W. Fred Turner
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W. Fred Turner (April 17, 1922 – November 23, 2003) was a lawyer who successfully defended Clarence Earl Gideon in the second trial that was given to him after the Gideon vs. Wainwright case overturned his conviction.
Turner was born in Millville, Florida on April 17, 1922. He joined the military after high school, and was involved with the American Volunteer Group (A.V.G) (also known as the Flying Tigers) during World War II. He rose to the rank of captain before leaving for the University of Florida. He graduated in 1948 and returned to Bay County, Florida to practice law.
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[edit] Gideon's case
In June 1961, $5 in change, a few beers, a few containers of Coca Cola, and a bottle of wine were stolen from a pool hall/bar joint that belonged to Ira Strickland Jr. An eyewitness, Henry Cook, a 22-year-old who lived nearby, told the police that he had seen Clarence Earl Gideon, a 51 year old unemployed man, walk out of the joint with a bottle of wine and his pockets filled with coins, and then get in a cab and leave.
Gideon soon was arrested in a tavern and was forced to defend himself at his trial after being denied a lawyer by his trial judge Robert McCrary Jr. (being too poor to pay for one). Being a poor lawyer, he was convicted of breaking and entering with the intent to commit larceny on August 27, three days before his 52nd birthday. Judge McCrary handed down the maximum sentence: five years in prison.
Gideon in jail started to read on the history of the American legal system and decided that Judge McCrary had violated his constitutional right to due process of law under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. He then wrote to an FBI office in Florida and next to the state supreme court, but he was denied help. Then in January 1962 he mailed a five-page petition to the United States Supreme Court asking the nine justices to consider his complaint. The Supreme Court, in reply, agreed to hear his appeal. The case would become known as Gideon vs. Wainwright, after Louie L. Wainwright, director of the Florida Division of Corrections.
The Gideon vs. Wainwright case took place on January 15, 1963. Abe Fortas was assigned to represent Gideon. Bruce Jacob, the assistant Florida attorney general, was assigned to argue against Gideon. The hearing ended three hours and five minutes after it began.
The ruling came back after two months. Justice Hugo Black was selected to author the decision. The justices unanimously agreed: Gideon's conviction should be set aside. Justice Black wrote that "precedents, reason and reflection" required all American courts to make a lawyer available to any person charged with a felony, if they could not pay for a lawyer.
Although about 2,000 convicts in Florida alone were freed as a result of the Gideon decision (because state governments did not want to take on the time, trouble and expense of new trials) Gideon himself was not freed. He instead got another trial.
[edit] Turner and Gideon
Gideon chose Turner to be his lawyer for his second trial. The retrial took place on August 5, 1963, five months after the Supreme Court ruling. Turner, during the trial, picked apart the testimony of eyewitness Henry Cook. The attorney in his opening and closing statements suggested the idea that Cook likely had been a lookout for a group of young men who broke in to steal beer, then grabbed the coins while they were at it. Turner also got an important statement from the cab driver who took Gideon from Bay Harbor, Florida to a bar in Panama City, Florida: Gideon was carrying neither wine, beer nor Coke when he picked him up, even though Cook testified that he watched Gideon walk from the pool hall to the phone, then wait for a cab.
The jury acquitted Gideon after a mere one hour of deliberation.
[edit] After Gideon
Turner worked as a private attorney until 1979, when he was elected to circuit judge. At age 70, he retired from the bench in 1991. His wife Helen died in 1997. Turner died on November 23, 2003 at his home in Panama City, Florida.
