# Willie James Brown v. Louie L. Wainwright, Etc.

> Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · January 11, 1982 · 665 F.2d 607

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9468661

## Case

- **Full name:** Willie James BROWN, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Louie L. WAINWRIGHT, Etc., Respondent-Appellee
- **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
- **Decided:** January 11, 1982
- **Citations:** 665 F.2d 607; 1982 U.S. App. LEXIS 22707
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Garwood
- **Judges:** Hatchett, Godbold, Brown, Clark, Roney, Gee, Tjoflat, Hill, Fay, Rubin, Vance, Kravitch, Johnson, Garza, Henderson, Reavley, Politz, Hatch-Ett, Anderson, Randall, Tate, Williams, Garwood
- **Cited by:** 231 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- **Yellow flag:** Disagreed with by People v. Dunkle, 32 Cal. Rptr. 3d 23 (2005).
- Negative treatments: 1
- Distinguished by: 0
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9468661

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- holding that the defendant waived his initial request through subsequent conduct because he agreed to counsel’s representation before the court denied his motion to waive counsel and because the defendant never informed the court of a continuing desire to conduct his own defen…
- finding that a defendant waived his right to self-representation where the defendant retained appointed counsel after a hearing on the defendant’s pro se motion to remove counsel, where Defendant told the court that he and appointed counsel had worked out their differences and…
- concluding that after the court had deferred a ruling on a motion for self-representation to allow the defendant to see if his differences with counsel could be resolved, the attorney’s subsequent statement that he and the client had resolved their differences supported the co…
- finding that right to self- representation was waived where the defendant conceded that at some point after his request to represent himself he asked counsel to continue his representation and counsel's statement that he and the defendant had worked out their differences
- finding that right to self-representation was waived where the defendant conceded that at some point after his request to represent himself he asked counsel to continue his representation and counsel’s statement that he and the defendant had worked out their differences

## Opinion text

*616 GARWOOD, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I concur in all of Judge Roney’s opinion. I wish, however, to emphasize that following an evidentiary hearing the federal district court has found on the basis of adequate evidence that Petitioner, after the requests and motion to represent himself were made and before any ruling thereon by the state trial judge, resolved his differences with his appointed lawyer and “requested him to continue the representation,” which resolution and request the lawyer then communicated to the state trial judge, who “therefore, either denied the motion or considered it to be abandoned.” Though Petitioner’s subsequent acquiescence in continued representation by counsel is corroborative of the evidence that he in fact requested counsel to continue to act on his behalf, I would be reluctant to hold that such acquiescence of itself waived his earlier clearly asserted right of self-representation. However, since Petitioner did in fact request continued representation by his appointed counsel, the substance of his rights has in fact been protected. While it would surely be efficient and otherwise desirable to have the facts in this regard more formally memorialized in the state court proceedings, not everything which is desirable or efficient is therefore constitutionally required; and where the relevant facts are adequately otherwise proved I cannot hold that the mere lack of memorialization gives Petitioner a constitutional right to another trial when it has been sufficiently established that he in fact was afforded all the representational rights to which he was entitled under the Constitution.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9468661. Public record. Not legal advice.
