Opinion ID: 853428
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Issue for the Trial Court

Text: In Wheat, the five-Justice majority reaffirmed the well established presumption in favor of counsel of defendant's choice. 486 U.S. at 164, 108 S.Ct. 1692. The United States Supreme Court nevertheless affirmed the trial court's grant of the prosecution's motion to disqualify joint counsel, and held the trial court should be given wide discretion in this area. Id. at 162-63, 108 S.Ct. 1692. Justice Stevens, joined by Justice Blackmun in dissent, agreed that the trial court should be given wide discretion, but found that discretion abused by a grant of the government's effort to deny the defense joint counsel of their choice. Id. at 173, 108 S.Ct. 1692. Thus, although seven Justices differed in outcome on the facts in Wheat, there was broad agreement that the trial court must be given latitude in its efforts to navigate the Scylla and Charybdis posed by the conflicting Sixth Amendment rights to counsel of one's choice and to competent counsel. We conclude that trial court discretion is necessary because of the tension between these two important rights that must be resolved by the trial court at a time when all relevant information is typically unavailable due to both attorney-client confidences and reluctance to expose trial strategies in advance. It does not follow, however, that because a trial judge may properly refuse a waiver even if the waiver is knowing and voluntary, a trial judge must do so. Although a fair trial is the ultimate goal, we believe an important step in evaluating whether the actual conflict or serious potential for conflict is sufficient to override the defendant's express choice of counsel is an assessment of the defendant's apprehension of the dangers of joint representation. Even if the defendant's consent to joint representation is ultimately determined to preclude a subsequent claim of ineffective assistance grounded in conflict, trial courts should still make appropriate inquiry. And, regardless of the ultimate resolution of the issue left open in Wheat, we think the presumption of deference to the defendant's choice is strengthened by confidence that it is an informed and individual choice by the defendant. Thus, the trial court should attempt to discern whether the defendant knew enough to make the choice an informed onea rational reconciliation of risks and gains that are in the main understood. United States v. Roth, 860 F.2d 1382, 1387-88 (7th Cir.1988). Although we resolve this appeal on grounds unrelated to the joint representation, because the issue was addressed by the Court of Appeals, we do so as well. In this case, the trial court's questioning was quite brief. It established in conclusory terms that Latta had been informed of the risks associated with joint representation and that she wished for Studtmann to represent her, but did not develop any record as to what her understanding of those risks was. At the postconviction hearing, Studtmann testified that he had explained the risks of joint representation to the Lattas rather at length, and discussed the idea of separate counsel with them at the time he moved for separate trials. A trial court may be hard pressed to know how much questioning is enough to establish a knowing and voluntary waiver of a defendant's right to conflict-free representation. Id. at 1387 (It is ... always possible to say that the judge could have mentioned one more thing.). Frequently the initiative to terminate joint representation before or at trial comes from the prosecution, not from a disgruntled defendant or from the court on its own motion. The reasons for this are typically tactical. A splintered defense is more likely to produce a plea agreement with weaker links in the defense chain and may ultimately produce that result as to all if some defendants become potential witnesses for the State. Evaluation of the degree of understanding of the risk of joint representation is made more difficult for the trial court because it cannot explore each defendant's understanding of the pros and cons of this arrangement in detail without intruding on both client confidences and the attorney's work product. Here we have only the conclusory testimony at trial that the Lattas discussed the risks, and their attorney's testimony in the postconviction proceeding that this was done rather at length. Accepting Latta's waiver is consistent with the recognition that the Sixth Amendment provides not only the right to counsel, but the right to counsel of one's choice. Indeed, four Justices in Wheat took the view that accepting the waiver and allowing joint representation was constitutionally required under the circumstances of that case. 486 U.S. at 165-66, 108 S.Ct. 1692 (Marshall, J., joined by Brennan, J., dissenting); 486 U.S. at 172-73, 108 S.Ct. 1692 (Stevens, J., joined by Blackmun, J., dissenting). Although not an absolute right, the right to counsel of one's choice is not one with which courts should be eager to interfere: Lawyers are not fungible, and often the most important decision a defendant makes in shaping his defense is the selection of an attorney. In situations where a defendant is able to retain counsel privately, `the choice of counsel rests in his hands, not in the hands of the state.' Hanna, 714 N.E.2d at 1165-66 (citations omitted). A defendant's exercise of the Sixth Amendment right to control the choice of counsel may ultimately prove disastrous. Nevertheless, we have recently held in another context that unwarranted interference with that Sixth Amendment right may, as in Hanna, require reversal. See Sherwood, 717 N.E.2d at 132 (imposing hybrid representation on a defendant who waives his right to counsel and chooses instead to exercise his right to represent himself violates the Sixth Amendment).