Indeed, lawyers have good reason to suffer from Sad Lawyer Syndrome. For example: Great rigor. For that jaw-dropping hourly rate, clients expect results even if, as often is the case, you're fighting a darn smart and perhaps even unethical opposing counsel.
In the US, most states have rules against lawyers sleeping with their clients, unless they had a pre-existing relationship. Lawyers can very much be like therapists and it is easy to transfer feelings to them. They can come in like a white knight on a horse when you are in the middle of a bad situation.
These advocates argue that the use of the term ‘‘syndrome’’ serves to stigmatize battered women defendants because it appears to indicate that battered women have some sort of medical condition or psychological disorder.
The American Psychological Association (APA) has endorsed the validity of the syndrome in amicus briefs it filed in homicide cases of battered women. In the noted case of State v.
Now, just because your lawyer fell asleep during trial doesn’t mean your conviction will be reversed. The Sixth Amendment guarantees criminal defendants the right to assistance of counsel, and showing ineffective assistance usually means proving (1) the lawyer’s performance was deficient and (2) it actually made a difference at trial. But, as this court held, if the record shows the lawyer was unconscious for a “substantial portion”of the trial, that’s all you have to prove: the court will presume the substantial unconsciousness made a difference.
Finally, the court recognized there are “dangers in presuming prejudice merely from a lack of alertness.” The danger they’re concerned about, apparently, is that if the rule were too lenient then lawyers might “use the appearance of sleep as a strategic tool,” either deliberately trying to undermine a verdict or “to downplay the importance of an adversary’s presentation.” I seriously doubt many lawyers would do the former, but we know they do the latter. Not all that often, though.
Whether a lawyer slept for a substantial portion of the trial should be determined on a case-by-case basis, considering, but not limited to, the length of time counsel slept, the proportion of the trial missed, and the significance of the portion counsel slept through. The corollary, of course, is that the occasional nap is okay.
Ragin, of course, testified to frequent snoozing, but he had every reason to do so. (I’d like to believe his claim that his lawyer once woke up and “asked [him] what he missed”—not something you want to hear from your lawyer at trial—but I’m skeptical.) The Fourth Circuit found more compelling the testimony of a juror who testified on Ragin’s behalf and said she noticed Mackey sleeping “almost every day … morning and evening,” for at least 30 minutes per nap. He had “ [t]otally dozed off,” she said, and claimed Ragin frequently “would have to punch him” in order to wake him up. She also said other jurors noticed the snoozing. In particular, she said they had discussed their observation that at one point Mackey was “resting his head against [Ragin]” and that it may have influenced the verdict.
However, legally using self-defense to justify the killing of partners by battered women is controversial and often problematic because of the kind of evidence that the defense offers at trial to prove its case and because of the jury’s perception of the battered woman’s situation at the time of the killing.
Battered woman syndrome has been used as a defense in criminal cases since the late 1970s. However, its introduction to support claims of self-defense and insanity in cases of spousal homicide raises many empirical, normative, and legal questions. Battered women’s advocates express concerns about the use of the term ‘‘syndrome’’ to describe the response of women who kill their batterers. These advocates argue that the use of the term ‘‘syndrome’’ serves to stigmatize battered women defendants because it appears to indicate that battered women have some sort of medical condition or psychological disorder. In addition, some behavioral science research questions the underlying empirical research used to support the claim that a specific, identifiable syndrome affects women who have been subjected to continuous physical abuse by their intimate partners. Finally, many psychologists, legal scholars, and attorneys challenge the use of BWS as evidence at trial, especially when the defense counsel uses expert witness testimony to support battered women’s defense claims.
Although BWS has been used to support a defense of insanity, critics argue that its use is misplaced because the extent to which the syndrome causes mental illness cannot be determined by clinicians and because BWS , as it was articulated by Walker, does not entail a loss of ability to understand the nature or consequences of what one is doing or the failure to appreciate right from wrong at the time the crime was committed. In addition some legal scholars claim that the use of BWS to support a defense of insanity creates judicial confusion because doing so suggests a biological/medical basis for the condition, rather than a social or behavioral basis. These critics also charge that this pathological view of BWS is further suggested when it is linked to PTSD. The pathological view stands in marked contrast to the view that battered women act in self-defense when they kill their abusers. Therefore, these critics assert that using BWS to support a claim of insanity argues against the idea that battered women’s actions are reasonable given their circumstances, and instead encourages courts to see them as helpless.
This research also indicated that when battered women sought outside help, they were confronted with insufficient help sources, a legal system that did not address their issues, and societal indifference. The lack of practical options, combined with victims’ lack of financial resources, made it likely that battered women would stay in abusive relationships. In contrast to this research demonstrating battered women’s active help-seeking behavior, Walker’s theory of BWS emphasized women as becoming passive and helpless in the face of repeated abuse.
This stage is eventually followed by an acute battering stage, in which the severity of the abuse increases and women are subjected to a violent battering incident. Following the acute battering stage is a calm, loving, contrite stage in which the batterer apologizes for his behavior.
These advocates argue that the use of the term ‘‘syndrome’’ serves to stigmatize battered women defendants because it appears to indicate that battered women have some sort of medical condition or psychological disorder.
In Kelly, the New Jersey Supreme Court held that the existence of battered spouse syndrome was relevant to the honesty and reasonableness of a woman’s claim that she believed she was in imminent danger of death or serious injury.