Ensuring the Right to Effective Representation

In 1997, Cory Maples was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in Alabama by a jury. During that trial, Mr. Maples was represented by counsel who had never handled a capital penalty-phase proceeding, conducted almost no investigation into Mr. Maples’s life, and presented the barest of cases to the jury for why Mr. Maples’s life should be spared.

Later, with the help of different lawyers, Mr. Maples filed a state post-conviction petition to challenge his conviction and sentence — arguing that his trial counsel had been ineffective at the penalty phase, thereby violating his constitutional rights. However, the lawyers handling his case subsequently left their firm without notifying the state appellate court. As a result, Mr. Maples never learned that the court had ruled against him, rejecting his claim of habeas relief for ineffective assistance of counsel, nor did he know that the deadline to appeal the decision had passed.

“Essentially, Mr. Maples was on his way to his execution because his lawyers had abandoned him,” said Greg Garre, one of the lead Latham partners advising Mr. Maples. “No one should want a system where individuals aren’t given every possibility of defending themselves before they face criminal punishment, particularly the gravest form of punishment in terms of taking one’s life.”

Latham took over as counsel, representing Mr. Maples before the US Supreme Court in 2011, and successfully persuaded the Court that Mr. Maples should not be penalized for his previous lawyers’ failures. Writing for a 7-2 majority, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg concluded that, “[i]n these circumstances, no just system would lay the default at Maples’ death-cell door.” The Court ruled that Mr. Maples deserved an opportunity to press forward with his habeas claim.

“No one should want a system where individuals aren’t given every possibility of defending themselves before they face criminal punishment, particularly the gravest form of punishment in terms of taking one’s life.”

Greg Garre, partner, Washington, D.C.

Following that decision, and a subsequent appeal to the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in which Latham prevailed again, our team was tasked with presenting evidence to the federal district court that the original jury in 1997 should have heard during the penalty phase of Mr. Maples’s trial. This was an extensive effort going back to events that took place decades ago. Such evidence was necessary to prove Mr. Maples’s claim that, had trial counsel represented him effectively, the sentencing jury would have heard compelling mitigating evidence about his life and thus potentially changed their death sentence recommendation.

“We knew the case would pose challenges,” said partner Elana Nightingale Dawson, who led the team at the 2019 evidentiary hearing as an associate. “In addition to knocking on doors, building relationships, and asking people to remember events that took place years ago, we recognized that people were still hurting on all sides. We had to approach the investigation with great sensitivity while doing all we could to ensure that the constitutional violation that occurred at Mr. Maples’s trial was remedied.”

After considering the evidence presented at the five-day evidentiary hearing, at which the Latham team put on more than 20 witnesses, then-Chief Judge Karon Bowdre for US District Court for the Northern District of Alabama ruled in Mr. Maples’s favor. At the conclusion of the hearing, Chief Judge Bowdre made extensive remarks — stating that in her 18 years on the federal bench, this was one of the most difficult cases she had presided over.

In January 2022, Chief Judge Bowdre issued an opinion holding that Mr. Maples had been denied effective assistance of counsel at the penalty phase of his 1997 trial and granting his petition for a writ for habeas corpus. Our victory ensures that Mr. Maples has the opportunity to receive effective representation of counsel, as the US Constitution requires.