holding that it is a violation of the Sixth Amendment for defense counsel to deprive a criminal defendant of a substantial defense by his own ineffectiveness or incompetence
How later courts described this case
- holding that it is a violation of the Sixth Amendment for defense counsel to deprive a criminal defendant of a substantial defense by his own ineffectiveness or incompetence
- noting that defense counsel “must conscientiously protect his client’s interest” by asserting “all apparently substantial defenses available to the defendant . . . in a proper and timely manner”
- holding a strategy could be so bad as to amount to ineffective assistance of counsel
- “counsel reasonably likely to render and rendering reasonably effective assistance”; “counsel must perform at least as well as a lawyer with ordinary training and skill in the criminal law and must conscientiously protect his client’s interests”
Written by the judges who cited it.
Distinguished
Distinguished by Pillette v. Foltz, 580 F. Supp. 1290 (1984)
While, as we stated in Beasley, the harmless error test is inapplicable to proven claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, the court must first find counsel’s performance constitutionally deficient, and that evaluation inevitably turns in large part on the soundness of counsel’s legal judgments____ Although we have rejected the idea that an attorney’s errors may be held entirely harm
Distinguished by United States v. Stanley Yelardy, 567 F.2d 863 (1978)
While, as we stated in Beasley, the harmless error test is inapplicable to proven claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, the court must first find counsel’s performance constitutionally deficient, and that evaluation inevitably turns in large part on the soundness of counsel’s legal judgments.
The opinion
EDWARDS, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I concur in Judge Celebrezze’s remand of this case for new trial. The phrase “farce and a mockery, shocking to the Court” is too subjective a standard to employ as the sole criterion for determining whether or not there has been a Sixth Amendment deprivation of counsel.
The District Judge has entered strong findings of fact concerning the incompetence and ineffectiveness of appellant’s trial counsel. These findings do not appear to me to be “clearly erroneous.”