Title: George v. State
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 43, 2019
State: Delaware
Issuer: Delaware Supreme Court
Date: April 12, 2019

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 
 
MONIR GEORGE, 
 
Defendant Below, 
Appellant, 
 
v. 
 
STATE OF DELAWARE, 
 
Plaintiff Below, 
Appellee. 
§ 
§  No. 43, 2019 
§ 
§  Court Below—Superior Court 
§  of the State of Delaware 
§   
§  Cr. ID No. 0805035299 
§ 
§ 
§ 
§ 
 
 
 
 
 
Submitted:   March 14, 2019 
 
 
 
 
Decided: 
April 12, 2019 
 
Before VAUGHN, SEITZ, and TRAYNOR, Justices. 
 
 
 
ORDER 
 
Upon consideration of the appellant’s opening brief, the appellee’s motion to 
affirm, and the record below, it appears to the Court that: 
(1) 
The appellant, Monir George, filed this appeal from an order in which 
the Superior Court denied as untimely George’s objections to a Commissioner’s 
report.  The Commissioner’s report recommended that George’s second motion for 
postconviction relief and related motions be denied.  The State has moved to affirm 
the judgment below on the ground that it is manifest on the face of George’s opening 
brief that his appeal is without merit.  We agree and affirm. 
(2) 
In 2009, following a bench trial, George was found guilty but mentally 
ill of Murder in the First Degree, Attempted Murder in the First Degree, Reckless 
2 
 
Endangering in the First Degree, and three counts of Possession of a Firearm During 
the Commission of a Felony.  The evidence at trial was that in May 2008 George 
shot Malak Michael, a deacon and chief fundraiser for St. Mary’s Coptic Orthodox 
Church, during a church fundraising event in a hotel banquet room.  Several 
witnesses to the event testified at trial, and the evidence also included a photograph 
of George pointing a gun at the victim just before the shooting.  The image was 
inadvertently captured by an attendee who was photographing the fundraising event.  
The defense did not dispute that George shot Michael; instead, the defense strategy 
focused on mitigating George’s culpability based on mental illness or insanity.  This 
Court affirmed George’s conviction on direct appeal1 and affirmed the Superior 
Court’s denial of George’s first motion for postconviction relief.2 
(3) 
George later filed a second motion for postconviction relief and related 
motions.  The Superior Court referred the motions to a Commissioner.  On 
September 17, 2018, the Commissioner issued a report recommending that the 
motions be denied.  On September 25, 2018, George filed a “Letter of Intent to 
Appeal Commissioner Decision of 9-17-18,” in which he stated that his case is 
similar to Fowler v. State3 and requested forms and instructions for filing an appeal. 
On October 10, 2018, George filed a motion for reconsideration of the 
                                                 
1 George v. State, 2010 WL 4009202 (Del. Oct. 13, 2010). 
2 George v. State, 2015 WL 1000228 (Del. Mar. 6, 2015). 
3 194 A.3d 16 (Del. 2018). 
3 
 
Commissioner’s report.  The Superior Court dismissed the motion as untimely and 
affirmed the Commissioner’s report.  This appeal followed. 
(4) 
Superior Court Criminal Rule 62(a)(5)(ii) provides that a defendant 
who objects to a Commissioner’s report must file written objections setting forth 
“with particularity the basis for the objections” within ten days after the 
Commissioner’s report is filed.  In this case, the Commissioner’s report was filed on 
September 17, 2018; any objections therefore would have been due on or before 
September 27, 2018.  George filed his motion on October 10, 2018, and it was 
therefore untimely.  Relying on the federal prison mailbox rule, George argues that 
his motion for reconsideration was timely because he gave it to prison personnel for 
mailing on September 29, 2018, which was within ten days of when he received the 
Commissioner’s report.  But the ten-day period for filing objections to the 
Commissioner’s report began to run when the report was filed on September 17.4  
Moreover, the Delaware courts have never adopted a prison mailbox rule.5  The 
Superior Court therefore did not err by dismissing the motion as untimely under Rule 
62.6 
                                                 
4 See SUPER. CT. CRIM. R. 62(a)(5)(ii) (“Within 10 days after filing of a Commissioner’s proposed 
findings of fact and recommendations . . ., any party may serve and file written objections . . . .”). 
5 See, e.g., Smith v. State, 47 A.3d 481 (Del. 2012) (declining to adopt the federal prison mailbox 
rule). 
6 See Johnson v. State, 2011 WL 5331670 (Del. Nov. 4, 2011) (holding that the Superior Court did 
not err in denying as untimely the defendant’s written objections to a Commissioner’s report). 
4 
 
(5) 
The Superior Court also did not err in determining that George’s “Letter 
of Intent to Appeal” did not comply with Rule 62(a)(5)(ii) because it did not state 
“with particularity” the basis for his objections to the Commissioner’s report.  Aside 
from requesting forms for filing an appeal, the letter merely stated that this case is 
similar to Fowler; it did not explain with particularity in what ways the cases are 
similar or how that should change the outcome of the motion for postconviction 
relief.  In any event, as the Superior Court noted, this case differs from Fowler in 
important ways.  In Fowler, the evidence provided by the State’s ballistics expert, 
Carl Rone, was a key component of identifying the defendant as the perpetrator.7  In 
this case, George shot the victim at a banquet in front of dozens of witnesses, the 
evidence presented at trial included a photograph of George pointing a gun at the 
victim just before the shooting, and George did not contend at trial that he was not 
the shooter—instead, the defense strategy focused on establishing that George was 
mentally ill or insane at the time of the offense.  In stark contrast to Fowler, the 
                                                 
7 See Fowler, 194 A.3d at 19-20 (“At Fowler’s trial, in which the charges for both incidents were 
jointly tried, a great deal of the State’s evidence was dedicated to proving that Fowler was the 
shooter in both incidents and that he used the same gun in each incident.  Not coincidentally, 
defense counsel’s strategy at trial was to create reasonable doubt by attacking the credibility of the 
ballistics evidence and suggesting that Chatman—the only eyewitness to both shootings—either 
was the shooter or was not credible because he implicated Fowler for the shooting to avoid 
prosecution for being the shooter.”); id. at 26 (“Rone presented evidence critical to the State’s 
theory of the case.”).  Several years after he provided testimony in the George and Fowler trials, 
Rone was arrested for Theft by False Pretense and Falsifying Business Records, which the Court 
in Fowler found “goes to both Rone’s professional reliability and honesty.”  Id. 
5 
 
ballistics testimony provided by Rone in George’s trial was not central to finding 
George guilty. 
(6) 
Because the ten-day period for filing objections to a Commissioner’s 
report is a challenging requirement for an incarcerated, pro se litigant to meet, we 
have also considered whether George’s arguments should be addressed on the merits 
notwithstanding the fact that his objections were untimely under Rule 62.  We hold 
that the arguments need not be addressed on the merits, because George’s motions 
were subject to summary dismissal under Superior Court Criminal Rule 61.8  Rule 
61(d)(2) provides that a second or subsequent motion for postconviction relief shall 
be summarily dismissed unless the movant was convicted after trial and the motion 
either: 
(i) 
pleads with particularity that new evidence exists that 
creates a strong inference that the movant is actually 
innocent in fact of the acts underlying the charges of which 
he was convicted; or 
(ii) 
pleads with particularity a claim that a new rule of 
constitutional law, made retroactive to cases on collateral 
review by the United States Supreme Court or the 
Delaware Supreme Court, applies to the movant’s case and 
renders the conviction or death sentence invalid.9 
 
                                                 
8 This Court may affirm the Superior Court’s judgment “on the basis of a different rationale than 
that which was articulated by the trial court.” Unitrin, Inc. v. Am. Gen. Corp., 651 A.2d 1361 (Del. 
1995). 
9 SUPER. CT. CRIM. R. 61(d)(2)(i), (ii).  See also SUPER. CT. CRIM. R. 61(i)(1)-(4). 
6 
 
(7) 
The Commissioner concluded that George’s motion was not 
procedurally barred by Rule 61 because George alleged “newly discovered 
evidence.”10  The Commissioner therefore reviewed—and rejected—George’s 
claims on their merits. 
(8) 
We disagree that George has identified any new evidence that 
overcomes the procedural bars of Rule 61.  Rule 61(d)(2)(i) provides for summary 
dismissal of a second or subsequent postconviction motion unless the defendant 
pleads with particularity new evidence that “creates a strong inference that the 
movant is actually innocent in fact of the acts underlying the charges of which he 
was convicted.”11  George’s efforts to impugn the credibility of the State’s ballistics 
expert and medical examiner do not create a strong inference that George was not 
the shooter.  The testimony provided by those witnesses was not central—or even 
necessary—to identifying George as the shooter, given the circumstances of this 
case, the other evidence of George’s guilt (including the photograph of George 
wielding the gun), and the fact that George did not even contend at trial that he did 
not perpetrate the shooting.12 
                                                 
10 Commissioner’s Report and Recommendation, Docket Entry No. 178, at 6, State v. George, Cr. 
ID No. 0805035299 (Sept. 17, 2018). 
11 SUPER. CT. CRIM. R. 61(d)(2)(i) (emphasis added). 
12 See Sykes v. State, 2018 WL 4932731, at *1 (Del. Oct. 10, 2018) (“speculative and implausible 
theories about how someone other than” the defendant might have committed the crime do not 
overcome the procedural bars of Rule 61, especially where there is overwhelming evidence that 
the defendant committed the acts underlying the charges). 
7 
 
NOW, THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that the Motion to Affirm is 
GRANTED and the judgment of the Superior Court is AFFIRMED.13 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
BY THE COURT: 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
/s/ Collins J. Seitz, Jr. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Justice 
 
 
                                                 
13 George filed with his opening brief a motion for appointment of counsel.  We find no compelling 
reason to justify the appointment of counsel in this case.  The motion is therefore denied.  See 
SUPR. CT. R. 26(b) (providing that the Court has discretion to appoint counsel in an appeal in a 
postconviction proceeding).