Rare habeas corpus win at the Court of Appeals

 

The Second Circuit has upheld a district court ruling that a criminal defendant received ineffective assistance of counsel at his murder trial. This rare habeas corpus win involves a murder conviction from 1995

The case is Jones v. Carlos, issued on November 10. The problem with habeas petitions is that in the mid-1990's, Congress made it more difficult to challenge state court convictions in federal court, which must defer to the state courts even if the state courts, in hindsight, got the constitutional issues wrong. The holding is that a criminal defense lawyer cannot ignore the one disinterested eyewitness who might undermine the prosecution’s. In this case, Jones did not receive adequate representation because his attorney did not investigate or interview a witness whose account contradicted the prosecution’s theory of the case. 

The victim, Eddie Harp, was shot and killed outside a New Haven hospital in October 1992. The prosecution's case rested on Tyrone Spears, an admitted participant in the shooting who received a reduced sentence in exchange for testifying against Jones. Spears testified that he, Jones, and another man, Pepper, participated in the killing. Another eyewitness, Sheila McCray, a hospital nurse who knew the victim, told the police shortly after the shooting that she saw only two shooters. She provided descriptions of both men that did not match Jones, and when shown a photographic lineup containing Jones's photograph, she specifically said he was not one of the shooters. McCray had no criminal record or connection to the alleged perpetrators.

McCray should have testified at trial on Jones's behalf, the Court of Appeals says. Jones's attorney, from the Public Defender's office, knew about McCray and her statements but he never interviewed her or tried to line her up for trial. Since the family could not afford a private investigator, the jury never heard from McCray. Her testimony could have made the difference at trial, the Second Circuit (Parker, Lee and Sullivan in dissent) holds. 

The Second Circuit found counsel's performance constitutionally deficient. McCray's account supported the defense theory that there were only two shooters and that Jones was not one of them. Jones's lawyer did not offer a good reason for failing to investigate, suggesting that  witnesses sometimes say things lawyers do not want to hear was insufficient. As the court explained, uncertainty about what a witness might say is precisely why an attorney must investigate. Unexpected witness testimony happens at trial, and lawyers have to take their chances.