Summaries of Successful Cases Under

Ake v. Oklahoma 
or Analogous to Ake
Through August 2006

 

INTRODUCTION

 

In Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68, 71 (1985), the Supreme Court recognized that indigent defendants are entitled to independent mental health experts when their assistance "may well be crucial to the defendant's ability to marshal a defense." Ake, supra, 470 U.S. at 80. The Court conducted a Fourteenth Amendment due process analysis, id. at 87, and held that without independent experts defendants could be denied "meaningful access to justice." Id. at 76-77. This was because, while jurors may disregard a defendant's testimony or a lawyer's argument, experts "assist lay jurors, who generally have no training in" scientific or medical matters "to make a sensible and educated determination about" the contested issues. Id., 470 U.S. at 81. "By organizing ...[data], interpreting it in light of their expertise, and then laying out their investigative and analytic process to the jury, the [expert] for each party enable[s] the jury to make its most accurate determination of the issue before them." Id. at 81 (emphasis added). See also Cowley v. Stricklin, 929 F.2d 640 (11th Cir. 1991); Kordenbrock v. Scroggy, 919 F.2d 1091 (6th Cir.)(en banc), cert. denied,499 U.S. 970 (1991); Blake v. Kemp, 758 F.2d 523 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 998 (1985); Smith v. McCormick, 914 F.2d 1153 (9th Cir. 1990). Because jurors do listen to, are influenced by, and will rely upon the testimony of such experts, a trial may be fundamentally unfair when a party is left without expert assistance. Ake, supra, 472 U.S. at 80.

Under Ake, "the State must, at a minimum, assure the defendant access to a competent psychiatrist who will conduct an appropriate examination and assist in evaluation, preparation and presentation of the defense." Ake, supra, 470 U.S. at 83 (emphasis added). See also Bell v. Evatt, 72 F.3d 421 (4^th Cir. 1995); Buttrum v. Black, 721 F.Supp. 1268, 1312 (N.D. Ga. 1989), aff'd, 908 F.2d 695 (11th Cir. 1990)(expert "failed to provide the scope of psychiatric assistance contemplated by Ake"). Furthermore, the expert must be the defendant's, i.e., independent of the state. Cowley, supra, 929 F.2d at 644; McCormick, supra, 914 F.2d at 1157; United States v. Sloan, 776 F.2d 926, 929 (10th Cir. 1985)("essential benefit of having an expert in the first place is denied the defendant when the services of the doctor must be shared with the prosecution").

While Ake involved the right to a mental health expert, its reasoning compels that states provide other competent and independent experts for the defense when such expertise is necessary. This case list presents cases which enforce Ake vis-a-vis all sorts of experts -- psychologists, forensic pathologists, serologists, hypnotists, ballistics, and others. If an expert would assist you in evaluating the state's case, or in developing and presenting your own, then Ake and its progeny requires that you seek, and the court provide, such assistance.

If you know of additional successful cases that are not included, please advise Wendy Peoples at wendypeoples@earthlink.net