JANE WILSON AND JEFFREY RAYMOND

Douglas Colbert (Photo provided by Robert Burke)

Criminal defendants appearing at their first bail hearings have the right to legal counsel, according to a unanimous Jan. 4 decision from the Maryland Court of Appeals, the state’s highest court. The ruling in favor of a class action lawsuit filed by 10 people who had been arrested on a variety of misdemeanor and felony charges follows years of pro bono work on their behalf by attorneys from the law firm Venable, LLP; by Douglas Colbert, JD, professor at the Francis King Carey School of Law; and by students in the School’s Access to Justice Clinic.    

Colbert called the court’s ruling “the most important right to counsel decision” since 1963, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a defendant charged with a felony cannot be forced to go to trial without a lawyer, even if the defendant cannot afford one. Colbert says the Maryland Court of Appeals “extended the right to counsel to initial appearances throughout the state of Maryland.” 

The decision, which Colbert says may have national implications, attracted the involvement of the American Bar Association and some of the country’s oldest and largest civil rights groups.

“This decision is a tremendous victory for low-income people who may otherwise spend time in jail simply because they can’t afford counsel,” says Phoebe A. Haddon, JD, LLM, professor and dean of the Francis King Carey School of Law. “It is part of the law school’s long tradition of expanding access to justice for all, particularly the poor.”

Currently, people arrested in Maryland for serious offenses appear before a commissioner who decides whether to release the person on their own recognizance or on bail—or not at all. Arrested persons appear alone and are not told that when responding to the commissioner their answers may be used against them later in a trial.  

If the commissioner sets bail that can’t be met, “the defendant stands a good chance of losing his or her liberty, if only for a brief time,” Judge Mary Ellen Barbera wrote in the court’s opinion.

Colbert and dozens of his students worked on the lawsuit for five years as it wound its way through the courts.

“It takes tremendous dedication, focus, long hours, and even tunnel,vision to accomplish a victory like this,“ says Sherrilyn Ifill, JD, professor at the law school. “But the payoff is a more just system and greater fairness for literally thousands of arrestees each year. What a great model for our students! I’m proud of Doug and all the many students who have helped him over the years.”

Colbert praised his students and Venable attorneys Michael Schatzow and Mitchell Merviss for their work, He also thanked the more than 100 faculty at the University of Maryland and University of Baltimore law schools who signed an amicus brief supporting Colbert’s arguments.