Criminal defense

A Collateral Consequence?

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Opinion on duty to advise on immigration consequences of guilty plea
The opinion in Padilla v. Kentucky is here. Here is the syllabus:

Petitioner Padilla, a lawful permanent resident of the United States for over 40 years, faces deportation after pleading guilty to drug-distribution charges in Kentucky. In postconviction proceedings, he claims that his counsel not only failed to advise him of this consequence before he entered the plea, but also told him not to worry about deportation since he had lived in this country so long. He alleges that he would have gone to trial had he not received this incorrect advice. The Kentucky Supreme Court denied Padilla postconviction relief on the ground that the Sixth Amendment’s effective-assistance-of-counsel guarantee does not protect defendants from erroneous deportation advice because deportation is merely a “collateral” consequence of a conviction.

Held: Because counsel must inform a client whether his plea carries a risk of deportation, Padilla has sufficiently alleged that his counsel was constitutionally deficient. Whether he is entitled to relief depends on whether he has been prejudiced, a matter not addressed here. Pp. 2–18.

(a) Changes to immigration law have dramatically raised the stakes of a noncitizen’s criminal conviction. While once there was only a narrow class of deportable offenses and judges wielded broad discretionary authority to prevent deportation, immigration reforms have expanded the class of deportable offenses and limited judges’ authority to alleviate deportation’s harsh consequences. Because the drastic measure of deportation or removal is now virtually inevitable for a vast number of noncitizens convicted of crimes, the importance of accurate legal advice for noncitizens accused of crimes has never been more important. Thus, as a matter of federal law, deportation is an integral part of the penalty that may be imposed on noncitizen defendants who plead guilty to specified crimes. Pp. 2–6.

(b) Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668, applies to Padilla’s claim. Before deciding whether to plead guilty, a defendant is entitled to “the effective assistance of competent counsel.” McMann v. Richardson, 397 U. S. 759, 771. The Supreme Court of Kentucky rejected Padilla’s ineffectiveness claim on the ground that the advice he sought about deportation concerned only collateral matters. However, this Court has never distinguished between direct and collateral consequences in defining the scope of constitutionally “reason-able professional assistance” required under Strickland, 466 U. S., at 689. The question whether that distinction is appropriate need not be considered in this case because of the unique nature of deportation. Although removal proceedings are civil, deportation is intimately related to the criminal process, which makes it uniquely difficult to classify as either a direct or a collateral consequence. Because that distinction is thus ill-suited to evaluating a Strickland claim concerning the specific risk of deportation, advice regarding deportation is not categorically removed from the ambit of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. Pp. 7–9.

(c) To satisfy Strickland’s two-prong inquiry, counsel’s representation must fall “below an objective standard of reasonableness,” 466 U.S., at 688, and there must be “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different,” id., at 694. The first, constitutional deficiency, is necessarily linked to the legal community’s practice and expectations. Id., at 688. The weight of prevailing professional norms supports the view that counsel must advise her client regarding the deportation risk. And this Court has recognized the importance to the client of “ ‘[p]reserving the . . . right to remain in the United States’ ”and “preserving the possibility of” discretionary relief from deportation. INS v. St. Cyr, 533 U. S. 289, 323. Thus, this is not a hard case in which to find deficiency: The consequences of Padilla’s plea could easily be determined from reading the removal statute, his deportation was presumptively mandatory, and his counsel’s advice was incorrect. There will, however, undoubtedly be numerous situations in which the deportation consequences of a plea are unclear. In those cases, a criminal defense attorney need do no more than advise a noncitizen client that pending criminal charges may carry adverse immigration consequences. But when the deportation consequence is truly clear, as it was here, the duty to give correct advice is equally clear. Accepting Padilla’s allegations as true, he has sufficiently alleged constitutional deficiency to satisfy Strickland’s first prong.Whether he can satisfy the second prong, prejudice, is left for the Kentucky courts to consider in the first instance. Pp. 9–12.

(d) The Solicitor General’s proposed rule—that Strickland should be applied to Padilla’s claim only to the extent that he has alleged affirmative misadvice—is unpersuasive. And though this Court must be careful about recognizing new grounds for attacking the validity of guilty pleas, the 25 years since Strickland was first applied to ineffective-assistance claims at the plea stage have shown that pleas are less frequently the subject of collateral challenges than convictions after a trial. Also, informed consideration of possible deportation can benefit both the State and noncitizen defendants, who may be able to reach agreements that better satisfy the interests of both parties.This decision will not open the floodgates to challenges of convictions obtained through plea bargains. Cf. Hill v. Lockhart, 474 U. S. 52, 58. Pp. 12–16.

253 S. W. 3d 482, reversed and remanded.

STEVENS, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which KENNEDY, GINSBURG, BREYER, and SOTOMAYOR, JJ., joined. ALITO, J., filed an opin-ion concurring in the judgment, in which ROBERTS, C. J., joined. SCALIA, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which THOMAS, J., joined.

March 31, 2010 | Permalink

Latest from the Supremes…..

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opinion in fair-cross-section case
The opinion in Berghuis v. Smith is here. Here is the syllabus:

Criminal defendants have a Sixth Amendment right to trial by an impartial jury drawn from a fair cross section of the community. See Taylor v. Louisiana, 419 U. S. 522. To establish a prima facie violation of the fair-cross-section requirement, a defendant must prove that: (1) a group qualifying as “distinctive” (2) is not fairly and reasonably represented in jury venires, and (3) “systematic exclusion” in the jury-selection process accounts for the underrepresentation. Duren v. Missouri, 439 U. S. 357, 364.

At voir dire in the Kent County Circuit Court trial of respondent Smith, an African-American, the venire panel included between 60 and 100 individuals, only 3 of whom, at most, were African-American. At that time, African-Americans constituted 7.28% of the County’s jury-eligible population, and 6% of the pool from which potential jurors were drawn. The court rejected Smith’s objection to the panel’s racial composition, an all-white jury convicted him of second-degree murder and felony firearm possession, and the court sentenced him to life in prison with the possibility of parole.

On order of the Michigan Court of Appeals, the trial court conducted an evidentiary hearing on Smith’s fair-cross-section claim.The evidence at the hearing showed, inter alia, that under the juror-assignment order in effect when Smith’s jury was empaneled, the County assigned prospective jurors first to local district courts, and,only after filling local needs, made remaining persons available to the countywide Circuit Court, which heard felony cases like Smith’s.Smith calls this procedure “siphoning.” The month after Smith’s voir dire, however, the County reversed course and adopted a Circuit-Court-first assignment order. It did so based on the belief that the district courts took most of the minority jurors, leaving the Circuit Court with a jury pool that did not represent the entire County. The trial court noted two means of measuring the underrepresentation of African-Americans on Circuit Court venires. First, the court de-scribed the “absolute disparity” test, under which the percentage of African-Americans in the jury pool (6%) is subtracted from the percentage of African-Americans in the local, jury-eligible population (7.28%). According to this measure, African-Americans were under-represented by 1.28%. Next, the court set out the “comparative disparity” test, under which the absolute disparity (1.28%) is divided by the percentage of African-Americans in the jury-eligible population (7.28%). The quotient (18%) indicated that, on average, African-Americans were 18% less likely, when compared to the overall jury-eligible population, to be on the jury-service list. In the 11 months after Kent County discontinued the district-court-first assignment policy, the comparative disparity, on average, dropped from 18% to15.1%. The hearing convinced the trial court that African-Americans were underrepresented on Circuit Court venires. But Smith’s evidence, the trial court held, was insufficient to prove that the juror-assignment order, or any other part of the jury-selection process, had systematically excluded African-Americans. The court therefore rejected Smith’s fair-cross-section claim.

The state intermediate appellate court reversed and ordered a newmtrial with jurors selected under the Circuit-Court-first assignment order. Reversing in turn, the Michigan Supreme Court concluded that Smith had not established a prima facie Sixth Amendment violation. This Court, the state High Court observed, has specified no preferred method for measuring whether representation of a distinctive group in the jury pool is fair and reasonable. The court noted that lower federal courts had applied three tests: the absolute and comparative disparity tests and a standard deviation test. Adopting a case-by-case approach allowing consideration of all three means of measuring underrepresentation, the court found that Smith had failed to establish a legally significant disparity under any measurement. Nevertheless giving Smith the benefit of the doubt on under-representation, the court determined that he had not shown systematic exclusion.

Smith then filed a federal habeas petition. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA) prohibits federal habeas relief unless the state court’s adjudication “resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of,clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,” 28 U. S. C. §2254(d)(1), or “resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding,” §2254(d)(2). Finding no infirmity in the Michigan Supreme Court’s decision when assessed under AEDPA’s standards, the District Court dismissed Smith’s petition. The Sixth Circuit reversed. The Court of Appeals ruled, first, that courts should use the comparative disparity test to measure underrepresentation where, as here, the allegedly excluded group is small. The court then held that Smith’s comparative disparity statistics demonstrated that African-Americans’ representation in County Circuit Court venires was unfair and unreasonable.It next stated that Smith had shown systematic exclusion. In accord with the Michigan intermediate appellate court, the Sixth Circuit believed that the district-court-first assignment order significantly reduced the number of African-Americans available for Circuit Court venires. Smith was entitled to relief, the Sixth Circuit concluded, because no important state interest supported the district-court-first allocation system.

Held: The Sixth Circuit erred in ruling that the Michigan Supreme Court’s decision “involv[ed] an unreasonable application o[f] clearly established Federal law,” §2254(d)(1). Duren hardly establishes—no less “clearly” so—that Smith was denied his Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury drawn from a fair cross section of the community. Pp. 10–16.

(a) The Duren defendant readily met all three parts of the Court’s prima facie test when he complained of the dearth of women in a county’s jury pool. First, he showed that women in the county were both “numerous and distinct from men.” 439 U. S., at 364. Second, to establish underrepresentation, he proved that women were 54% of the jury-eligible population, but accounted for only 26.7% of those summoned for jury service, and only 14.5% of those on the postsummons weekly venires from which jurors were drawn. Id., at 364–366. Finally, to show the “systematic” cause of the underrepresentation, he pointed to Missouri’s law permitting any woman to opt out of jury service and to the manner in which the county administered that law. This Court noted that “appropriately tailored” hardship exemptions would likely survive a fair-cross-section challenge if justified by an important state interest, id., at 370, but concluded that no such interest could justify the exemption for each and every woman, id., at 369–370. Pp. 10–11.

(b) Neither Duren nor any other decision of this Court specifies the method or test courts must use to measure underrepresentation.Each of the three methods employed or identified by the courts below—absolute disparity, comparative disparity, and standard deviation—is imperfect. Absolute disparity and comparative disparity measurements can be misleading where, as here, members of the distinctive group compose only a small percentage of the community’s jury-eligible population. And it appears that no court has relied exclusively on a standard deviation analysis. Even absent AEDPA’s constraint, this Court would have no cause to take sides here on the appropriate method or methods for measuring underrepresentation.Although the Michigan Supreme Court concluded that Smith’s statistical evidence failed to establish a legally significant disparity under either the absolute or comparative disparity tests, the court nevertheless gave Smith the benefit of the doubt on underrepresentation in order to reach the issue ultimately dispositive in Duren: To the extent underrepresentation existed, was it due to “systematic exclusion”? See Duren, 439 U. S., at 364. Pp. 11–13.

(c) Smith’s evidence gave the Michigan Supreme Court little reason to conclude that the district-court-first assignment order had any significant effect on the representation of African-Americans on Circuit Court venires. Although the record established that some County officials believed that the assignment order created racia ldisparities, and the County reversed the order in response, the belief was not substantiated by Smith’s evidence. He introduced no evidence that African-Americans were underrepresented on the Circuit Court’s venires in significantly higher percentages than on the District Court for Grand Rapids, which had the County’s largest African-American population. He did not address whether Grand Rapids had more need for jurors per capita than any other district in Kent County. And he did not compare the African-American representation levels on Circuit Court venires with those on the Federal District Court venires for the same region. See Duren, n. 25. Smith’s best evidence of systematic exclusion was the decline in comparative underrepresentation, from 18 to 15.1%, after Kent County reversed its assignment order. But that evidence indicated no large change and was, in any event, insufficient to prove that the original assignment order had a significantly adverse impact on the representation of African-Americans on Circuit Court venires. Pp.13–14.

(d) In addition to renewing his “siphoning” argument, Smith urges that a laundry list of factors—e.g., the County’s practice of excusing prospective jurors without adequate proof of alleged hardship, and the refusal of County police to enforce orders for prospective jurors to appear—combined to reduce systematically the number of African-Americans appearing on jury lists. No “clearly established” precedent of this Court supports Smith’s claim. Smith urges that one sentence in Duren, 439 U. S., at 368–369, places the burden of proving causation on the State. But Smith clipped that sentence from its context: The sentence does not concern the demonstration of a prima face case; instead, it speaks to what the State might show to rebut the defendant’s prima facie case. The Michigan Supreme Court was therefore far from “unreasonable,” §2254(d)(1), in concluding that Duren first and foremost required Smith himself to show that the underrepresentation complained of was due to systematic exclusion. This Court, furthermore, has never “clearly established” that jury-selection-process features of the kind on Smith’s list can give rise to a fair-cross-section claim. Rather, the Taylor Court “recognized broad discretion in the States” to “prescribe relevant qualifications for their jurors and to provide reasonable exemptions.” 419 U. S., at 537–538. And in Duren, the Court understood that hardship exemptions resembling those Smith assails might well “survive a fair-cross-section challenge.” 439 U. S., at 370. Pp. 14–16.

543 F. 3d 326, reversed and remanded.

GINSBURG, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court. THOMAS, J., filed a concurring opinion.

It is important to take into consideration where you are….

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Adam Benforado (Drexel University – Earle Mack School of Law) has posted The Geography of Criminal Law (Cardozo Law Review, Vol. 31, No. 3, 2010) on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

When Westerners explain the causes of actions or outcomes in the criminal law context, they demonstrate a strong tendency to overestimate the importance of dispositional factors, like thinking, preferring, and willing, and underestimate the impact of interior and exterior situational factors, including environmental, historical, and social forces, as well as affective states, knowledge structures, motives, and other unseen aspects of our cognitive frameworks and processes. One of the situational factors that we are particularly likely to overlook is physical space – that is, landscapes, places, natures, boundaries, and spatialities. Our shortsightedness comes at a great cost. Spatial concerns shape legal structures, order interactions, and influence behavior.

What to do……

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President Obama was expected to quickly turn the page on President
Bush’s detention policies, and yet, over a year into his presidency,
we’re still finding that the page is stuck: The New York Times looks at
the schism within the Obama administration over counterterrorism powers.
Administration lawyers, particularly within the State Department and the
Pentagon, are split over the extent of the White House’s power. The
Times recounts several internal White House battles. Early on, the Obama
team said it would revise Bush’s sweeping detention policies by limiting
its detentions of people without trials to members and “substantial
supporters” of al Qaeda. But last summer, some lawyers argued that an
Algerian “supporter” who helped al Qaeda recruits travel to Afghanistan
was not as detainable as actual al-Qaeda fighters. In a secret memo,
Harold Koh, the State Department’s top lawyer, said there was no backing
in the laws of war for the Algerian man’s detention; the Pentagon’s top
lawyer, meanwhile, argued for a flexible definition of whom could be
detained. Rather than answer the question, the administration simply
redefined the man as effectively part of al Qaeda, rather than just a
supporter.
Read it at The New York Times:
http://e.thedailybeast.com/a/tBLsJs9B7SwhTB8GpDnCgEg3DyG/dail2
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Next week in Criminal Law….

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Next week’s criminal law and procedure arguments
Summaries are from ScotusWiki, which also includes links to briefs and opinions below.

Monday

Renico v. Lett: Whether the Sixth Circuit erred in holding that the Michigan Supreme Court failed to apply clearly established precedent by denying habeas relief on double jeopardy grounds when the state trial court declared a mistrial after the foreperson said that the jury was not going to be able to reach a verdict.
Tuesday

Dillon v. United States: (1) Whether the Federal Sentencing Guidelines are binding when a district court imposes a new sentence pursuant to a revised guideline range under 18 U.S.C. § 3582. (2) Whether during a § 3582(c)(2) sentencing, a district court is required to impose sentence based on an admittedly incorrectly calculated guideline range.
Barber v. Thomas: Does “term of imprisonment” in Section 212(a)(2) of the Sentencing Reform Act, enacting 18 U.S.C. 3624(b), unambiguously require the computation of good time credits on the basis of the sentence imposed?
Wednesday

Carachuri-Rosendo v. Holder: Whether a person convicted under state law for simple drug possession (a federal misdemeanor) has been “convicted” of an “aggravated felony” on the theory that he could have been prosecuted for recidivist simple possession (a federal felony), even though there was no charge or finding of a prior conviction in his prosecution for possession.
Robertson v. U.S. ex rel. Watson: Whether an action for criminal contempt in a congressionally created court may constitutionally be brought in the name and pursuant to the power of a private person, rather than in the name and pursuant to the power of the United States.
March 27, 2010 | Permalink

A Terrorist Lawyer and….

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A Terrorist Lawyer, and Proud of It

Published: March 26, 2010
ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO — I am a criminal defense lawyer. Over the past 32 years I have defended people and institutions charged with a myriad of crimes in the United States and I have consulted on criminal cases in Europe. When I defended someone charged with raping a baby, no one thought I might have raped my own. When I defended someone charged with murder, no one searched my closets for skeletons. When I defended someone charged with a drug crime, no one accused me of using narcotics. And even when I defended those accused of espionage for attempting to sell America’s nuclear secrets, no one questioned my loyalty to my country.

No longer. Now that I am defending those accused of terrorism, some people assume that I have stepped over an imaginary line and become “soft on terrorism” or worse, that I support terrorism and am providing aid and comfort to the enemy.

So let me say it: I am a terrorist lawyer, if that means I am willing to defend those accused of terrorism. I am currently defending two men imprisoned in Guantánamo and I defend others accused of terrorism. Contrary to recent attacks by those who claim to be supporters of American justice, my defense of people accused of serious and sometimes horrific crimes is not an endorsement of those crimes. Rather, it is a testament to the strength of my belief in, and commitment to, the American system of justice. Why? Because in my defense of every client, I am defending the United States Constitution and the laws and treaties to which it is bound, and I am defending the rule of law. If I am a terrorist lawyer, I also am a rule-of-law lawyer, a constitutional lawyer and a treaty lawyer.

Of course I am not alone. Our history is filled with those who were proud to defend accused terrorists and enemies of the state. John Adams, who went on to become the second president of the United States, defended the British soldiers who killed innocent American civilians during what became known as the Boston Massacre. He said of his defense: “The Part I took in Defence of Cptn. Preston and the Soldiers, procured me Anxiety, and Obloquy enough. It was, however, one of the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested Actions of my whole Life, and one of the best Pieces of Service I ever rendered my Country.”

Col. Kenneth Royall, who later became Secretary of the Army, defended eight Germans who came ashore in 1942 intent on damaging U.S. weapons factories. He proclaimed this his finest hour as a lawyer.

Today civilian and military lawyers defend the non-citizens long and wrongfully imprisoned in Guantánamo — most (but not all) of whom are innocent men captured by bounty hunters.

Yes, some, in fact many, of the people I have defended have been found guilty of crimes, including terrorism.

But I am proud to have stood by their sides because they were entitled to have at least one person stand firm in their defense and in the defense of the rule of law against a powerful adversary — the awesome power of my own government. That is what the U.S. Constitution requires me to do and what our system of justice needs me to do if it is to maintain its strength for all of us.

Elected officials in the United States continue to plan for trials by military commissions and even talk of permanently detaining some people without ever determining their guilt or innocence. At least for now, this does not apply to U.S. citizens. But that could change. Once we begin compromising our legal principles and values, it is difficult to predict how much further those principles and values will erode.

The critical point is that this is not American justice. The U.S. Constitution provides that all citizens of the United States and all non-citizens who come to our shores, legally or illegally, or who are accused of violating the long arm of our anti-terrorism statutes abroad, will be safe here from arbitrary treatment.

Sadly, some of the clients accused of terrorism that I and other criminal defense lawyers have sworn an oath to protect and defend have not been safe in the custody of the United States. They have been locked away for years alone and without recourse, and they have suffered from abuse or even torture.

The highest members of the U.S. government knew of this torture and condoned it for too many years, leaving men broken in mind and body. Both of my clients now at Guantánamo have been brutally tortured and both continue to be imprisoned without trial, now for almost 10 years.

The Constitution, laws and treaties I am sworn to defend are not safe either. Every day political figures in the United States continue to use fear in an effort to convince Americans that danger lies in protecting the very freedoms, rights and principles we value.

Those who are shouting the loudest today to limit the rights and protections available to my clients include some who may find themselves on the other side of the law in the future.

Whom will they call should the day come when they are charged with crimes as a result of lying to get the United States into war in Iraq, or permitting prisoners to be tortured, or illegally wiretapping our citizenry?

Nancy Hollander is a criminal defense lawyer in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and a past president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. She currently represents two prisoners incarcerated in Guantánamo.

I need no shackles to remind me…..

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New rule released this week on restraining defendants during trial
By Bethany Krajelis
Law Bulletin staff writer

SPRINGFIELD — The Illinois Supreme Court codified two of its opinions on restraining defendants in a new rule released this week, about two months after an attorney urged the justices to stop the routine shackling of detained juveniles.
Supreme Court Rule 430 states that incarcerated defendants should not be placed in any type of restraint during trial unless there is a clear need to protect the security of the court, maintain the order of proceedings or prevent an escape.
Effective July 1, the rule requires a separate hearing on the need for restraints to be held once the trial judge becomes aware of the restraints, but before letting the defendant appear before the jury.
Though these hearings are now required under the new Supreme Court rule, they aren’t new.
Commonly referred to as Boose hearings, these hearings, as well as factors judges should consider during them, were outlined more than three decades ago in the Illinois Supreme Court opinion in People v. Boose, 66 Ill. 2d 261 (1977).
The new rule simply codifies the court’s holding in Boose as well as its 2006 opinion in People v. Allen, 222 Ill. 2d 340.
In Boose, the state high court held that a defendant could not be shackled before a jury without showing that there was a need for restraint. The court said that this showing can be based on a number of factors, including the possibility the defendant would try to escape or endanger the safety of the courtroom.
In the Illinois Supreme Court’s 4-3 holding in Allen, the court held that a defendant’s due process rights were violated when he was required to wear an electronic stun belt during his trial without having a hearing on the need for the restraint.
The three dissenting justices argued in a 25-page dissent written by Justice Charles E. Freeman that the majority erred in reasoning the defendant in Allen was not entitled to a new trial because he failed to prove the absence of a Boose hearing affected the fairness of his trial.
Though Boose and Allen make it clear that such hearings are required, the new rule lays out 10 factors trial judges must consider before determining whether the need for restraints outweighs the defendant’s right to be free from such restraint.
Those factors are: 1) the seriousness of the charge, 2) the defendant’s temperament or character, 3) the defendant’s age and physical attributes, 4) the defendant’s criminal history, 5) the defendant’s history of past, attempted or planned escapes, 6) evidence of threats made by the defendant, 7) evidence of risk of mob violence, 8) evidence of the possibility others would try to rescue the defendant, 9) the size and mood of the courtroom’s audience and 10) the physical security of the courtroom.
The new rule also comes on the heels of an oral argument in the case of In re Jonathan, C.B., No. 107750, which took place in January and focused on the shackling of a minor in Champaign County.
Though the court has yet to release an opinion in this case, the minor’s attorney Catherine K. Hart, an assistant appellate defender, said she speculates her case may have spurred the new rule.
“Most of the justices’ questions had to do with if there was enough evidence to support my argument that shackling is a widespread problem,” she said Friday.
During her argument before the court, Hart spent a good portion of her time on the issue of shackling. She said her juvenile defendant’s due process rights were violated when he was shackled without a Boose hearing.
To bolster her argument, Hart told the justices about Justice Thomas R. Appleton’s dissent of the 4th District Appellate Court opinion, which affirmed the adjudication of her client’s delinquency. Appleton said in his dissent that “In Champaign County, defendants wear chains as a seeming matter of course.”
One of the several questions posed during the January argument came from Justice Lloyd A. Karmeier. He asked Hart if she was wanted the Supreme Court to require trial judges to conduct Boose hearings even when there is no objection or request from counsel to do so.
She told the justices that “Trial courts should have the responsibility to have a Boose hearing every time a juvenile is brought to court in shackles.”
On Friday, Hart said she was happy the justices codified their previous holdings in the new rule that she hopes will help further protect the due process rights of incarcerated defendants.
New Supreme Court Rule 430, as well as video from the oral argument in Jonathan C.B and the court’s 2006 opinion in Allen, can be found on the Supreme Court Web site.