Andrew Cohen, in a blog for The Atlantic, argues that the U.S. Supreme Court's unanimous decision to reject "a claim by a convicted murderer who argued that she was denied her Sixth Amendment right to the 'effective assistance of counsel' because her lawyer counseled her to reject a manslaughter plea deal without first adequately investigating the facts of her case" turns the constitutional right to counsel into a right without a remedy. Cohen expounds: "Your lawyer may have violated ethical rules; he may have failed to timely consult with other attorneys; he may have not adequately investigated your case; he may have given you bad advice that leads you to withdraw a guilty plea. And yet the legal standards imposed by the Supreme Court declare that you still aren't entitled to any meaningful relief by the courts. In law school, they call this 'a right without a remedy.' In real life, it's called injustice."
Lawyer and Legal Journalist
