Judy Haney's court appointed lawyer was so drunk during
the trial in 1989 that he was held in contempt and sent to jail. The next
day, both client and attorney came out of the cell block and the trial
resumed. The same lawyer failed to present hospital records showing that
Haney was a battered spouse, a key factor in why she had her adulterous
husband killed. Many other women have successfully used such abuse in their
defense. Despite her faulty representation, Haney's death sentence was
upheld by the Alabama Supreme Court in 1992 and she remains on death row.
Jack House was represented at his capital trial by a husband
and wife team in Georgia who had never read the state's death penalty
statute. The lawyers never visited the crime scene or
interviewed the state's witnesses, made no attempt to discover the state's
evidence and barely spoke to their client. They stated "they were too busy."
One of them left during the testimony of a key prosecution witness
and they presented no mitigating evidence at sentencing because they didn't
know about the sentencing phase at the trial. When their client was sentenced
to death, they submitted a boilerplate motion for a new trial but failed
to point out that three credible neighbors had surfaced who claimed to
have seen the victim after the state's certified time of death. Their client
had an alibi for that time. Worse still, the lawyers even failed to appear
to argue their own motion. The U.S. Court of Appeals in 1984 charitably
characterized this shambles by saying that the attorneys' "state of preparation
qualified them only as spectators." One of the attorneys was later disbarred
for his performance. Even with two attorneys, Jack House stood alone at
his trial.
"Courtesy of http://justice.policy.net/"
Walter McMillian was convicted of the shooting death of a storekeeper. On the day of the murder, he was at a fish fry with his friends and relatives, many of whom testified to that at the trial. No physical evidence linked him to the crime. Three people that testified connected him to he murder. A volunteer lawyer, after listening to a tape of the key witness' testimony, flipped the tape over to see if there was anything on the other side. Only then did he hear the same witness complaining that he was being pressured to frame McMillian. Walter McMillian was released from Alabama's death row after having spent six years in jail. He was released March 3rd 1993.
Federico Marcias was sentenced to death in Texas for a murder he did not commit. His court appointed attorney did nothing to prepare for the trial. A few years later, a new lawyer from a large firm volunteered his time to the case. His conviction was overturned when the federal court found not only that Marcias' original attorney was ineffective, but that he had missed considerable evidence pointing to his innocence. Federico Marcias was released in 1993.
"Courtesy of http://www.abanet.org"
John Young met his capital defense attorney for the first
time a few weeks before his trail. Young was in a county jail and so was
his lawyer, after pleading to drug charges. During Young's trial, the lawyer
was unprepared and inept. Long after the trial, the lawyer admitted to
being on drugs, exhausted and severely distracted by personal and business
problems. Despite his lawyer's inadequacies Young was executed.
"Courtesy of http://www.oneworld.org"
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