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| News flash: Common sense appears briefly in courtroom... |
| 2002-06-03 |
| A Texas Death Row inmate whose lawyer slept for long portions of his murder trial will either win freedom or a new trial after the Supreme Court refused to intervene Monday. The high court rejected an appeal from Texas authorities, who argued that the lawyer's inattention did not necessarily equal an unfair trial. The Supreme Court's action means that Texas must choose whether to retry Calvin Jerold Burdine or set him free. Of course, since this thing has been grinding on since roughly 1983, it's probably not a large quantity of common sense that's appeared. And I haven't read anything about a ruling to have Mr Lawyer beaten with a stick in public. |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |
| #2 I have my J.D., though I don't practice law, and I have to say that sleeping on the job during your client's trial is about as blatant a violation of legal ethics (yes, there _is_ such a thing!) and lawyers' codes of professional responsibility as I can think of. This kind of professional misconduct - what would you think if your ophthalmologist were to sneak off for a nice long nap in the middle of a Lasix procedure on your corneas? - ought to have resulted in the original trial being voided and a new trial ordered pronto. I think someone ought to take a good hard look at the judge, too, who allowed counsel to nod off in his court during proceedings. |
| Posted by: Joe 2002-06-03 14:34:59 |
| #1 the WashPost article says that Mr. Lawyer died in the 90's....retry this SOB though, shouldn't be hard...he admitted to the crime, but now (wonder of wonders!) denies it and says someone else did the stabbing |
| Posted by: Frank G 2002-06-03 10:56:05 |