Case Name: Ralph R. STOGNER, III, Petitioner, v. STATE of Wyoming, Respondent
Court: Supreme Court of Wyoming
Jurisdiction: Wyoming
Decision Date: 1990-05-24
Citations: 792 P.2d 1358
Docket Number: No. 89-185
Parties: Ralph R. STOGNER, III, Petitioner, v. STATE of Wyoming, Respondent.
Judges: Before CARDINE, C.J., and THOMAS, URBIGKIT, MACY and GOLDEN, JJ.
Reporter: Pacific Reporter 2d
Volume: 792
Pages: 1358–1369

Head Matter:
Ralph R. STOGNER, III, Petitioner, v. STATE of Wyoming, Respondent.
No. 89-185.
Supreme Court of Wyoming.
May 24, 1990.
Leonard D. Munker, State Public Defender and Jacalyn L. Bachlet, Asst. Public Defender, Cheyenne, for petitioner.
Joseph B. Meyer, Atty. Gen., John W. Renneisen, Deputy Atty. Gen., Karen A. Byrne, Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., Kaylin D. Kluge, Asst. Atty. Gen., Cheyenne, for respondent.
Before CARDINE, C.J., and THOMAS, URBIGKIT, MACY and GOLDEN, JJ.

Opinion:
GOLDEN, Justice.
Ralph R. Stogner, III (Stogner), filed a Petition for Writ of Certiorari on August 16, 1989. On August 25, 1989, this court entered an order noting probable jurisdiction and granting the petition to review Stogner's claim that his appellate counsel failed to adequately represent him on appeal.
Petitioner raises the following issues:
I. Whether petitioner's appellate counsel failed to adequately represent him on appeal.
The Standard
A. Whether appellate counsel for petitioner was ineffective because he failed to bring issue of ineffectiveness of trial counsel.
The Standard
1. The Particular Facts Upon Which Claim of Inadequate Representation By Appellate Counsel Rests.
(a) Whether Counsel was ineffective at the trial level.
(1) Failure to Timely File
(2) Lack of Due Diligence
(3) Failure to Call Essential Witnesses
(b) Whether Counsel's ineffectiveness at the trial level prejudiced petitioner's defense.
2. The rule of law transgressed.
3. Adverse effect upon a substantial right.
B. Whether petitioner Stogner was prejudiced at the appellate level due to appellate counsel's failure to bring the issue.
II. Whether the supreme court failed to properly review on appeal.
In opposition to these contentions, the appellee, State of Wyoming (State), provides this statement of the issues:
Respondent objects to Petitioner's phrasing and expansion of the issues beyond those specifically delineated in the Wyoming Supreme Court's Order dated August 25, 1989 granting Petitioner's petition for writ of certiorari. The issues which the Wyoming Supreme Court has confined this proceeding to are:
1. Whether petitioner's appellate counsel failed to adequately represent him on appeal in presenting issues of ineffectiveness of trial counsel which are intended to include: (1) failure to timely file motion [to present evidence of victim's prior sexual conduct]; (2) lack of due diligence [in inquiring into victim's prior sexual conduct]; and (3) failure to call essential witnesses [who could have corroborated the testimony of one witness who was available to testify to victim's prior sexual conduct], which errors petitioner now contends in post-conviction relief to have prejudiced his trial defense from which denial of petition for post-conviction relief this appeal is taken by Petition for Writ of Certiorari?
2. Whether the Wyoming Supreme Court failed to properly review on appeal.
Stogner contends he has a right to a new trial or a reversal of his conviction; however, we will deny relief.
THE WRIT OF CERTIORARI
To clarify the court's reasoning for granting this writ of certiorari, it is perhaps appropriate to consider the historical development of the writ. See Wyo.Const, art. 5, § 3. The State of Wyoming celebrates its 100th year of statehood this year, and it, was in our State Constitution, adopted in 1890, that the authority of this court to grant writs of certiorari was established.
We granted certiorari in this case to address petitioner's claim that he was a victim of ineffective assistance of counsel on appeal. This is an issue which has been repeatedly raised in this court in recent years and resolution of the issue is of great public importance. Moreover, it is an issue of constitutional magnitude. A district court's ruling on the admission of evidence is discretionary and the issue is not susceptible of full review on appeal. Finally, we have adopted a rule which treats the issue of effective assistance of trial counsel as waived unless raised on direct appeal, and the issue is res judicata for purposes of its consideration upon petition for post-conviction relief. Kallas v. State, 776 P.2d 198 (Wyo.1989); Amin v. State, 774 P.2d 597 (Wyo.1989); Campbell v. State, 772 P.2d 543 (Wyo.1989). For these reasons, we shall give substantive consideration to petitioner's issues.
FACTS
This court reviewed Stogner's conviction for first-degree sexual assault in 1984. Briefly, the facts are that:
[o]n June 8, 1982, [Stogner] confronted victim with a gun at a store in Rock Springs where she was working and forced her to accompany him to a trailer house where he bound and gagged her and committed multiple sexual assaults on her. The case was set for trial on March 29, 1983. On March 23, 1983, [the State] filed a motion in limine to prevent introduction of evidence of the prior sexual conduct of the victim. On March 25, 1983 [Stogner] filed a motion for hearing on the admissibility of evidence pertaining to the prior sexual conduct of the victim, contending that he received inforr mation on March 24,1983, that the victim had engaged in acts of prostitution in the past and that such evidence was necessary to support his defense to the sexual assault charge, i.e., that the sexual acts were engaged in voluntarily by the victim in anticipation of payment for them.
Stogner v. State, 674 P.2d 1298, 1299 (Wyo.1984). Additional facts of consequence to the issues presented include these: Stogner filed a motion for continuance the day before trial, contending the prosecuting attorney interfered with a material witness who would have testified to the victim's prostitution activities and that he needed more time to rehabilitate the witness, as well as to develop testimony from other witnesses to bolster his theory of defense. He relies heavily on the trial court's denial of the motion. The denial was based, in part, upon defense counsel's failure to timely file a motion to present evidence of the victim's prior sexual conduct, as well as the fact that Stogner's counsel did not exercise due diligence in obtaining evidence of the victim's alleged past activities as a prostitute. Stogner, 674 P.2d at 1301. The same counsel defending Stogner at trial represented him in the original appeal; incompetence at trial was not raised as an issue.
DISCUSSION
This court's definitive opinion on the issue of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel is Cutbirth v. State, 751 P.2d 1257 (Wyo.1988). There, we held that ineffective assistance of counsel on appeal is not an issue which can be foreclosed as a matter of waiver or default because it is not an issue that could have been raised in the initial appeal. Id. at 1263. In resolving this issue, we adopted the "effective assistance of counsel" test from Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674, reh'g denied 467 U.S. 1267, 104 S.Ct. 3562, 82 L.Ed.2d 864 (1984). See, e.g., Frias v. State, 722 P.2d 135 (Wyo. 1986).
In Cutbirth this court established a more clearly defined standard so as to avoid ad hoc decisions and the necessity to proceed contrary to our waiver rule in future cases:
We conclude that the issue of whether counsel's performance was constitutionally deficient should be analyzed in much the same way that this court has analyzed the concept of plain error. In submitting a claim of deficient representation by appellate counsel, the petitioner in the post-conviction proceeding must demonstrate to the district court, by reference to the record of the original trial without resort to speculation or equivocal inference, what occurred at the trial. The particular facts upon which the claim of inadequate representation by appellate counsel rests must be presented. The petitioner then must identify a clear and unequivocal rule of law which those facts demonstrate was transgressed in a clear and obvious, not merely arguable way. Furthermore, the petitioner must show the adverse effect upon a substantial right in order to claim that the performance of appellate counsel was constitutionally deficient because of a failure to raise the issue on appeal. The adverse effect upon a substantial right in the context of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel is shown by demonstrating a " reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different. A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome." In this regard the test does address the fairness and integrity of the judicial proceedings. The reasonable probability must be one that demonstrates a more favorable result to the appellant if the omitted issue had been pursued.
Id. at 1266-67 (citations omitted). See also Murray v. State, 776 P.2d 206, 209 (Wyo. 1989).
The following matters are raised as the basis for Stogner's assertion of ineffective assistance of counsel:
1. Defense counsel failed to timely file a motion to admit evidence of the victim's -prior sexual conduct. W.S. 6-4-312.
2. Defense counsel had a long time to prepare Stogner's defense, but was tardy in discovering evidence of the victim's past sexual conduct and reputation. Stogner had claimed as his defense, since the day of his arrest, that the victim was a prostitute. Also, since he had no other evidence with which to defend himself, it was his word against that of the victim's at trial. Stogner suggests that since Rock Springs is a small town, a competent investigator should have been able to uncover this evidence.
3. Defense counsel failed to call essential witnesses, such as Karen Singleton and Wendell House, intimated as the victim's "man" (pimp?). Singleton's testimony about the victim's prior sexual conduct was excluded because the motion to use it was untimely and because the conduct was remote in time)
FAILURE TO TIMELY FILE MOTION
Wyoming, along with most other jurisdictions, enacted a "rape-shield" statute to bring under control a long-standing tradition that rape victims could be discredited as witnesses based on prior sexual conduct. W.S. 6-4-312 (Cum.Supp.1978). This tradition was based on the faulty notion that women who engaged in nonmari-tal intercourse were immoral and likely to engage in such conduct on any given occasion, and was deemed prejudicial and humiliating to the victim. Annotation, Constitutionality of "Rape Shield" Statute Restricting Use of Evidence of Victim's Sexual Experiences, 1 A.L.R.4& 283, 286 (1980). These statutes have, almost without exception, been found to be proper and constitutional, both facially and as applied. Id. at 287.
This court applied the rape-shield statute in Velos v. State, 752 P.2d 411, 414-15 (Wyo. 1988), holding that the victim's prior sexual behavior was irrelevant to the defendant's defense of mistaken identity. We held such evidence may not be used to attack a victim's credibility. See also W.R.E. 608(b).
In Heinrich v. State, 638 P.2d 641, 646 (Wyo.1981), this court held the rape-shield statute protected the victim from embarrassment and abuse at trial and also encouraged the reporting of sexual assaults to the authorities. We emphasized the evidence at issue in that case would not likely have been admissible in any event, suggesting rather clearly that the law in Wyoming is that such evidence is generally not admissible. Id., citing Annotation, Modern Status of Admissibility, in Forcible Rape Prosecution, of Complainant's Prior Sexual Acts, 94 A.L.R.3d 257, 265 (1979). See also Annotation, Modern Status of Admissibility, in Forcible Rape Prosecution, of Complainant's General Reputation for Unchastity, 95 A.L.R.3d 1181 (1979) (the reader will note that virtually all cases cited in the August 1989 Latest Case Service stand for the proposition that such evidence is generally inadmissible).
In Heinrich, the court held that the district court committed error in failing to follow the procedures required by the rape-shield statute, but concluded that the error did not affect substantial rights of the defendant or prejudice him and, therefore, could not be considered plain error. Id. at 645-46. In Weddle v. State, 621 P.2d 231, 238-39 (Wyo.1980), we indicated that failure to follow the procedure required by the rape-shield statute was of significance, even at the preliminary hearing stage, and could be fatal to the introduction of such evidence.
At the hearing on petitioner's motion to introduce evidence of the victim's prior sexual conduct, the district court made it clear that the motion was being denied because of untimeliness and remoteness in time of the conduct. Weathers v. State, 652 P.2d 970, 972 (Wyo.1982); Taylor v. State, 642 P.2d 1294, 1295 n. 5 (Wyo.1982); Lonquest v. State, 495 P.2d 575, 583 (Wyo.1972), cert. denied, 409 U.S. 1006, 93 S.Ct. 432, 34 L.Ed.2d 299.
Because the prior sexual conduct evidence was held inadmissible due to remoteness as well as untimeliness, a timely motion would have been similarly denied. Although Stogner's counsel should have met the statutory filing requirement, Stogner cannot show any adverse effect on a substantial right. Because this evidence was otherwise inadmissible, no reasonable probability exists that the result would have been different had the motion been filed on time. Decisions as to remoteness of evidence, and hence its admissibility, rest in the sound discretion of the trial court and will be upheld absent a clear abuse of discretion.
FAILURE TO DISCOVER OTHER WITNESSES
The only evidentiary material attached to the petition was Stogner's affidavit which stated the conclusion that he had been denied effective assistance of counsel. W.S. 7 — 14—102(b) (June 1987 Repl.), requires a petitioner to attach, "affidavits, records or other evidence supporting the allegations or [petitioner] shall state why the same are not attached." There are no affidavits from additional witnesses that could or should have been called. The only suggestion of an additional witness is the name of Wendell House who, according to Karen Singleton, had been the victim's "man" (pimp?) back in 1978. If evidence of some sort could have been obtained from him, it would have suffered from the same remoteness problem as that of Karen Singleton's. Stogner asserts that in a small town like Rock Springs a competent attorney should have been able to uncover some witnesses on this matter of prostitution, yet he himself can offer no names of witnesses that should have been called. On the other hand, the state provided an affidavit from Stogner's counsel that stated an experienced investigator had been used to inquire into the victim's background; the investigator was unable to uncover the sort of evidence, i.e., prostitution, that Stogner claims existed. A letter from Stogner's counsel answering to a grievance, filed by Stogner with the Grievance Committee of the Wyoming State Bar, was also appended to the state's response and it contained essentially the same information as the affidavit. The district court made detailed findings concluding that Stogner's counsel had not been ineffective at trial or on appeal.
The inevitable conclusion is that there simply were no additional witnesses that could or should have been called by defense counsel. The petitioner's allegations to the contrary are unsupported by anything in the record and rely totally upon speculation. A claim of ineffective assistance of counsel cannot be premised upon the failure to call witnesses where none exist or where the witnesses are not called for sound reasons. Laing v. State, 746 P.2d 1247, 1249-50 (Wyo.1987). See People v. Dillard, 680 P.2d 243, 245 (Colo.App.1984); State v. Onishi, 64 Haw. 62, 636 P.2d 742, 744 (1981).
FAILURE TO CALL ESSENTIAL WITNESSES
We will not belabor this third point because, as noted above, the record demonstrates no other witnesses were, or have been, discovered that counsel should have called. Stogner asserts Karen Singleton and Wendell House were essential witnesses, but as we have already concluded, Singleton's testimony was properly barred on grounds of remoteness, as well as failure to comply with the rape-shield statute. Wendell House's testimony would likely have met that same fate if he had been found and called as a witness. Even if the motion to introduce such testimony had been timely filed, we conclude that their testimony could have been excluded because a district court could properly conclude that the probative value of the evidence was outweighed by the probability that admission would have created prejudice. W.S. 6-4-312(a)(iv). Again, with respect to this issue, Stogner's argument does not meet the test established in Cut-birth.
' CONCLUSION
Stogner has failed to demonstrate facts which occurred at his trial and support a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, or that counsel improperly failed to raise errors they made at trial in Stogner's original appeal. Stogner is in the position of having to rely on rulings of the district court that were discretionary and proper under established rules of law. Moreover, Stogner cannot demonstrate that the result of his trial would have been different had the errors he alleges not occurred. The jury had more than sufficient facts before it to rationally find Stogner guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
The order of the district court denying Stogner relief on his petition for post-conviction relief is affirmed.
. Paragraphs 1 and 2 of the state's statement of the issues quote the issues this court identified in the order granting the petition.
. The historical development is appended for easy reference. This analysis does not include a consideration of writs granted under W.S. 5-2-119 (Cum.Supp.1989) and W.R.A.P. 13.
. Wyoming's 1886 session laws provided:
Writs of error and certiorari to reverse, vacate or modify judgments or final orders in civil cases are abolished; but courts shall have the same power to compel transcripts of the proceedings, containing the judgment and final order sought to be reversed, to be furnished or perfected as they heretofore had under writ of error and certiorari.
1886 Wyo.Sess.Laws ch. XII, § 801. The exact limits of this statute are not clearly understood, but there apparently was very little call for the Wyoming Supreme Court to interpret the statute, which remained extant even after the adoption of the Wyoming Constitution.
. One need only review the Annotation, Adequacy of Defense Counsel's Representation of Criminal Client Regarding Appellate and Postconviction Remedies, 15 A.L.R.4th 582 (1982), to get some flavor of the enormous number of cases this issue has generated.
.It should be noted at this juncture that the statute which governs claims that are barred in petitions for post-conviction relief matters was amended in 1988. 1988 Wyo.Sess.Laws ch. 46, § 1; and see, 1989 Wyo.Sess.Laws ch. 17, § 1. It now includes the following provision which became effective June 9, 1988. Stogner's original petition for post-conviction relief was filed pro se on December 9, 1987. The district court appointed the public defender to represent Stog-ner on April 22, 1988, and an amended petition for post-conviction relief was filed on December 19, 1988, which raised the issue of ineffective assistance of counsel on appeal. The district court denied relief on this issue and dismissed the petition in its entirety on March 15, 1989. Stogner's petition for writ of certiorari was filed in this court on August 16, 1989.
W.S. 7-14-103 (Cum.Supp.1989), states in pertinent part:
(b) Notwithstanding paragraph (a)(i) of this section [which bars claims which could have been raised on direct appeal], a court may hear a petition if:
A A A A A A
(ii) The court makes a finding that the petitioner was denied constitutionally effective assistance of counsel on his direct appeal. This finding may be reviewed by the supreme court together with any further action of the district court taken on the petition.
. Stogner was charged under W.S. 6-4-302(a)(i) (Cum.Supp.1978) (now W.S. 6-2-302(a)(i) (June 1988 Repl.)).
. See W.S. 6-4-312 (Cum.Supp.1978) (now W.S. 6-2-312 (June 1988 Repl.)).
. It must be demonstrated that counsel's representation was deficient by showing errors were made that were so serious that counsel was not functioning in accordance with the constitutional guarantee, and furthermore, the deficient performance prejudiced the appellant.
Cutbirth, 751 P.2d at 1263-64.