In a lecture at the Widener University School of Law, Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Thomas G. Saylor criticized the poor state of death penalty representation in Pennsylvania. He offered numerous cases in which death sentences were overturned because attorneys had failed to present mitigating evidence to the jury. Quoting from a special concurrence he wrote on a capital case involving ineffective assistance of counsel, he said, “Of greatest concern, these sorts of exceptionally costly failures, particularly as manifested across the wider body of cases, diminish the State’s credibility in terms of its ability to administer capital punishment and tarnish the justice system, which is an essential part of such administration.” He cited a study of Philadelphia’s death-penalty representation system, which found that the system for appointing lawyers was “woefully inadequate,” “completely inconsistent with how competent trial lawyers work,” “punish[ed] counsel for handling these cases correctly,” and unacceptably “increase[d] the risk of ineffective assistance of counsel” in individual cases. Saylor said, “Every taxpayer should be seriously concerned about the systemic costs of inadequate defense for the poor. When the justice system fails to get it right the first time, we all pay, often for years, for new filings, retrials, and appeals. Poor systems of defense do not make economic sense.”
Saylor concluded with recommendations for improving representation, including greater public awareness of the problem, better funding for indigent defense, guidelines for defense counsel in capital cases, and better judicial decision-making.
(T. Saylor, “Death-Penalty Stewardship and the Current State of Pennsylvania Capital Jurisprudence,” Widener Law Journal, 2013.) See Representation and New Voices.
