments before theSupreme Court, Fortas repeatedly asserted that the existing frameworkfor a state trial court to appoint counsel was unworkable. Under theexisting framework, a magistrate in a preliminary hearing determinedwhether there were "special circumstances" in thecase meriting that the defendant receive counsel. But as Fortashighlighted, that determination occurred too early in the case to beof any use. For example, whether a witness's statement should bebarred because it was hearsay is an extremely complicated issue thatno layman could readily confront, and such a situation arises onlyduring a trial.