Pleading the Sixth: In a new lawsuit, the ACLU of Washington alleges that the right to counsel system for juveniles facing delinquency proceedings in Grays Harbor is so constitutionally deficient that the State of Washington must take action.
Author: David Carroll
Nevada Chief Justice: “We must do better at providing representation to rural defendants.”
Pleading the Sixth: In his State of the Judiciary address, Nevada’s Chief Justice decried the growing justice gap in right to counsel services between urban and rural jurisdictions in his state. Announcing that rural counties simply cannot shoulder the state’s…
Tagged with: caseloads & workloads, commissions, funding, history, judiciary, legislation, Nevada, rural areas, Shepherd L. Wixom, video
Should non-lawyer judges be sending people to jail? SCOTUS asked to review
Pleading the Sixth: In 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that the 14th Amendment permits non-lawyer judges to impose jail time so long as the defendant has the ability to get a do-over in front of a judge who is…
Indiana stands as a cautionary tale for other states with similar indigent defense system models
Pleading the Sixth: On October 24, 2016, the Sixth Amendment Center released its report detailing how the “Indiana Model” for defender services leads to the actual denial of counsel and/or the provision of a lawyer in name only throughout the state.…
The “Indiana Model” for providing right to counsel services does not work
Pleading the Sixth: On October 24, 2016, the Sixth Amendment Center released its report on trial level indigent defense services in Indiana. Beginning in the 1990s, the “Indiana Model” was widely promoted as potentially the best way to improve the provision…
Tagged with: county systems, evaluations of systems, Indiana, Sixth Amendment Center, standards - system
A Cronic resolve to America’s chronic right to counsel deficiencies
Pleading the Sixth: On September 28, 2016, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that indigent defendants have a right to challenge systemic deficiencies at the outset of a case before having to suffer from actual or constructive denial of counsel. [Click…
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