The Impact of COVID-19 on Sixth Amendment Rights and Perceived Violations: A Content Analysis

• In Event: A Collection of Systematic Content Analyses of Constitutional Criminal Procedure Issues

Abstract

In 2020, COVID-19 was designated as a pandemic impacting millions of people and affecting the way that courts operated. Lockdown requirements introduced unprecedented delays between an individual’s arrest or appeal and their trial. Questions about Sixth Amendment rights, specifically a right to a speedy trial, were brought up as a result. The current paper aimed to explore cases that occurred between 2020-2024 in which a person claimed that their right to a speedy trial was violated during COVID-19 and how the Courts ruled on these claims. Specifically, these cases were examined in the context of Barker v. Wingo (1972) and its established balancing test. Relevant cases were found utilizing Nexis Uni, a legal source database, and a content analysis was performed to examine emerging themes. Preliminary findings indicate that the majority of these cases ruled in favor of the Courts and rejected that individuals’ rights to a speedy trial were violated during these delays. When analyzed within the framework of Barker v. Wingo (1972), results from the current study implicate and reiterate that the Sixth Amendment’s interests lie in serving the justice system rather than the rights of the defendant, even in the face of a public pandemic.

Author

• Rhiannon Roberts, Arizona State University