One attor­ney’s appeal brief on behalf of a Texas death row inmate was so poor­ly writ­ten that State District Judge Noe Gonzalez of Edinburg wrote that ​“Applicant total­ly mis­in­ter­prets what actu­al­ly occurred in this case.” A com­mit­tee of cit­i­zens and attor­neys filed a com­plaint about the appel­late lawyer with the State Bar of Texas, but noth­ing was done: the lawyer remains on the state’s list of approved death penal­ty attor­neys, and the client remains on death row.

The prob­lem is wide­spread and Judge Cheryl Johnson, a Republican on the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, remarked, ​“It’s a prob­lem. It needs to be addressed. But I don’t think there are any easy solu­tions to it.”

Ultimately, it is the defen­dant who suf­fers from such inef­fec­tive rep­re­sen­ta­tion. According to an inves­ti­ga­tion by the San Antonio Express- News, ​“Just last month, Texas exe­cut­ed Justin Fuller, whose appoint­ed lawyer filed a habeas chal­lenge with ram­bling claims, glar­ing typos and inco­her­ent rep­e­ti­tions. Another exe­cu­tion is sched­uled in January for an inmate whose appoint­ed lawyer filed two pages — upward of 100 is more com­mon — that raised only one claim, and experts say it was fatal­ly flawed.”

(Maro Robbins, San Antonio Express-News, Sept. 25, 2006). See Representation.

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