Boykin v. Alabama
Boykin v. Alabama, 395 U.S. 238 (1969) is a United States supreme court case where the court determined that when a defendant enters into a plea agreement he waives his Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial. A defendant may not waive this Constitutional right unless he does so knowingly, voluntarily, and intelligently. The defendant was an African-American charged with robbery, which carried a death sentence in Alabama at the time. He plead guilty.
Holding
The Court first held that it had jurisdiction to review the voluntary character of the plea, since the plain error of the trial judge's acceptance of petitioner's guilty plea absent an affirmative showing that the plea was intelligent and voluntary was before the state court under the Alabama automatic appeal statute.
The Court then held that a waiver of the Fifth Amendment privilege agains self-incrimination and the right to trial by jury, and the right to confront one's accusers by taking a plea cannot be presumed from a silent record.
The Court then held that acceptance of the petitioner's guilty plea in the case was reversible error since the record failed to disclose that the petitioner voluntarily and understandingly entered his plea of guilty.