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Course Catalog
Criminal Procedure: Indigents' Right to Counsel: Special Topic (2)
This criminal procedure two-credit course provides upper level students exposure to doctrinal and professional responsibility issues related to the historic development of indigent defendants’ right to counsel and its’ reality in practice at the pretrial bail stage. Constitutional analysis begins with the Supreme Court’s 1932 ruling in Powell v. Alabama (Scottsboro), which first recognized an accused’s due process right to counsel in a capital case and continues to the Court’s landmark Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment felony right to counsel guarantee in 1963 in Gideon v. Wainwright and to a “critical stage” analysis. The Scottsboro and Gideon trials provide background for understanding the evolution of the guarantee of counsel through a race-and class-based analysis. Students’ then examine Maryland practice and the statutory guarantee to counsel at "all stages" of a criminal proceeding, including the initial bail stage. The course considers counsel's role as an advocate and whether a delay in representation not only results in denying pretrial liberty, but also impedes an accused from presenting a meaningful defense, thereby increasing the likelihood of wrongful convictions. This course concludes by exploring the legal profession’s ethical responsibility to guarantee counsel. In the fall semester 2006, students enrolling in Access to Justice Clinic: Effective Assistance of Counsel at Bail must also enroll in this course.
Current & Previous Instructors:
Douglas Colbert;
| This course is not currently scheduled. |
Key to Codes in Course Descriptions
P: PrerequisiteC: Prerequisite or Concurrent Requirement
R: Recommended Prior or Concurrent Course
