The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
washingtonpost.com
The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
1–10 of 121 posts
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#2You're allowed to ignore the sixth amendment when the target is a poor brown skinned foreigner, you can't do that to rich white Americans!
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#3You're allowed to ignore the sixth amendment when the target is a poor brown skinned foreigner, you can't do that to rich white Americans!
[deleted]
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#4Is this just an assertion that no money == no counsel, or is there some other attack on the 6th amendment here?
I think the notion that 'clean' assets can be frozen pre-trial is unfair, but as long as a public defender is actually available, that would seem to satisfy the amendment.
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#5>the court will decide whether the government can freeze all of a defendant’s assets before trial, even those the government itself concedes aren’t tainted by any connection to criminality, thus effectively preventing that defendant from paying for his own defense.
The shadow issue of our time is equal access to the legal system. It will be interesting to see how this changes the dynamic of the court system if the Supreme Court really decides that defendants cannot hire their own counsel though it is a bit like solving the equal access to education problem by banning all private colleges -- more than a little absurd.
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#6[deleted]
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#7Is this just an assertion that no money == no counsel, or is there some other attack on the 6th amendment here? I think the notion that 'clean' assets can be frozen pre-trial is unfair, but as long as a public defender is actually available, that would seem to satisfy the amendment.
> actually available
Define "actually available"
Most public defenders offices are so oversubscribed and underfunded that they can't really provide good representation for the majority of their clients.
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#8Is this just an assertion that no money == no counsel, or is there some other attack on the 6th amendment here? I think the notion that 'clean' assets can be frozen pre-trial is unfair, but as long as a public defender is actually available, that would seem to satisfy the amendment.
So the same government that is spending money to prosecute you gets to determine how much money they will spend on a public defender for you? We've covered this ground before:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10177778
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#9Is this just an assertion that no money == no counsel, or is there some other attack on the 6th amendment here? I think the notion that 'clean' assets can be frozen pre-trial is unfair, but as long as a public defender is actually available, that would seem to satisfy the amendment.
> actually available Define "actually available" Most public defenders offices are so oversubscribed and underfunded that they can't really provide good representation for the majority of their clients.
That sounds like a different argument: that the current public-defender system operates so poorly that the result violates the 6th amendment by failing to provide effective counsel. But the proper remedy there would be to issue an injunction ordering the system to be improved, not to unfreeze certain defendants' assets, since the latter would leave the 6th amendment violation uncured in the case of defendants who don't have assets in the first place.
The current case seems to be arguing something different: that freezing defendant's assets that they could use to pay for counsel is a 6th amendment violation even assuming an effective public-defender system. That requires a separate right, something like: the right to pay for the best defense you can afford. Afaict, this is at the Supreme Court because they've never ruled either way on whether the 6th amendment includes such a right; the previous cases have focused on the minimum threshold for what constitutes effective assistance of counsel.
Re: The Supreme Court could soon deliver a blow to the Sixth Amendment
#10Is this just an assertion that no money == no counsel, or is there some other attack on the 6th amendment here? I think the notion that 'clean' assets can be frozen pre-trial is unfair, but as long as a public defender is actually available, that would seem to satisfy the amendment.
Yes, the theoretical availability of public defenders satisfies the literal text of the amendment. That being said, effectively banning most private counsel (except those working for free or possibly on contingency) and, in practice, forcing most defendants to rely on a government-employed counsel means locking up the spirit and throwing away the key.