“Mr. Maples has lost his right to appeal through no fault of his own,” Justice Alito said, “through a series of very unusual and unfortunate circumstances.”
When an Alabama court sent two copies of a ruling in Mr. Maples’s case to the New York offices of the law firm, Sullivan & Cromwell, its mailroom sent them back unopened and marked “Return to Sender.” A court clerk in Alabama filed the returned envelopes and did nothing more.
Mr. Maples’s deadline to appeal the ruling came and went, and so far every court to hear his case has said, in effect, tough luck.
Mr. Maples was convicted of murdering two companions after a night of drinking, and his guilt is not in serious dispute. His main argument is that his court-appointed trial lawyers in Alabama failed to present important evidence about his background at the penalty phase of the trial.
Several justices seemed inclined to find a way to help Mr. Maples and appeared to be frustrated by the conduct of Alabama officials.
Justice Alito, for instance, pressed John C. Neiman, Alabama’s solicitor general, about why the state had opposed Mr. Maples’s efforts to have the deadline waived instead of addressing his claims on the merits.
“Why push this technical argument?” Justice Alito asked.
Mr. Neiman did not give a direct answer.
Justice Elena Kagan wondered whether the court clerk should have done more to make sure the ruling was actually received by Mr. Maples’s lawyers in New York.
“Is this what somebody would do if they actually wanted to accomplish notice, if they actually wanted the person to get that letter?” Justice Kagan asked.
“So you send off this letter,” she added, “and you get it back from the principal attorneys, and you ask yourself: ‘Huh, should I do anything now?’ What would you say?”
Mr. Neiman responded, “Your Honor, I suspect that in those circumstances I might well personally do something else.”
Justice Antonin Scalia proposed a wrinkle. “The clerk has to believe it’s an important letter,” he said.
That caveat did not trouble Justice Kagan. “Justice Scalia is right,” she said. “I am assuming that a letter disposing of a ruling in a capital case issued after 18 months when nobody knew that that letter was coming, that that’s an important letter for a death row prisoner to get.”
The ruling came in response to a filing by two lawyers from Sullivan & Cromwell, both associates, who argued that Mr. Maples’s trial lawyers had been ineffective. But the associates had left the firm by the time the state court ruled, and neither they nor the firm had informed the court or, seemingly, the firm’s own mailroom.
Mr. Maples, now represented by Gregory G. Garre of Latham & Watkins, argued that the lawyers from Sullivan & Cromwell had abandoned him and that their mistakes should therefore not be imputed to him.
At one point, Mr. Garre said, the state seemed to acknowledge that Mr. Maples’s lawyers had disappeared. When the deadline for appeals had passed, an Alabama prosecutor wrote directly to Mr. Maples in prison to tell him so, Mr. Garre said, “which would have been unethical if the state had known or believed that he was represented by counsel.”
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. seemed to find that letter both significant and offensive.
“Why did he do it?” Chief Justice Roberts asked. “Just gloating that the fellow had lost? What was the point of it? He must have thought there was a problem, right?”
Mr. Neiman said only that the prosecutor knew that Mr. Maples’s lawyers from Sullivan & Cromwell had failed to file an appeal.
Mr. Maples’s case, Maples v. Thomas, No. 10-63, is complicated by the fact that a third lawyer, in Alabama, had indisputably received the crucial document.
That lawyer said in a sworn statement that he was Mr. Maples’s lawyer in name only, serving as local counsel because the New York lawyers were not licensed to practice in Alabama. He added that he had not passed the ruling along to his co-counsel or to his client.
That did not satisfy Justice Scalia. “He’s the counsel of record, right?” Justice Scalia asked. “I’m counsel of record, but I don’t even do so much as to forward notices to the guys that are doing the real work?”