Crone, J.
….
Here, it is undisputed that counsel had no knowledge that Carrillo was not a native-born United States citizen. Carrillo did not inform counsel of his resident alien status. Having lived here since he was one year old, Carrillo acted and spoke like a native-born citizen. There was nothing about Carrillo that would have made his counsel suspect that he was not a United States citizen. There are no circumstances that would have indicated that immigration consequences would have been relevant to Carrillo’s decision to plead guilty.
Carrillo argues that “this Court should explicitly hold that the duty to inform criminal clients of immigration consequences does not depend upon the attorney’s knowledge or suspicions of his client’s citizenship.” Appellant’s Br. at 10. In Clarke v. State, 974 N.E.2d 562 (Ind. Ct. App. 2012), another panel of this Court observed,
The State asks us to focus upon the clause, “the knowledge of the lawyer of the client’s status as an alien” [from Segura] as one of the facts a court should consider when deciding whether the failure to advise constitutes deficient performance. We need not address this question in the present case because the post-conviction court’s decision is affirmable on other grounds. We note, however, that this issue is percolating in other states and the early trend seems to be in favor of imposing a duty on criminal defense attorneys to ascertain the citizenship status of their clients. . . . .
Id. at 568-69.
Given the State’s interest in safeguarding the integrity of its criminal convictions, we think that it would be proper for the judiciary to play a part in ensuring that noncitizen defendants are adequately advised of the immigration consequences of guilty pleas. The 2009 edition of the Indiana Criminal Benchbook, developed by the Indiana Judicial Center and distributed to trial judges in early 2010, began recommending that the trial court’s guilty plea dialogue with a criminal defendant include a query as to whether he or she is a United States citizen, and if the answer is no, to follow up with questions regarding whether the possibility of deportation had been discussed with counsel. Ind. Crim. Benchbook §§ 50.20.050, 50.70.300, 50.50.350, 50.50.400 (2011). If the defendant has not received immigration advice, the Benchbook Committee recommends that the judge continue the hearing to allow the defendant to have such a discussion. Id., §§ 50.70.300, 50.50.350, 50.50.400.
Even with these safeguards, we caution that it would still be incumbent upon the defendant’s attorney to accurately inform the noncitizen defendant of the deportation consequences of pleading guilty where they can be easily determined from reading the relevant immigration statute. Padilla v. Kentucky, 130 S. Ct. at 1483. “When the law is not succinct and straightforward …, a criminal defense attorney need do no more than advise a noncitizen client that pending criminal charges may carry a risk of adverse immigration consequences.” Id. Hopefully, this procedure will prospectively eliminate a situation like this where the defendant’s counsel is unaware of the defendant’s noncitizen status.
However, the question before us is whether the prevailing professional norms in 2006 required attorneys to ask every client whether he or she was a United States citizen. Carrillo has failed to persuade us that the prevailing professional norms in 2006 required attorneys to do so. [Footnote omitted.] Therefore, we conclude that Carrillo’s counsel did not provide deficient performance in failing to advise him regarding the risk of deportation where counsel did not know, and had no reason to suspect, that Carrillo was not a native-born citizen of the United States. [Footnote omitted.] Accordingly, we affirm the denial of post-conviction relief.
KIRSCH, J., and MATHIAS, J., concur.