Clarence Thomas would let people be executed for a legal filing error [View all]

[muriel_volestrangler]

This sniffing that a couple of innocent filing errors are just an occupational hazard may be necessary to ward off the more obvious and sensible conclusion to be drawn here, which is that Thomas applies one standard to himself and another to everyone else—and most specifically, to capital defendants who face execution because of errors committed by their attorneys, through no fault of their own, and often without their knowledge.

In perhaps the most egregious example, 2012’s Maples v. Thomas, two lawyers at the law firm Sullivan and Cromwell volunteered to represent Cory Maples, an indigent defendant contesting his death sentence. The lawyers left the law firm and ended their representation but failed to inform their client. An Alabama court ruled against Maples automatically because his (erstwhile) lawyers failed to appear. Maples had no idea. He then inadvertently forfeited his right to appeal because the clock ran out with no filings from his lawyers—again, without his knowledge. The Alabama court sent copies of its decision to Sullivan and Cromwell, but the mailroom returned them unopened. When Maples finally discovered these mistakes, he asked a federal court for relief, pointing to his lawyers’ blunders. A lower court ruled against him, but the Supreme Court sided with Maples, declaring, “A client cannot be charged with the acts or omissions of an attorney who has abandoned him.”

Thomas dissented. He, along with Justice Antonin Scalia, would’ve let the consequences of Sullivan and Cromwell’s error fall upon Maples, with the resulting death penalty as a consequence. Scalia and Thomas reasoned that Maples had “no right to counsel” to begin with since he had already been convicted. So, they concluded, his counsels’ mistakes did not provide cause for a do-over.
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Unfortunately, Thomas has not always been on the losing side of these cases; in fact, he wrote the majority opinion in Lawrence v. Florida, a particularly egregious 5–4 decision in 2007. The facts were depressingly familiar: A lawyer for Gary Lawrence, who contested his death sentence, missed a deadline that prevented him from seeking relief. Lawrence asked for an extension, equitable tolling, citing his attorney’s error. Thomas refused. Writing for the court, he explained, “If credited, this argument would essentially equitably toll limitations periods for every person whose attorney missed a deadline. Attorney miscalculation is simply not sufficient to warrant equitable tolling, particularly in the postconviction context where prisoners have no constitutional right to counsel.”

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/08/clarence-thomas-ethics-worst-supreme-court-votes.html

via the Lawyers, Guns & Money blog