Lacking guidance, Liberal released criminal before start of sentence (10)
I believe the answer is:
leaderless
'lacking guidance' is the definition.
'liberal released criminal before start of sentence' is the wordplay.
'liberal' becomes 'l' (abbreviation**).
'criminal' indicates an anagram.
'before' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'start of' suggests taking the first letters.
The initial letter of 'sentence' is 's'.
'released' with letters rearranged gives 'eaderles'.
'l'+'eaderles'+'s'='LEADERLESS'
(Other definitions for leaderless that I've seen before include "Without direction" , "Lacking direction" , "Lacking a commander" , "as Browning felt, betrayed by Wordsworth?" .)