Court Opinion

ID: 9419740
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:51:20.70008+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:27.875676
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Murphy,
dissenting.
The complete travesty of justice revealed by the record in this case forces me to dissent.
The constitutional right to assistance of counsel is a very necessary and practical one. The ordinary person accused of crime has little if any knowledge of law or experience in its application. He is ill-prepared to combat the arsenal of statutes, decisions, rules of procedure, technicalities pleading and other legal weapons at the ready disposal of the prosecutor. Without counsel; many of his elementary procedural and substantive rights may be lost irretrievably in the intricate legal maze of a criminal proceeding. Especially is this true of the ignorant, the indigent, the illiterate and the immature defendant. Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S. 45, 69; Williams v. Kaiser, 323 U. S. 471, 474-476. Courts must therefore be unyielding in their insistence that this basic canon of justice, this right to counsel, be respected at all times.
*88Today, however, a serious qualification is added to this constitutional right to which I am unable to assent. Petitioner and two others were indicted on May 25, 1931, for three offenses: (1) robbery in the first degree; (2) grand larceny in the second degree; and (3) assault in the second degree. They were arraigned on the same day and pleaded not guilty. Petitioner at this time was but 19 years old, indigent, poorly educated, orphaned and ignorant of his right to counsel. The court did not inform him of his right to counsel at this time and it does not appear that he competently and intelligently waived his constitutional right. Several days later, on June 1, petitioner again appeared without counsel and without being informed of his right in that respect. This time he withdrew his plea of not guilty and entered a plea of guilty to the crime of first degree robbery. The prosecutor agreed to withdraw the other charges. On June 17, a notice of appearance of counsel on behalf’of petitioner was filed. And on June 19, in the presence of this counsel, petitioner was sentenced to serve from 15 to 30 years in prison. On the basis of these facts, the Court now holds that petitioner was adequately represented by counsel. The error manifest in the denial of the right of counsel during the arraignment and the plea of guilty is held cured by the mere presence of counsel on the day of the imposition of the sentence.
It is said that, at least under New York practice, the attorney on the day of the sentencing could have moved to withdraw petitioner’s plea of guilty; the judge would then have had power to set aside the plea and let the petitioner stand trial. On the assumption that the judge would have granted such a motion had it been made, the argument is advanced that petitioner had counsel in ample time to take advantage of every defense originally avail*89able. Thus the conclusion is reached that this denial of the right to counsel prior to the imposition of sentence is in compliance with the Constitution.
In my opinion, however, the right to counsel means nothing unless it means the right to counsel at each and every step in. a criminal proceeding. The failure at any particular point to have representation or to be aware of one’s right to counsel may have an indelible and imponderable effect upon the entire proceeding, an effect which may not be erasable on the day of imposing the sentence. As was said in Glasser v. United States, 315 U. S. 60, 76, “The right to have the assistance of counsel is too fundamental and absolute to allow courts to indulge in nice calculations as to the amount of prejudice arising from its denial.” So here we cannot assume or determine that the denial of counsel at the timé of the arraignment and plea was harmless. Nor can we say with certainty that the presence of counsel at the final stage of the proceeding was sufficient to counteract the prejudice inherent in the prior denial of counsel. Unless all the effects of such a constitutional infirmity are completely and unquestionably eliminated, a conviction cannot stand. An elimination of that nature ordinarily, and particularly in this case, means a new proceeding in which the right to counsel is fully protected at all times.
It is further significant that the failure of the trial court to inform the petitioner of his right to counsel was in violation not only of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment but also of Article 1, § 6, of the New York Constitution and of §§ 8,188,308 and 309 of the New York Code of Criminal Procedure. The arraignment and the plea of guilty were thereby vitiated, from which it follows that the conviction was inconsistent with due process of law. See Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U. S. 458, 468; Waley v. Johnston, 316 U. S. 101, 104.
*90The lack of due process in the conviction was unaffected by the possibility that the counsel which petitioner eventually obtained might have successfully moved to vacate the void plea of guilty. Constitutional rights as well as due process requirements rest upon something more substantial than what might have been but was not done. The inescapable facts confronting us are that petitioner-was denied the right to counsel and that the court’s judgment was based upon an illegal arraignment and plea. Counsel’s negligence in failing to move to set aside that plea should not blind us to those facts; nor can it invest the proceeding with the due process which it otherwise lacked.
Moreover, even had petitioner’s counsel been successful in making such a motion, the effect of the illegal plea might not have been dissipated. Under New York law, a plea of guilty which is withdrawn may subsequently be admitted in evidence at the trial. People v. Steinmetz, 240 N. Y. 411, 148 N. E. 597. And even though such a practice might be of doubtful constitutionality under these circumstances, the possibility of its occurrence may have effectively and understandably deterred counsel from seeking to set aside the plea and subjecting petitioner to the risk of a greater sentence.
The denial of the petitioner’s constitutional rights was a serious matter. Unaided by counsel, he was faced with charges of three crimes. Each of these crimes involved different degrees. Petitioner was not competent, to decide whether he was properly charged with the correct degree of each crime. Nor was he competent to determine whether to plead guilty to any or all of the offenses. Those were complex legal problems as to which petitioner deserved legal aid. Yet that necessary aid was denied him. Nothing happened on the day of sentencing, moreover, to negative that fact. To sustain his conviction there*91fore fails to give petitioner the high degree of protection which his constitutional right to counsel deserves.