Court Opinion

ID: 9568263
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:01:58.981649+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:24:31.342675
License: Public Domain

SUNDBY, J.
(dissenting). I am unable to agree with the majority that the defendant was not prejudiced by the fact that his attorney was representing the State's sole police witness when Street was charged with and tried for sexual contact with a child. I conclude that such simultaneous representation has an impermissible chilling effect upon counsel's duty to represent his or her client. I therefore dissent.
When defendant retained his trial counsel, counsel was representing Detective Thomas Schrank in a *555divorce action. Counsel testified that he informed Street that he was representing Schrank. Street interjected: "He's a liar." Counsel testified that he was aware that he needed written permission from both Street and Schrank in order to represent Street in the criminal prosecution. At the request of appellate counsel, the court took judicial notice of Supreme Court Rule 20:1.7 which provides in part:
(a) A lawyer shall not represent a client if the representation of that client will be directly adverse to another client, unless:
(2) each client consents in writing after consultation.
The COMMENT to this rule states in part:
Loyalty is an essential element in the lawyer's relationship to a client. An impermissible conflict of interest may exist before representation is undertaken, in which event the representation should be declined....
. . . Loyalty to a client is . . . impaired when a lawyer cannot consider, recommend or carry out an appropriate course of action for the client because of the lawyer's other responsibilities or interests.... A possible conflict does not itself preclude the representation. The critical questions are the likelihood that a conflict will eventuate and, if it does, whether it will materially interfere with the lawyer's independent professional judgment in considering alternatives or foreclose courses of action that reasonably should be pursued on behalf of the client....
... The potential for conflict of interest in representing multiple defendants in a criminal case is so *556grave that ordinarily a lawyer should decline to represent more than one co-defendant... .
The potential for conflict of interest in simultaneously representing a criminal defendant and a representative of the State charged with the responsibility of prosecuting the defendant is so grave that an attorney should not undertake representation of a criminal defendant in such circumstances, even where disclosure is made and the client consents. The usual criminal defendant is so unfamiliar with criminal procedure — plea bargaining, admission of inculpatory statements, admission of other-acts evidence, impeachment of witnesses, submission to the jury of an instruction on a lesser-included offense, and jury instructions, for example — that the criminal defendant cannot be expected to make an intelligent decision whether to waive the conflict of interest.
The multiple representation of co-defendants does not implicate these considerations in the usual case. Frequently, the defendant may gain an advantage by having his or her counsel represent co-defendants. It can be easily explained to a defendant that such representation could result in antagonistic defenses, depending on the course of the trial and the evidence presented by the State. However, there is nothing a criminal defendant can gain by having as his counsel an attorney who may have a conscious or unconscious reluctance to present a zealous defense which may antagonize his private client.
The majority would place on the criminal defendant the burden to show that his counsel did not in fact provide the kind of zealous representation to which a criminal defendant is entitled. I conclude that placing this burden on the defendant violates his Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel and his *557Fourteenth Amendment right to due process. A criminal defendant cannot possibly know what course of action his or her counsel might have taken had he or she been free to represent the defendant zealously.
Although I conclude that an attorney may not represent a criminal defendant and a member of the prosecutor's team simultaneously, I do not conclude that failure of an attorney to withdraw when such conflict becomes evident, requires reversal of every resulting criminal conviction. The attorney may represent a minor player on the prosecutor's team without adversely affecting his or her representation of the criminal defendant. However, Detective Schrank was not a minor player on the prosecutor's team; he was the investigating officer, he interviewed the children and Street, referred the case to the district attorney, testified on behalf of the State, and sat with the district attorney at counsel table throughout the trial. As the majority concludes, the defendant and Detective Schrank were adversaries. Majority op. at 544. I therefore conclude that the defendant did not receive a fair trial and I would reverse his conviction and remand for a new trial.