Court Hears Mentally Ill Defendent Case

AP via SFGate ^ | 3/26/8 | MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer

[SmithL]

Several Supreme Court justices suggested Wednesday that defendants with a history of mental illness can be judged competent to stand trial or plead guilty, yet forfeit their constitutional right to represent themselves.

The court heard arguments in a case from Indiana in which a judge prevented a defendant from acting as his own lawyer at trial out of concern that the proceedings would become a farce.

Justice Stephen Breyer said that allowing judges' discretion in those cases could increase public confidence in the criminal justice system and reduce the number of "very disturbed people ending up in prison because they are disturbed, not because they're guilty."

Ahmad Edwards was convicted of attempted murder and other charges in 2005 for a shooting six years earlier at an Indianapolis department store.

He was initially found to be schizophrenic and suffering from delusions and spent most of the five years following the shooting in state psychiatric facilities. But by 2005, he was judged competent to stand trial.

Edwards asked to represent himself. A judge denied the request because he was concerned that Edwards' trial would not be fair. Edwards, represented by a lawyer, was convicted anyway and sentenced to 30 years in prison.

He appealed, and Indiana courts agreed that his right to represent himself had been violated, citing a U.S. high court decision from 1993. The courts overturned his conviction and ordered a new trial.

The justices appeared to be concerned with the difficulty trial judges would face if forced to allow defendants like Edwards to represent themselves.

Even if a judge could step in once the trial was under way and order a lawyer to mount a defense, "the damage is done" by that point, Justice David Souter said.

[brooklyn dave]

Now the SCOTUS has to see what it can do to reign in lawyers using the insanity defense.

[SeaHawkFan]

Stancil said at other times, though, that Edwards provided lucid answers to legal questions from the judge.

Justice Anthony Kennedy was not impressed by Stancil's observation. "There are all kinds of nuts who can get 90 percent on the bar exam," Kennedy said.

Kennedy got that one right.

[SeaHawkFan]

Seems to me that if a defendant is mentally competent to be prosecuted, he is also competent to decide whether or not to use a lawyer.

[burroak]

you’ve got some fuzzy logic there, SHF.

Just because the guy is capable of riding on a bus doesn’t mean he should drive the bus.

[SmithL]

Just because the guy is capable of riding on a bus doesn’t mean he should drive the bus.

I guess that depends on whether or not it's the short bus.

[SeaHawkFan]

I am not saying that my statement doesn’t have some questions, because it is not an easy case either way.

My main concern is what happens when somone is able to represent himself, but the judge doesn’t want him to do so because his defense might expose government misconduct and an attorney simply might not be willing to present evidence of that misconduct.

In most states, and attorney has a pretty broad authority to determine strategy and will rarely result in a reversal of a conviction even if the strategy is not what the defendant wants. IOW, a defense attorney may not always be interested in agressively defending his client. To think otherwise is naive.