Michael Washington v. Florida Department of Transportation
DueProcess
Whether the reasoning in Olano applies in a civil context where the failure of a party's counsel to object to closing argument due to misconduct or negligence is an 'intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right' by the party himself that affirmatively waives the fundamental right to a new trial, or is instead a forfeiture, which does not wholly foreclose appellate review by the State's highest court?
QUESTION PRESENTED This Court has held that a waiver of constitutional rights must be knowing and intelligent. Specifically, “[wlaiver is different from forfeiture. Whereas forfeiture is the failure to make the timely assertion of a right, waiver is the ‘intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right.” United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 733 (1993) (quoting Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464 (1988), Additionally, in Johnson v. Zerbst, the Court opined that it is a duty of trial court to protect the right of the scrueoh to counsel, and, if he has no \ counsel, to determine whether he has intelligently and competently waived the right. If the accused is not represented by counsel and has not competently and intelligently waived his constitutional right, the Sixth Amendment stands as a jurisdictional bar to a valid conviction and sentence depriving him of his life or his liberty. P. 468. 5. li. The question is: Whether the reasoning in Olano applies in a civil context where the failure of a party’s counsel to object to closing argument due to misconduct or negligence is an . “intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right” by the party himself that affirmatively waives the fundamental right to a new trial, or is instead a forfeiture, which does not wholly foreclose appellate review by the State’s highest court? | ili.