Brown v. Smith

Nichols, Justice.

W. Eugene Smith, a prisoner in the Decatur County Prison Branch of the State Penitentiary of Georgia, filed a habeas corpus petition in which he alleged that his imprisonment was illegal because he was not represented by counsel anytime between his arrest and sentence for burglary, nor did he make an intelligent waiver of such right. On the trial of the issue thus made the prisoner, his brother, wife and aunt testified there was no attorney present representing him although the indictments were signed by an attorney as representing the prisoner and the sentence stated that…