“An Indigent Criminal Defendant is Entitled to ‘An Expert of His Own'”

The title of this post is the title of this short and timely new piece authored by Fredrick Vars now available via SSRN. Here is the abstract:

The Supreme Court yesterday (April 24, 2017) heard the case of an Alabama death row inmate, James McWilliams. A thus far overlooked argument could save his life and help level the playing field in other capital cases. The Court in 1985 promised independent expertise. Now is its chance to make good on that promise.

For more on the issue presented and SCOTUS oral argument in McWilliams v. Dunn, folks can check out this recent SCOTUSblog posting by Amy Howe titled “Argument analysis: Nine justices, with five votes for death row inmate?” and/or this new Slate commentary by Dahlia Lithwick titled “Back at the Supreme Court, After Garland: It’s strange being back in this place, and stranger still to hear them debate lunacy.”