Opinion ID: 2088662
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Right to Presence of Counsel During Psychiatric Examination

Text: The defendant pleaded insanity, and defense counsel asked the trial court for an order that he be allowed to attend the court-ordered psychiatric examinations required by Ind. Code § 35-36-2-2. The trial court instead allowed the examining doctors to decide whether defense counsel could be present during their examinations of the defendant. One of the two doctors did not allow defense counsel to be present. The defendant argues that under the test stated in Manley v. State (1980), Ind. App., 410 N.E.2d 1338, a psychiatric examination following an insanity plea is a critical stage at which his constitutional right to counsel arises. Manley defines critical stage as those parts of the proceedings where incrimination may occur or where the opportunity for effective defense must be seized or be foregone. Id. at 1342. This definition was taken from a Third Circuit Court of Appeals case, United States v. Anderson (1972), 3d Cir., 461 F.2d 739. However, the United States Supreme Court has taken another path in determining what is a critical stage. In United States v. Wade (1967), 388 U.S. 218, 87 S.Ct. 1926, 18 L.Ed.2d 1149, the Court noted that its cases have construed the sixth amendment guarantee of assistance of counsel to apply to critical stages of the proceedings. Id. at 224, 87 S.Ct. at 1931, 18 L.Ed.2d at 1157. It is central to that principle that in addition to counsel's presence at trial, the accused is guaranteed that he need not stand alone against the State at any stage of the prosecution, formal or informal, in court or out, where counsel's absence might derogate from the accused's right to a fair trial. Id. at 226, 87 S.Ct. at 1932, 18 L.Ed.2d at 1157. In United States v. Ash (1973), 413 U.S. 300, 93 S.Ct. 2568, 37 L.Ed.2d 619, the Court examined the historical background and development of the sixth amendment right to counsel, then concluded: This review of the history and expansion of the Sixth Amendment counsel guarantee demonstrates that the test utilized by the Court has called for examination of the event in order to determine whether the accused required aid in coping with legal problems or assistance in meeting his adversary. Id. at 313, 93 S.Ct. at 2575, 37 L.Ed.2d at 628. The Court was guided by Wade and Ash in United States v. Gouveia (1984), 467 U.S. 180, 188-89, 104 S.Ct. 2292, 2298, 81 L.Ed.2d 146, 154-55, when it said: We have recognized that the core purpose of the counsel guarantee is to assure aid at trial, when the accused [is] confronted with both the intricacies of the law and the advocacy of the public prosecutor. [quoting Ash ]       Although we have extended an accused's right to counsel to certain critical pretrial proceedings, [citing Wade ], we have done so recognizing that at those proceedings, the accused [is] confronted just as at trial, by the procedural system, or by his expert adversary, or by both, [quoting Ash ], in a situation where the results of the confrontation might well settle the accused's fate and reduce the trial itself to a mere formality. [quoting Wade ] Thus, the proper test for determining whether a particular proceeding is a critical stage, to which the assistance of counsel guarantee applies, is whether the defendant is confronted with the intricacies of the law or the advocacy of the public prosecutor or prosecuting authorities. A psychiatric examination involves no intricacies of the law. Because the examiner, appointed by the trial court, under Ind. Code § 35-36-2-2, is disinterested, the defendant is thus not facing his adversary in such an examination. The defendant was not entitled to the presence of his counsel during the psychiatric examinations.