About 2,000 people were freed in Florida alone as a result of the
Gideon decision. The decision did not directly result in Gideon being freed; instead, he received a new trial with the appointment of defense counsel at the government's expense. Gideon chose
W. Fred Turner to be his lawyer in his second trial. The retrial took place on August 5, 1963, five months after the Supreme Court ruling. During the trial, Turner picked apart the testimony of eyewitness Henry Cook. In his opening and closing statements, Turner suggested that Cook likely had been a lookout for a group of young men who broke into the poolroom to steal beer and then grabbed the coins while they were there. Turner also obtained a statement from a cab driver who had taken Gideon from Bay Harbor to a bar in Panama City, stating that Gideon was carrying neither wine, beer, nor Coca-Cola when he picked him up, even though Cook testified that he had watched Gideon walk from the pool hall to a payphone and then wait for a cab. This testimony completely discredited Cook. The jury acquitted Gideon after one hour of deliberation. After his acquittal, Gideon resumed his previous life and married sometime later. He died of cancer in Fort Lauderdale on January 18, 1972, at age 61. Gideon's family in Missouri accepted his body and laid him to rest in an unmarked grave. A granite headstone was added later. It was inscribed with a quote from a letter Gideon wrote to Abe Fortas, the attorney appointed to represent him in the Supreme Court: "Each era finds an improvement in law for the benefit of mankind."
Impact on courts The former "incorrect trial" rule, where the government was given a fair amount of latitude in criminal proceedings as long as there were no "shocking departures from fair procedure", was discarded in favor of a firm set of "procedural guarantees" based on the Constitution. The court reversed
Betts and adopted rules that did not require a case-by-case analysis, but instead established the requirement of appointed counsel as a matter of right, without a defendant's having to show "special circumstances" that justified the appointment of counsel.
Public defender system Many changes have been made in the prosecution and legal representation of indigent defendants since the
Gideon decision. The decision created and then expanded the need for public defenders, which had previously been rare. For example, immediately following the decision, Florida required
public defenders in all of its circuit courts. The need for more public defenders also led to a need to ensure that they were properly trained in criminal defense, in order to allow defendants to receive as fair a trial as possible. Several states and counties followed suit. Washington, D.C., for instance, has created a training program for their public defenders, who must receive rigorous training before they are allowed to represent defendants, and must continue their training in order to remain current in criminal law, procedure, and practices. In 2010, a public defender's office in the South Bronx,
The Bronx Defenders, created the Center for Holistic Defense, which has helped many state public defender offices and developed a model of public defense called holistic defense or holistic advocacy. In it, criminal defense attorneys work on interdisciplinary teams, alongside civil attorneys, social workers, and legal advocates to help clients with not only direct but also collateral aspects of their criminal cases. More recently the
American Bar Association and the
National Legal Aid and Defender Association have set minimum training requirements, caseload levels, and experience requirements for defenders.
Cause of the civil right to counsel movement Gideon v. Wainwright marked a key transition in
legal aid in the United States. After
Gideon, and amid growing concern about the paucity of resources for poverty lawyering and the resource burden of case-by-case counsel determinations, state judges and legislators saw the benefit of ensuring the right to counsel for civil litigants just as Gideon provided for criminal defendants. Additionally, an influential 1997 article by a federal district court judge helped revitalize the conversation about the need and justification for a right to counsel in civil cases. In contrast to the self-representation movement, the historical civil right to counsel movement was founded on the premise that systemic representation by counsel "ensures more accurate outcomes in civil cases". Proponents of the movement also argue that a right to counsel "saves federal and state government money by helping to avoid the
negative externalities caused by litigants wrongly losing their civil cases (such as increased use of shelters, emergency medical care, foster care, police, and public benefits), and increases the public's faith and investment in the judicial process". some of its opponents have argued that it places an unreasonable financial burden on states that have an inadequate understanding of the costs and resources needed for civil counsel. Outside of influencing policy, the civil right to counsel movement has fueled approaches to legal aid that aim to alleviate the financial burden civil litigants face. Aid through lawyer substitutes has become more prevalent, involving non-lawyer professionals who can assist clients in legal matters without the supervision of a certified attorney. Similarly, pro bono legal aid, which involves providing legal services without fees in order to promote public good, has gained prominence.
Waiving the right to counsel Doughty v. Maxwell demonstrates the differences between how states and the federal government address standards for waiver of the right to counsel. In this case, the Supreme Court granted certiorari and reversed the decision of the Ohio court in
Doughty, which held that regardless of
Gideon, the defendant waived their right to appointed counsel by entering a plea of guilty. The underlying alleged crime and trial in
Doughty took place in
Ohio, which had its own way of interpreting the right to counsel, as do many states.
Pennsylvania and
West Virginia also deemed that the right to counsel was waived when a plea of guilty was entered. Depending upon one's viewpoint, rules such as these could be seen as an attempt by a state to establish reasonable rules in criminal cases or as an attempt to save money even at the expense of denying a defendant due process. This varies a great deal from federal law, which generally has stricter guidelines for waiving the right to counsel. An analogous area of criminal law is the circumstances under which a criminal defendant can waive the right to trial. Under federal law, the defendant can only waive their right to trial if it is clear that the defendant understands the "charges, the consequences of the various pleas, and the availability of counsel". State laws on the subject are often less strict, making it easier for prosecutors to obtain a defendant's waiver of the right to trial. ==Criticism==