Cleveland v. Davis

Citations

• 2022 Ohio 195

Syllabus

Constitutional right to the assistance of counsel waiver of the right to counsel knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily colloquy and conceded error. The Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution guarantee that persons brought to trial in any state or federal court must be afforded the right to the assistance of counsel before they can be validly convicted and punished by imprisonment. When a defendant manages his or her own defense, they relinquish, as a purely factual matter, many of the traditional benefits associated with the right to counsel. Therefore, in order to represent themselves, defendants must \knowingly and intelligently\ forgo those relinquished benefits. Appellant argues that the trial court erred in allowing him to proceed to trial pro se without ensuring he had properly waived his Sixth Amendment right to counsel. The City filed a notice of conceded error pursuant to Loc.App.R. 16(B). Our review of the record, including the colloquy, reveals that the trial court did not discuss with Davis the consequences of waiving counsel, the charges against him, or possible defenses. As such, the inquiry was insufficient to determine whether Davis was making a knowing, intelligent, and voluntary waiver of his right to the assistance of counsel.