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Nature of Suit Code: 530
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Habeas Corpus
Cause of Action: 

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In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 18-1736

PHILLIP HARTSFIELD,

Petitioner-Appellant,

v.

STEPHANIE DORETHY,

Respondent-Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 14-cv-05816 — John Robert Blakey, Judge.

____________________

ARGUED JANUARY 8, 2020 — DECIDED FEBRUARY 3, 2020

____________________

Before FLAUM, ROVNER, and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges.

FLAUM, Circuit Judge. Fifteen years ago, an Illinois jury convicted Phillip Hartsfield of first-degree murder and home invasion. Hartsfield unsuccessfully challenged his convictions 

on direct appeal and collateral attack in the Illinois courts. In 

2014, Hartsfield petitioned a federal district court for a writ of 

habeas corpus alleging seven claims. The district court denied 

his petition and Hartsfield appealed. We certified one of the 

issues Hartsfield presented for review: whether the state court 

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reasonably held that Hartsfield’s counsel did not usurp his 

personal right to testify at trial. We now affirm the judgment 

of the district court.

I. Background1

On January 4, 2004, Alberto Martinez found his brother 

Alejandro shot dead in his bed. Police responding to the home 

recovered two .40-caliber shell casings inside Alejandro’s bedroom. The medical examiner identified four gunshot wounds 

on Alejandro’s body and recovered one bullet. Police also noticed that the back door to the Martinez home had a crack 

along its narrow edge, as if it had been kicked or punched 

open. Later, the People of the State of Illinois (“the State”) 

charged Phillip Hartsfield and Mohammed Abukhdeir with 

first-degree murder and home invasion. The co-defendants 

simultaneously tried their cases before separate Cook County 

juries.

A. Trial

The State put Claudia Garcia, Candy Richmond, and Kristina Kasper on the stand. Together, the women’s testimony 

established that they had attended a party at the Martinez 

home that lasted into the early morning hours on January 4. 

Alejandro Martinez and several other men were at the party. 

While there, Kasper called Hartsfield, with whom she was 

having a sexual relationship. Kasper got angry after she heard 

another woman on the phone with Hartsfield. After she hung 

up on Hartsfield, the men at the party asked Kasper why she 

1 We take the facts from the Illinois Appellate Court’s opinions because they are presumptively correct on habeas review and Hartsfield has 

not rebutted this presumption. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1); Perez-Gonzalez v. 

Lashbrook, 904 F.3d 557, 562 (7th Cir. 2018).

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No. 18-1736 3

was dating “a black guy,” and an argument broke out between the women and the men. As the women left the house 

between 4:30 and 5:00 a.m., the argument continued, and one 

of the men struck Kasper and her friend Richmond as they got 

into their car.

Garcia drove Kasper and Richmond home. During the car 

ride, Kasper and Richmond made several phone calls. According to Garcia, Richmond gave someone Martinez’s address over the phone and threatened to have someone killed. 

Richmond subsequently denied making such a threat. As 

stated by Kasper, either she or Richmond called Hartsfield 

and gave him Martinez’s address.

Another woman, Katherine Chrzan, testified at Hartsfield’s trial. She claimed she was pregnant with Hartsfield’s 

child in January 2004. Specifically, on January 4, Chrzan explained that Hartsfield was driving with Abukhdeir in

Chrzan’s car and they picked her up from a friend’s house 

around 4:30 a.m. While in the car, Hartsfield received a phone 

call, and Chrzan heard a woman raise her voice. Hartsfield 

told the woman that he would be there in 20 minutes. Hartsfield drove to his house and brought Chrzan up to his bedroom while Abukhdeir waited in the car. Before Hartsfield left 

the room, he retrieved a shotgun from underneath his bed. 

Hartsfield departed his house around 6:30 or 7:00 a.m. and 

returned at 9:00 or 9:30 a.m.

At approximately 7:00 a.m., Hartsfield and Abukhdeir 

picked up Richmond and Kasper in Chrzan’s car. Hartsfield 

drove to Martinez’s home, where he and Abukhdeir knocked 

on the front door. When no one answered, they returned to 

the car and opened the trunk. Richmond saw Hartsfield pick 

up a silver automatic handgun. Hartsfield and Abukhdeir 

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then walked down the gangway beside Martinez’s home, returning five minutes later.

Back at the car, Richmond heard Abukhdeir say that “he 

had blood all over him,” and when she looked, Richmond saw 

blood on Abukhdeir’s knuckles. Hartsfield told Abukhdeir to 

“shut the fuck up,” to which Abukhdeir responded: “If it 

wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t have gotten through the back 

door.”2Richmond also heard Abukhdeir say: “I hope you did 

it right.” Kasper claimed she did not hear the men’s conversation. After they left Martinez’s home, Hartsfield stopped the 

car and put the gun in the trunk. He drove Kasper home first 

and Richmond second.

The next evening, Chrzan discovered her gas tank was almost empty and asked Hartsfield where he had driven her car 

earlier that morning. Hartsfield answered that he went to Chicago. He added that if he told her what had happened, she 

“wouldn’t want to come around anymore,” and that “if he 

ever went to jail for murder, he would kill himself.” Shortly 

afterward, Chrzan overheard Hartsfield on the phone, asking 

if “Sally” was registered. Chrzan understood that “Sally” was 

a gun.

John Waszak, a friend of Hartsfield and Abukhdeir’s, was 

an additional witness at their trials. He testified that on January 6, 2004, he was at the home of a man named Billy Thompson with Hartsfield and Abukhdeir. While there, Abukhdeir 

gave Waszak a knotted sock, which contained a .40 caliber 

gun barrel, spent casings, and live shells. Waszak recognized 

2 Martinez’s aunt, who lived in the basement apartment of the Martinez home, did not hear any loud noises or notice anything unusual about 

the back door that morning.

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No. 18-1736 5

the gun as “Sally” because he had previously sold it to Abukhdeir. Waszak eventually threw the sock into the Des Plaines 

River. On cross-examination, defense counsel elicited testimony about inconsistencies between Waszak’s testimony and 

his statements to police; Waszak’s extensive criminal history; 

and the implausibility of Waszak dropping the sock off a 

bridge on a busy street.

After the State rested, Hartsfield did not put on a case. The 

jury convicted him of first-degree murder and home invasion. 

The judge sentenced him to consecutive terms of 45 and 6

years in prison.

B. Direct Appeal and Collateral Attack

Hartsfield directly appealed his convictions and sentence 

arguing that the State failed to prove him guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The Illinois Appellate Court affirmed, holding 

that a rational jury could have found Hartsfield guilty, highlighting that the circumstantial evidence against Hartsfield 

was strong. The Illinois Supreme Court denied Hartsfield’s 

ensuing petition for leave to appeal.

Next, Hartsfield collaterally attacked his convictions and 

sentence. He petitioned the state trial court pro se contending 

that his trial counsel ineffectively assisted him when counsel

(1) usurped his right to testify and (2) declined to call Thompson as a witness to impeach Waszak. The court appointed 

counsel, who amended Hartsfield’s petition reiterating those 

same claims. Hartsfield attached to his petition affidavits from 

himself, his mother, and Thompson.

In his first affidavit, Hartsfield insists that he told counsel 

“many times” that he wished to testify, to which counsel reCase: 18-1736 Document: 54 Filed: 02/03/2020 Pages: 18
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plied that he did not want Hartsfield to testify. Hartsfield further maintains that counsel asked his mother to “convince” 

him not to testify, and Hartsfield told her that counsel would 

not let him testify. At trial, counsel told Hartsfield that he 

would “get his chance” when the judge admonished him 

about his right to testify, but the judge never did that. When 

Hartsfield attempted to speak up, counsel “shushed” him. For 

her part, Hartsfield’s mother stated that counsel asked her to 

convince Hartsfield not to testify and that Hartsfield informed 

her that counsel would not let him testify; indeed, that counsel “shushed” him.

In his second affidavit, Hartsfield described what his testimony would have been if counsel would have permitted 

him to testify in his own defense. Hartsfield asserted he spent 

the night before the murder with Abukhdeir and Chrzan. According to his account, he left Chrzan asleep in his bedroom 

and then drove to Chicago by himself. Around 7:00 a.m., he 

unsuccessfully attempted to reach another woman with 

whom he was having a sexual relationship. Chrzan called 

Hartsfield at 8:00 a.m. asking where he was. After driving 

downtown, Hartsfield turned around and arrived home

around 8:30 a.m. Hartsfield fell asleep and did not wake up 

until 6:00 p.m.

The state trial court dismissed Hartsfield’s postconviction 

petition. The appellate court affirmed that judgment, applying Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), to both ineffective assistance of counsel allegations. Important here, the 

appellate court held that defense counsel made “a tactical decision” in advising Hartsfield, who was aware that it was ultimately his decision not to testify. It found that the record did 

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not support Hartsfield’s complaint that counsel prevented 

him from speaking up.

Relatedly, it ruled that Hartsfield’s failure to contemporaneously assert his right to testify barred his ineffective assistance claim. Even if counsel deficiently performed, the court 

reasoned, that did not prejudice Hartsfield because it was not 

reasonably likely that his proposed testimony that he was 

driving around at the time of the murder would have affected 

the jury’s verdict, especially given the strong circumstantial 

evidence against him. The Illinois Supreme Court denied 

Hartsfield’s petition for leave to appeal that followed.

C. Federal Habeas Petition

In 2014, Hartsfield petitioned a federal district court for a 

writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, claiming that: 

(1) the State failed to prove him guilty beyond a reasonable 

doubt; (2) counsel usurped his right to testify; and (3) counsel 

was ineffective for failing to call Thompson as a witness. The 

district court denied the petition and declined to issue a certificate of appealability in 2018.

We, however, granted Hartsfield’s application for a certificate, limited to the question presented regarding his right to 

testify. We directed the parties to analyze whether the state 

appellate court unreasonably concluded that: (1) Hartsfield 

needed to contemporaneously assert his right to testify during his trial; and (2) Strickland applied to such a claim, rather 

than the harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard from 

Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18 (1967). Furthermore, if the 

parties decided that Strickland did not apply, we asked the 

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parties to address whether Hartsfield suffered actual prejudice sufficient to justify habeas relief under Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619 (1993).

II. Discussion

We review the district court’s decision to deny habeas relief de novo. See Jones v. Zatecky, 917 F.3d 578, 581 (7th Cir. 

2019). The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act 

(AEDPA), however, sets the standard we apply to Hartsfield’s 

petition. The Act permits us to grant relief only if the decision 

of the Appellate Court of Illinois, the last state court to address Hartsfield’s claim on its merits, was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established 

Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the 

United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d); see also Sims v. Hyatte, 914 

F.3d 1078, 1086–87 (7th Cir. 2019).

Hartsfield argues that the state court decision is contrary 

to federal law because Strickland does not control these circumstances, and even if it did, the state appellate court unreasonably applied it in rejecting his claim that his counsel 

usurped his right to testify. “We give state courts broad latitude in applying [Strickland’s] general standard.” Weaver v. 

Nicholson, 892 F.3d 878, 884 (7th Cir. 2018), cert. denied, 139 S. 

Ct. 649 (2018) (citation omitted); see also Knowles v. Mirzayance, 

556 U.S. 111, 123 (2009) (describing the standard of review on 

Strickland claims evaluated under § 2254 as “doubly deferential”). In other words, “‘[t]he bar for establishing that the state 

court’s application of the Strickland ineffective assistance of 

counsel standard was ‘unreasonable,’ is a high one.” Felton v. 

Bartow, 926 F.3d 451, 464 (7th Cir. 2019) (quoting Taylor v. 

Bradley, 448 F.3d 942, 948 (7th Cir. 2006)).

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No. 18-1736 9

A. Strickland and the Right to Testify

We begin with the question of how best to frame Hartsfield’s claim that his counsel usurped his right to testify. 

Hartsfield contends that he need not show prejudice when the 

case involves the right to testify, but that is contrary to our 

precedent and the unanimous weight of authority. See Barrow 

v. Uchtman, 398 F.3d 597, 603 n.4 (7th Cir. 2005) (holding that 

“Strickland is the appropriate governing precedent” in circumstances such as these); see also Alexander v. United States, 

219 F. App’x 520, 523 (7th Cir. 2007) (“We analyze Alexander’s 

claim of ineffective assistance of counsel under the familiar 

two-prong test laid out in Strickland[,] which requires proof 

that counsel’s performance fell below minimum professional 

standards and that this deficient performance ‘prejudiced’ the 

defendant.”) (citation omitted).

Nonetheless, we take this opportunity to clarify what we

believe is explicit—but certainly implicit—in our earlier rulings: An ineffective assistance of counsel claim is the appropriate vehicle in which to allege that counsel violated a defendant’s right to testify. See United States v. Stuart, 773 F.3d 

849, 853 (7th Cir. 2014) (applying the Strickland analytical 

framework to a claim that counsel violated the defendant’s 

right to testify); Starkweather v. Smith, 574 F.3d 399, 403–04 (7th 

Cir. 2009), as corrected on denial of reh’g (Aug. 7, 2009) (same); 

Gross v. Knight, 560 F.3d 668, 672–73 (7th Cir. 2009) (same); 

United States v. Stark, 507 F.3d 512, 521 (7th Cir. 2007) (same); 

Canaan v. McBride, 395 F.3d 376, 384 (7th Cir. 2005) (same); Rodriguez v. United States, 286 F.3d 972, 983–84 (7th Cir. 2002), as 

amended on denial of reh’g and reh’g en banc (May 21, 2002) 

(same); Milone v. Camp, 22 F.3d 693, 705 (7th Cir. 1994) (same); 

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Underwood v. Clark, 939 F.2d 473, 476 (7th Cir. 1991); United 

States v. Muehlbauer, 892 F.2d 664, 669 (7th Cir. 1990).

Our sister circuits, so far as we can tell, all agree that “the 

appropriate vehicle for claims that the defendant’s right to 

testify was violated by defense counsel is a claim of ineffective 

assistance of counsel.” Casiano-Jiménez v. United States, 817 

F.3d 816, 819 (1st Cir. 2016) (citation and quotation marks 

omitted); see also Palmer v. Hendricks, 592 F.3d 386, 397–98 (3d 

Cir. 2010) (collecting cases); Matylinsky v. Budge, 577 F.3d 1083, 

1097 (9th Cir. 2009); Hodge v. Haeberlin, 579 F.3d 627, 639 (6th 

Cir. 2009); Winfield v. Roper, 460 F.3d 1026, 1035 n.3 (8th Cir. 

2006); Sexton v. French, 163 F.3d 874, 882 (4th Cir. 1998); Wimberly v. McKune, 141 F.3d 1187, *3 (10th Cir. 1998) (unpublished table decision); Brown v. Artuz, 124 F.3d 73, 79 (2d 

Cir. 1997); United States v. Teague, 953 F.2d 1525, 1534 (11th Cir. 

1992). The Strickland standard applies to “any claim by the defendant that defense counsel has not discharged this responsibility—either by failing to inform the defendant of the right 

to testify or by overriding the defendant’s desire to testify ....” 

Artuz, 124 F.3d at 79.

The courts of appeals are united in reaching this conclusion for good reason: “It is primarily the responsibility of the 

defendant’s counsel, not the trial judge, to advise the defendant on whether or not to testify and to explain the tactical advantages and disadvantages of doing so.” United States v. 

Campione, 942 F.2d 429, 439 (7th Cir. 1991) (quoting United 

States v. Goodwin, 770 F.2d 631, 637 (7th Cir. 1985)); see also 

Teague, 953 F.2d at 1534. Not to put too fine a point on it, but 

we have described “‘[t]he decision not to place the defendant 

on the stand [as] a classic example’ of a strategic trial decision.” Stuart, 773 F.3d at 853 (quoting United States v. Norwood, 

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798 F.2d 1094, 1100 (7th Cir. 1986)) (additional citations omitted); see also Stark, 507 F.3d at 516 (calling it a “sensitive aspect 

of trial strategy”) (quoting United States v. Manjarrez, 258 F.3d 

618, 624 (7th Cir. 2001)).

Now, it is true that “[t]his [C]ourt has previously ruled 

that the Chapman standard [not Strickland] applies when a petitioner has been denied the right to testify.” Ortega v. O’Leary, 

843 F.2d 258, 262 (7th Cir. 1988) (citing Alicea v. Gagnon, 675 

F.2d 913, 925 (7th Cir. 1982) (per curiam)). As an initial matter, 

Alicea preceded Strickland by two years. More importantly, we

agree with Warden Dorethy that Alicea and its progeny stand 

for the proposition that Chapman’s harmless error standard 

applies when a court—not counsel—denies a defendant the 

right to testify, at least on direct review. See United States v. 

Books, 914 F.3d 574, 580 (7th Cir. 2019), cert. denied, 139 S. Ct. 

2682 (2019) (citing Ortega and Alicea to support the assertion 

that harmless error analysis applies when “the district court’s 

ruling constructively foreclosed [the defendant’s] decision to 

take the stand”).

In Ortega, as we have previously explained, “the defendant twice interrupted the proceedings and expressed his desire to testify. The trial judge ordered the defendant to remain 

silent ... The defendant protested, but the court treated the 

evidence as closed and allowed the case to proceed to closing 

arguments.” United States v. Jones, 844 F.3d 636, 646 (7th Cir. 

2016). Similarly, in Alicea, the trial court “excluded [the defendant’s] alibi testimony simply because he failed to notify 

the prosecution that he intended to raise such a defense.” 675 

F.2d at 916.

The Supreme Court’s recent precedents are not to the contrary; in fact, they too draw a distinction between a court’s 

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denial of a defendant’s constitutional right and counsel’s denial of that same right. See McCoy v. Louisiana, 138 S. Ct. 1500, 

1511–12 (2018) (reasoning its ineffective-assistance-of-counsel 

jurisprudence did not apply in that case because “the violation of [the defendant’s] protected autonomy right was complete when the court allowed counsel to usurp control of an issue 

within [the defendant’s] sole prerogative.” (emphasis

added)). 

This distinction is not arbitrary; it makes sense for reasons 

the Supreme Court originally articulated in Strickland, which 

we have since reiterated:

In Strickland, for example, the Court discussed and distinguished various “Sixth Amendment contexts” in 

which prejudice to the defendant is legally presumed. 

The latter situations include cases of “state interference 

with counsel’s assistance,” and, most pertinently, cases 

involving “actual or constructive denial of the assistance of counsel altogether.” Relying in part on the 

analysis in [United States v. ]Cronic, [466 U.S. 648, 

(1984)], ... the Court in Strickland distinguished these 

latter circumstances on the grounds that prejudice to 

the defendant “is so likely that case by case inquiry into 

prejudice is not worth the cost,” and that they “involve 

impairments of the Sixth Amendment right that are 

easy to identify and, for that reason and because the 

prosecution is directly responsible, easy for the government to prevent.” With respect to the kinds of errors by defense counsel that would normally form a 

basis for an ineffective assistance claim, on the other 

hand, the “government is not responsible for, and 

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No. 18-1736 13

hence not able to prevent” them, they “come in an infinite variety and are as likely to be utterly harmless in 

a particular case as they are to be prejudicial,” and they 

cannot “be defined with sufficient precision to inform 

defense attorneys correctly just what conduct to 

avoid.”3

Siverson v. O’Leary, 764 F.2d 1208, 1215–16 (7th Cir. 1985); see 

also Smith v. Robbins, 528 U.S. 259, 287 (2000); United States v. 

Hernandez, 948 F.2d 316, 319–20 (7th Cir. 1991); Lange v. Young, 

869 F.2d 1008, 1012–13 (7th Cir. 1989); Solles v. Israel, 868 F.2d 

242, 246 (7th Cir. 1989); Sanders v. Lane, 861 F.2d 1033, 1038 & 

n.4 (7th Cir. 1988).

The Warden, of course, defends actual prejudice under 

Strickland as the appropriate standard. Hartsfield, in his principal brief, first vies for Brecht’s harmless-error standard for 

habeas petitions. In his reply brief, however, Hartsfield decides to operate outside the trial error paradigm and call for 

the structural error standard to apply. In our view, the best 

reading of the Supreme Court’s decisions in this realm is that

Strickland controls because defense counsel allegedly interfered with Hartsfield’s right to testify. Accordingly, the state 

3 As a clarification, Cronic is an exception to Strickland’s prejudice 

prong for the most extreme displays of professional incompetence. We 

presume prejudice in those circumstances because “counsel was absent 

from the proceedings and unavailable to make any tactical judgments 

whatsoever. Thus, both Strickland and Cronic expressly treat cases involving the total lack of assistance of counsel as separate and distinct from 

cases involving ineffective assistance of counsel.” Siverson, 764 F.2d at 

1216.

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appellate court’s decision to apply Strickland was not contrary 

to clearly established federal law.4

B. Reasonableness of the State Court’s Decision

In applying Strickland, the state appellate court rejected 

Hartsfield’s right-to-testify claim, concluding that Hartsfield

did not satisfy either of the test’s two prongs: (1) he has not 

established counsel deficiently performed because he did not 

contemporaneously assert his right to testify at trial; and 

(2) assuming his allegations are true and counsel forbade him 

from testifying, that decision did not ultimately prejudice 

Hartsfield’s case. This was a reasonable application of Strickland.

First, Illinois law requires a defendant to “protest a lawyer’s refusal to allow her to testify during trial to preserve the 

right.” Thompson v. Battaglia, 458 F.3d 614, 619 (7th Cir. 2006) 

4 To be sure, we have acknowledged that the call between an ineffective-assistance-of-counsel and an absence-of-counsel claim is a close one. 

See Sanders, 861 F.2d at 1037–38 & n.4. And in absence-of-counsel cases, 

we presume prejudice. See Hernandez, 948 F.2d at 320; Lange, 869 F.2d at 

1013 (citations omitted). But even if this were an absence-of-counsel case—

and it is not—the Supreme Court has never adopted, and thereby clearly 

established, a corresponding presumption of prejudice. See Schmidt v. Foster, 911 F.3d 469, 483 (7th Cir. 2018) (en banc) (noting “[t]here is no clearly 

established lesser standard for state-action denials.”); see also Arredondo v. 

Huibregtse, 542 F.3d 1155, 1171 n.4 (7th Cir. 2008) (distinguishing Ortega 

because it “arose prior to Congress’ enactment of [AEDPA] and, therefore, 

the court in Ortega was at liberty to apply a much more searching standard 

of review than the one to which AEDPA confines us.”). Thus, the state 

court could not have contradicted clearly established Supreme Court precedent because there was never any clearly established precedent to begin 

with.

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(citing People v. Smith, 680 N.E.2d 291, 302–03 (Ill. 1997)) (additional citations omitted); see also People v. Medina, 851 N.E.2d 

1220, 1227 (Ill. 2006). Hartsfield and his mother both allege 

that Hartsfield communicated his desire to testify to his counsel. According to them, counsel disagreed and said he would 

not put Hartsfield on the stand. Counsel assured Hartsfield, 

however, that he would get his chance to speak when the trial 

judge admonished him of his right to testify. But the trial 

judge never so admonished Hartsfield, and when Hartsfield 

attempted to contemporaneously assert his right to testify on 

the record and in open court, he claims his counsel “shushed” 

him. Therefore, the court was unaware of Hartsfield’s wishes, 

and in the eyes of the appellate court, that added up to waiver.

Only two of our decisions hold that a defendant did not 

properly preserve the right to testify. See Stark, 507 F.3d at 

518–19 (illustrating and distinguishing Ward v. Sternes and Ortega v. O’Leary because of their unusual circumstances). It is 

thus worth reiterating our prior suggestion that “prudent 

counsel may choose to put such waivers on the record outside 

the presence of the jury, as is standard practice in some 

courts.” Thompson, 458 F.3d at 619 (citing Taylor v. United 

States, 287 F.3d 658, 662 (7th Cir. 2002)). Even though “we do 

not require judges to question defendants regarding their desire to testify,” we certainly prefer it. Id.5

5 Indeed, we are troubled by the obligation that Illinois caselaw appears to impose upon a defendant to contemporaneously assert a right to 

testify in circumstances where defense counsel has just silenced the defendant. Perhaps the Illinois Supreme Court will find occasion to take another look at its approach when it considers Knapp later this term. See People v. Knapp, 2019 IL App (2d) 160162, ¶¶ 39–40, appeal allowed, 132 N.E.3d 

283 (Ill. 2019).

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Not all jurisdictions, however, follow Illinois’s lead when 

it comes to requiring a defendant’s contemporaneous assertion of the right to testify to preserve it for judicial review. 

That has consequence in the habeas context: “The variety in 

practice among the state courts and the various federal courts 

shows ... that there is no standard clearly established by the 

Supreme Court of the United States that is binding on all.” 

Thompson, 458 F.3d at 619; see also Arredondo, 542 F.3d at 1165; 

Jenkins v. Bergeron, 824 F.3d 148, 153 (1st Cir. 2016) (agreeing 

with our analysis and stating that “the Supreme Court has 

never articulated the standard for assessing whether a criminal defendant has validly waived his right to testify or determined who has the burden of production and proof under 

particular circumstances.”).

In ruling that Hartsfield did not contemporaneously assert

his right to testify, the state court did not unreasonably apply 

clearly established Supreme Court precedent because there 

was no clearly established Supreme Court precedent to apply 

in the first place. See Clark v. Lashbrook, 906 F.3d 660, 664 (7th 

Cir. 2018) (“Where Supreme Court cases ‘give no clear answer 

to the question presented, let alone one in the petitioner’s favor,’ it cannot be said that the state court unreasonably applied Supreme Court precedent and thus ‘relief is unauthorized.’” (citation omitted)).6

6 Hartsfield contends Rock, McCoy, and Garza v. Idaho, 139 S. Ct. 738 

(2019) all clearly establish that a defendant need not point to an on-therecord assertion of his right to testify in the trial court. As to Rock, we have 

cautioned against reading it “too broadly in the habeas context” because 

it applies, if at all, at a very high level of generality. Hanson v. Beth, 738 

F.3d 158, 164 (7th Cir. 2013) (citing Arredondo, 542 F.3d at 1170). Turning 

to McCoy and Garza, Hartsfield has not even begun to argue (let alone analyze) that those decisions apply retroactively on collateral review. Cf. 

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Without the benefit of clearly established federal law, we 

cannot say the Illinois Appellate Court unreasonably decided 

that Hartsfield did not meet his burden of proving that his 

attorney in fact prohibited his testimony. Assuming we could 

independently find that Hartsfield met this burden, then that 

would of course constitute deficient performance. See, e.g., 

Galowski v. Murphy, 891 F.2d 629, 636 (7th Cir. 1989) (“The attorney may not, as a tactical decision, forbid the defendant 

from testifying, but instead may only advise the defendant as 

to what the best approach would be.”).

Second, and though we need not address it, Hartsfield 

cannot satisfy the prejudice prong under Strickland either. It 

is, in short, not reasonably probable that his proposed testimony would have affected the jury’s verdict. As a preliminary 

matter, the circumstantial evidence against Hartsfield was 

strong. Two eyewitnesses placed him at the scene of the crime, 

armed with a weapon and a motive to use it. Hartsfield’s own 

comments later that night further implicated him in the incident. More to the point, Hartsfield’s uncorroborated story is 

that he was by himself and driving around during the time of 

the murder. We agree with the Warden that this amounts “to 

little more than a generic denial of guilt, which is insufficient 

to establish prejudice.” In a nutshell, the state court reasonably applied Strickland.

United States v. Khan, 769 F. App’x 620, 623–24 (10th Cir. 2019), petition for 

cert. filed, No. 19-7223 (U.S. Jan. 2, 2020) (“Even assuming McCoy applies 

retroactively to this collateral proceeding, [the defendant] has not made a 

debatable showing that its holding applies under the facts of his case.”).

Case: 18-1736 Document: 54 Filed: 02/03/2020 Pages: 18
18 No. 18-1736

C. Scope of the Certificate of Appealability

For the sake of completeness, we note that Hartsfield 

brings two claims in addition to his ineffective assistance 

claim based on his right to testify. Hartsfield argues that the 

state appellate court unreasonably discounted his claims that 

the evidence at trial was insufficient for the jury to convict him 

on, and counsel was ineffective for failing to call a witness. We 

included neither of these issues in our order granting Hartsfield a certificate of appealability. The only issue we certified 

for appellate review was the right-to-testify issue.

Therefore, those other evidentiary issues are outside the 

scope of the certificate and we decline to review them. See Peterson v. Douma, 751 F.3d 524, 529 (7th Cir. 2014) (“[W]e have 

repeatedly said that an appeals panel will decide the merits of 

only those issues included in the certificate of appealability.”

(citation omitted)). We also decline Hartsfield’s implicit request to amend the certificate this late in the game. See Thompson v. United States, 732 F.3d 826, 831–32 (7th Cir. 2013) (instructing counsel who wish to raise additional claims to not 

simply brief them but first request permission to do so).

III. Conclusion

The Appellate Court of Illinois reasonably held that defense counsel did not usurp Hartsfield’s right to testify at trial. 

For that reason, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court 

denying Hartsfield’s habeas petition.

Case: 18-1736 Document: 54 Filed: 02/03/2020 Pages: 18