Law Commons^™

The Bounds Of Zeal In Criminal Defense: Some Thoughts On Lynne Stewart, Abbe Smith

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

On April 9, 2002, a troop of armed FBI agents stormed the Brooklyn town house of sixty-two-year-old Lynne Stewart. A school librarian turned criminal lawyer, Stewart thought they had come for her life partner, longtime political activist Ralph Poynter. Flashing an arrest warrant, the agent in charge informed her otherwise, "We're not here for him, we're here for you." As her neighbors looked on, Stewart was handcuffed and taken off to jail.

Indicted under a federal law that prohibits providing "material support or resources" to organizations designated by the Secretary of State as engaging in terrorist activity, Stewart suddenly found …

Defending The Innocent, Abbe Smith

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Of the legal scholarship examining the representation of the innocent accused, most has to do with guilty pleas, not trial or post-trial advocacy. Most of this literature is concerned with the pressure put on innocent defendants to plead guilty in order to receive a more lenient sentence than what they would get if found guilty at trial. This problem is compounded by the inability of poor defendants to make bail. Unfortunately, there are other, equally insidious ways to pressure innocent defendants to plead guilty. When addressing the question of defending the innocent at trial or in a post-conviction challenge, most …