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Is the Padilla ruling as profound as it seems?

By Douglas A. Berman

I have now had a chance to read closely all the Justices opinions in Padilla concerning the application of the Sixth Amendment to how an attorney advises a defendant prior to a plea (basics here), and I am now thinking that it is Justice Alito's concurrence that makes the majority's ruling so important and so potentially profound.  Let me explain Though Justice Stevens opinion for the Court could be read broadly, it also makes express reference to the "unique nature of deportation."  This language alone would readily allow lower courts and others to assert that Padilla is a special rule for the special problem of deportation as a collateral consequence and thus the opinion is not relevant to any other types of conviction consequences.  But Justice Alito at the start of his concurrence stresses that there are lots and lots of other collateral consequences that are also "serious," and he therein suggests that Padilla should not be viewed as a narrow and limited opinion confined to a single consequence of a conviction...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on April 01, 2010 (boomark / email).