Preventable Tragedy In Prince George's? - washingtonpost.com

...What if White had been afforded a lawyer at the initial proceeding before the commissioner, as the Sixth Amendment required? He was not, of course, a candidate for immediate release on bail; still, a lawyer would have explained to the commissioner (who, in Maryland, is usually not a lawyer) that White could be lawfully detained someplace other than Prince George's County, and that the circumstances of the case demanded that he be jailed elsewhere. If a lawyer had been there to argue it, it seems inconceivable that the commissioner would not have ordered White held in some other county's jail -- which might have kept him alive to face his ultimate judgment before a court of law.