The Appellate Defender Commission (ADC) has selected Michigan Appellate Assigned Counsel System (MAACS) roster attorney Patrick K. Ehlmann as the recipient, posthumously, of the first “Barbara R. Levine Award for Excellence in Appellate Advocacy.” The award will be given annually to a MAACS roster member whose appellate advocacy achieves outstanding results or who demonstrates extraordinary commitment on behalf of appellate assigned clients. The ADC selected Ehlmann as the recipient of this award not only for his long and excellent service to his MAACS roster clients, but also for his 2012 individual representation, in extremely dire circumstances, in People v Samuel Lee Elliott.
Ehlmann first joined the MAACS roster of attorneys at its inception in 1987. After a brief hiatus, he returned to the roster on Sept. 4, 1990 and remained on it until his 2012 resignation for health reasons. Throughout his lengthy service on the MAACS roster, Ehlmann provided excellent representation to his MAACS clients, who were sentenced for the most serious felonies. He also actively involved himself with issues relevant to those clients and the MAACS roster of attorneys. Ehlmann also lectured at MAACS Roster Attorney Trainings. In Elliott, on March 8, 2012 Ehlmann achieved a reversal of an armed robbery conviction in a published opinion in the Court of Appeals. In early May of 2012, Ehlmann was hospitalized and diagnosed with a terminal illness. He resigned from the MAACS roster on May 14, 2012. Nevertheless, Ehlmann persuaded his physicians to allow him to leave the hospital and on May 18, 2012, he filed a brief in opposition to the prosecutor’s application for leave to appeal on behalf of Elliott in the Michigan Supreme Court. On May 21, 2012, Ehlmann was re-admitted to the hospital where he died, on June 9, 2012. Ehlmann’s lengthy record of excellent representation of MAACS roster clients, exemplified by the extraordinary circumstances of his representation of Elliott, made him a worthy selection for the inaugural Barbara R. Levine Award.
The award is named for Levine, who worked tirelessly with the Appellate Defender Commission to achieve the creation of MAACS in 1987. She also served as the first MAACS Administrator from its creation until July 9, 1999.
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