Opinion ID: 2681023
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Jalloh, the jailhouse informant.

Text: Amadu Sulamon Jalloh, an inmate with pending criminal charges, was incarcerated with Jamaal Alexis and Donnell Hunter (a/k/a “Fat Rat”) at the Prince George’s County Detention Center. Jalloh informed his attorney that he overheard conversations between Alexis and Fat Rat regarding the murder of Brown and the potential killing of a witness. Jalloh’s attorney arranged a meeting between Jalloh and an Assistant State’s Attorney. According to Jalloh’s ultimate grand jury testimony, 4 Alexis confessed to him in jail that he murdered Brown. Moreover, Jalloh stated that, on one occasion, he heard Fat Rat tell Alexis that “the only way you can go home is to kill the witness.” Jalloh testified also that, at some point after Jalloh’s meeting with the Assistant State’s Attorney, Alexis told Jalloh that he was going home because “[his] brother got rid of the witness.” According to Jalloh, Alexis told him that three people had been shot: two men were killed and a girl was injured. On 30 July 2009, the State charged Alexis with the murder of Bobby Ennels, a purported witness to the Raymond Brown murder, as well as with attempted murder, conspiracy to commit murder, solicitation to obstruct justice by preventing Ennels’s future testimony, and solicitation to obstruct justice by retailiating against Ennels for his grand jury testimony. 4 When Jalloh refused to testify at trial, the trial judge permitted the State to read his grand jury testimony aloud to the jury. -7- B. Pre-Trial Events Relating to the Disqualification of Alexis’s Lead Defense Counsel. On 13 October 2006, when Petitioner was charged initially with the first degree murder of Raymond Brown, and related charges, attorney Luis J. Martucci represented Alexis. Subsequent to the indictment on 1 April 2008, an additional attorney, John McKenna, entered an appearance on behalf of Alexis. The case against Alexis was scheduled initially for a motions hearing on 1 July 2008 and for trial on 6 August 2008. After several continuances, Messrs. Martucci and McKenna withdrew the pending motions and the case was set for trial on 9 March 2009. On 18 December 2008, Harry Tun, Esquire, filed a Motion for Substitution of Counsel (replacing Martucci and McKenna), which the Circuit Court granted on 29 December 2008. Tun filed additionally a motion to continue the trial date to 13 April 2009, which the Circuit Court granted as well. Several months later, on 1 April 2009, the State filed a Motion to Strike the Appearance of Defense Counsel Tun. In their Memorandum of Law in support of their motion, the State explained that Jalloh was a material witness in its case because he agreed to testify about Alexis’s confession to murdering Brown and other related conversations. The State sought to strike the appearance of Tun as defense counsel for Alexis because of a conflict of interest arising from Tun’s prior representation of Jalloh with respect to charges pending against Jalloh in State of Maryland v. John Doe, aka Kamara Mohamed, CT07-2450X, in the Circuit Court (apparently Jalloh was known also as Kamara Mohamed). -8- To summarize the facts regarding this prior representation, as presented to the Circuit Court at the hearing on the motion to disqualify counsel, Tun’s representation of Jalloh against the then still pending charges of attempted murder and associated charges in a matter unrelated to the case against Alexis lasted from 18 December 2007 until 5 February 2008. During that time, according to Tun, he met with Jalloh “at least five times going over [ ] the case that he was involved [in].” As part of Tun’s representation of Jalloh, he received from the State discovery in Jalloh’s case on 2 January 2008, represented Jalloh at a bond hearing on 18 January 2008, and filed a motion to sever Jalloh’s case from that of a co-defendant on 25 January 2008. After Tun’s representation of Jalloh was terminated, Jalloh filed a complaint on 19 February 2008 against Tun with the Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland. In light of this prior representation, the State moved to strike the appearance of Tun. The State averred that a conflict of interest existed between Tun’s representation of Alexis and his prior representation of Jalloh, a State material witness, because “Tun was provided with confidential privileged attorney-client information concerning Mr. Jalloh’s background and the facts and circumstances of Mr. Jalloh’s case.” In support of this assertion, the State attached an affidavit by Jalloh indicating that he provided “confidential information pertaining to [his] case” to Tun. Particularly because the State predicted that Jalloh’s credibility would be a “center-point of both the State’s examination and the Defense’s cross-examination,” the State asserted that the conflict of interest would violate the Maryland Lawyers Rules of Professional Conduct, see Md. Rules of Professional Conduct 1.7 & 1.8, because Jalloh refused to waive his attorney- -9- client privilege. Additionally, the State argued that the court should strike defense counsel’s appearance because any conviction of Alexis obtained with Tun as Alexis’s counsel would be overturned on appeal or during collateral review on the basis of ineffective assistance of counsel if Tun were permitted to continue representing Alexis in view of the conflict of interest with Jalloh. On 9 April 2009, Tun filed, on behalf of Alexis, a Memorandum of Law in Opposition to the State’s motion. Tun acknowledged that he had represented Jalloh, whom he knew at the time as Kamara Mohamed, but argued that the representation was for “a brief and limited period of time,” less than two months. Tun stated that, during the representation, he had “focused chiefly on procedural matters” and had not prepared for trial at that time. “[Tun] estimate[d] that he spent less than 20 hours working on Mr. Mohamed’s case altogether.” Moreover, Tun stated that, when he was retained by Alexis on 18 December 2008, “[he] was unaware that Jalloh had any involvement or personal stake in [] Alexis’s matter.” Tun maintained that the Circuit Court should not strike his appearance for several reasons. First, Tun averred that the information that Tun gained about Jalloh during his representation of him was not privileged because it had become known generally to the State (the opposing party) through Jalloh’s voluntary divulgements and through Jalloh detailing his case in his complaint filed against Tun with the Attorney Grievance Commission of Maryland. Second, Tun argued that he should not be disqualified because effective safeguards in the trial of Alexis could eliminate any conflicts associated with his prior representation of Jalloh. Specifically, Tun proffered that “the limited -10- appearance of attorney Antonio Jones for the purpose of cross-examining [ ] Jalloh at trial will create a ‘Chinese wall’ that will effectively serve to isolate any conflict of interest [ ] Tun’s previous limited representation of [ ] Jalloh might have upon the Defendant.” Tun believed that “this screen will address any concerns that a conflict of interest in [ ] Tun representing [ ] Alexis while maintaining any privileged communications from [ ] Jalloh” because Tun screened effectively himself from any conflict associated with Jalloh. Lastly, Tun argued that Alexis would suffer less prejudice if he is permitted to retain his current counsel. Also on 9 April 2009, defense co-counsel, Ross D. Hecht, filed a motion to exclude Jalloh’s statements. In that motion, Hecht made several statements indicating that it was his understanding that Jalloh had a history of serving as a jail house snitch: It is undersigned counsel’s understanding that Mr. Jalloh has cooperated with the State as an informant in several criminal matters in an effort to benefit his own circumstances. . . . It is undersigned counsel’s understanding that Mr. Jalloh has been cooperating with the law enforcement for some time. . . . It is submitted that throughout the tenure of Mr. Jalloh’s cooperation, Mr. Jalloh has been actively seeking information and trying to gain details from other inmates to help himself. . . . At the time that Mr. Jalloh obtained such information, he was working as a criminal informant for law enforcement in several different criminal cases in an effort to compel the prosecution to pursue a more lenient sentence in his own pending criminal matters. On 10 April 2009, the Circuit Court held a hearing to address the various motions, including the motion to disqualify defense counsel and the motion to exclude Jalloh’s statements. The court stated that it would allow each side a chance to make an opening and “then we’ll call witnesses as necessary” on the motions. After hearing the parties’ arguments on the motion to disqualify counsel, the hearing judge stated: -11- THE COURT: Anything else? MR. TUN: No, your Honor. THE COURT: All right. On the State’s motion to strike Mr. Tun as attorney for the Defendant, for some reason, I don’t know what the statistical likelihood of this happening is, the Defendant in this case and Mr. Tun’s former client, Mr. Amadu Jalloh, were placed in the same jail cell at the County Correctional Center and apparently have some conversations which I believe the State intends to use, if I’m not mistaken. [ASSISTANT STATE’S ATTORNEY]: Yes, Your Honor. THE COURT: While Mr. Alexis has waived whatever conflict Mr. Tun might have, . . . Jalloh . . . has not and, in fact, takes significant exception to Mr. Tun continuing to participate in this case when he [Jalloh], in fact, is going to be a witness for the State. The conflict is a significant one and I think we all agree there is, in fact, conflict. There is conflict with the duty of loyalty. I appreciate Mr. Tun represented him [Jalloh] for a short period of time but, I think, that duty of loyalty continues and, in fact, there is really is truly a conflict were this case to go to trial with Mr. Tun at the table. To say that we can create a Chinese wall, a masonry wall, a brick or a block wall that solves this problem I think is folly. I just don’t believe that we can do that. Having said all that, accordingly, I’m going to direct the Clerk to strike Mr. Tun’s appearance. During a recess in the court proceedings, Hecht approached the court in chambers (which was recounted on the record after the recess concluded) to ask whether the court would reconsider its ruling striking Tun’s appearance if Tun was not present in the courtroom during any examination of Jalloh. The Circuit Court replied on the record: “I’m really not inclined to reconsider that ruling. I just think if I do, I’ll be doing this case twice.” -12- C. Trial: Jury Instructions, Jury Verdict, & Sentencing. The cases against Alexis were tried together in a sixteen-day trial in October of 2010. Prior to closing arguments, the Circuit Court instructed the jury as to the solicitation charges as follows: The defendant is charged with two separate counts of the crime of Solicitation to Commit Obstruction of Justice. That is preventing witness testimony or retaliation for testimony. A criminal solicitation is an effort to persuade another person to commit a crime. In order to convict the defendant of Solicitation, the State must prove, one, that the defendant urged, advised, induced, encouraged, requested, or commanded another person to commit Obstruction of Justice by Preventing Witness Testimony and/or Obstruction of Justice in Retaliation for Testimony; and two, that at the time the defendant made the oral or written efforts to persuade another person to commit Obstruction of Justice by Preventing Witness Testimony and/or Obstruction of Justice by Retaliation for Testimony, the defendant intended that the Obstruction of Justice Preventing the Witness Testimony and/or Obstruction of Justice for Retaliation for Testimony be committed. The crime of Solicitation is in the asking. It is not necessary that the Obstruction of Justice Preventing the Witness Testimony and/or Obstruction of Justice Retaliation for Testimony actually be committed. With respect to the first case, the jury convicted Alexis of second degree murder of Brown, robbery with a dangerous weapon of Brown, use of a handgun in the commission of a crime of violence, conspiracy to commit theft over $500, and two counts of theft over $500. With respect to the second case, the jury convicted Alexis of solicitation of Rashadd Alexis to obstruct justice and murder Ennels to prevent his future testimony and solicitation of Rashadd Alexis to obstruct justice by retaliating against Ennels for his grand jury testimony. At the sentencing hearing on 14 December 2010, defense counsel argued that Alexis was “found guilty of two offenses which the lesser charge would merge with the -13- second” and, thus, the solicitation to obstruct justice by retaliation for the testimony of Ennels before the grand jury would merge with the solicitation to obstruct justice by preventing Ennels’s testimony at trial. The State responded, arguing that the solicitation sentences should not merge for several reasons. First, the solicitation convictions are two separate offenses (C.L. §§ 9-302 and 9-303) that “refer to two separate aspects. One is retaliation for testifying against the grand jury. The other is an inducement to not testify at trial.” Moreover, because “the solicitation is in the asking[,] . . . it has to be asked two separate times, to retaliate and to prevent.” Lastly, “they refer to two separate dates; one being March of #08 for the grand jury and the second being the October 2010 eventual trial.” The Circuit Court rejected defense counsel’s merger argument and sentenced Alexis to two consecutive sentences of twenty years for the solicitation convictions. The two cases were consolidated on appeal. The Court of Special Appeals affirmed, in Alexis v. State, 209 Md. App. 630, 61 A.3d 104 (2013), the Circuit Court’s judgment. On 20 June 2013, this Court issued a writ of certiorari, in response to Alexis’s petition, to consider the following questions: (1) Did the trial court err by disqualifying petitioner's attorney, who had previously represented a State's witness, when the witness refused to waive the conflict of interest and appellant's counsel had arranged for co-counsel to cross-examine the witness? (2) Are consecutive sentences appropriate where petitioner was convicted of two counts of solicitation where both counts were predicated on the same evidence? -14- II. TRIAL COURT’S DISQUALIFICATION OF DEFENSE COUNSEL. The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article 21 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights guarantee that, in all criminal prosecutions, the accused has the right to assistance of counsel for his defense. 5 The Supreme Court recognizes that “this right was designed to assure fairness in the adversary criminal process,” Wheat, 486 U.S. 153, 159, 108 S.Ct. 1692, 1697, 100 L.Ed.2d 140 (1988) (citing United States v. Morrison, 449 U.S. 361, 364, 101 S.Ct. 665, 667, 66 L.Ed.2d 564 (1981)), and that “the purpose of providing assistance of counsel ‘is simply to ensure that criminal defendants receive a fair trial.’” Id. (quoting Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 689, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 2065, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984)). Additionally, included as part of the right to assistance of counsel, is the qualified right of a defendant to select and be represented by one’s preferred attorney. See Wheat, 486 U.S. at 159, 108 S.Ct. at 1697, 100 L.Ed.2d 140; State v. Goldsberry, 419 Md. 100, 117-18, 18 A.3d 836, 847 (2011); McCleary v. State, 122 Md. 394, 400, 89 A. 1100, 1103 (1914). As the Supreme Court observes, “[i]n evaluating Sixth Amendment claims, ‘the appropriate inquiry focuses on the adversarial process, not on the accused's relationship with his lawyer as such.’” Id. (quoting United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 657, n. 21, 104 S.Ct. 2039, 2046 n. 21, 80 L.Ed.2d 657 (1984)). Thus, “while the right to select and 5 The Sixth Amendment to the United State Constitution guarantees that “[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.” Similarly, Article 21 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights provides “[t]hat in all criminal prosecutions, every man hath a right . . . to be allowed counsel . . . .” -15- be represented by one's preferred attorney is comprehended by the Sixth Amendment, the essential aim of the Amendment is to guarantee an effective advocate for each criminal defendant rather than to ensure that a defendant will inexorably be represented by the lawyer whom he prefers.” Id. (citing Morris v. Slappy, 461 U.S. 1, 13–14, 103 S.Ct. 1610, 1617–1618, 75 L.Ed.2d 610 (1983); Jones v. Barnes, 463 U.S. 745, 103 S.Ct. 3308, 77 L.Ed.2d 987 (1983)). Accordingly, the right of a defendant to counsel of choice is “circumscribed in several important respects.” Wheat, 486 U.S. at 159, 108 S.Ct. at 1697, 100 L.E.2d 140. See also Goldsberry, 419 Md. at 118, 18 A.3d at 847 (“The right to counsel of choice . . . is qualified.”). For example, a defendant may not “insist on the counsel of an attorney who has a previous or ongoing relationship with an opposing party, even when the opposing party is the Government.” Id. The question raised in the present case is the extent to which a defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to choice of counsel is qualified by the fact that the chosen attorney has a previous attorney-client relationship with a material witness of the opposing party. A. Standard of Review In multiple cases involving requests for disqualification of counsel due to alleged conflicts of interest, the Supreme Court and this Court applied the abuse of discretion standard of review. See, e.g., Wheat, 486 U.S. at 163, 108 S.Ct. at 1699, 100 L.E.2d 140 (stating that “[w]e do not think it can be said that the court exceeded the broad latitude which must be accorded it in making this decision” on the motion for substitution of counsel due to an alleged conflict of interest); Gatewood, 388 Md. at 538-40, 880 A.2d at 329-30 (concluding, after review of prior case law, the appropriate standard of review in -16- such cases is abuse of discretion) (citing Lykins v. State, 288 Md. 71, 415 A.2d 1113 (1980); Young v. State, 297 Md. 286, 465 A.2d 1149 (1983)). In Wheat, the leading Supreme Court case on the disqualification of counsel due to a conflict of interest, the Court held that “the district court must be allowed substantial latitude in refusing waivers of conflicts of interest not only in those rare cases where an actual conflict may be demonstrated before trial, but in the more common cases where a potential for conflict exists which may or may not burgeon into an actual conflict as the trial progresses.” Id., 486 U.S. at 163, 108 S.Ct. at 1699. The Court explained that wide latitude was necessary for the following reasons: [A] district court must pass on the issue whether or not to allow a waiver of a conflict of interest by a criminal defendant not with the wisdom of hindsight after the trial has taken place, but in the murkier pre-trial context when relationships between parties are seen through a glass, darkly. The likelihood and dimensions of nascent conflicts of interest are notoriously hard to predict, even for those thoroughly familiar with criminal trials. It is a rare attorney who will be fortunate enough to learn the entire truth from his own client, much less be fully apprised before trial of what each of the Government's witnesses will say on the stand. A few bits of unforeseen testimony or a single previously unknown or unnoticed document may significantly shift the relationship between multiple defendants. These imponderables are difficult enough for a lawyer to assess, and even more difficult to convey by way of explanation to a criminal defendant untutored in the niceties of legal ethics. Nor is it amiss to observe that the willingness of an attorney to obtain such waivers from his clients may bear an inverse relation to the care with which he conveys all the necessary information to them. Wheat, 486 U.S. at 162-63, 108 S. Ct. at 1699, 100 L.E.2d 140. 6 6 Alexis points out that these cases involved conflicts of interest arising from multiple representation (an attorney with a conflict or potential conflict between two or more current clients) and not successive representation (an attorney with a conflict or (continued…) -17- In applying the abuse of discretion standard in Wheat, the Supreme Court concluded that the trial judge “relied on instinct and judgment based on experience in making its decision” on the motion for substitution of counsel due to alleged conflict of interest and, thus, the decision should be given wide deference. Wheat, 486 U.S. at 163, 108 S.Ct. at 1699, 100 L.E.2d 140. See also Gatewood, 388 Md. at 540, 880 A.2d at 330 (acknowledging similarly that, in reviewing a circuit court’s decision regarding the disqualification of counsel request for alleged conflicts of interest created by past client representation, “the trial judge is in a unique position to ‘sense the nuances’ of the situation before him or her.”) (quoting Lykins, 288 Md. at 85, 415 A.2d at 1121). The Supreme Court acknowledged that “[o]ther district courts might have reached differing or opposite conclusions with equal justification,” but emphasized “that does not mean that one conclusion was ‘right’ and the other ‘wrong.’” Id., 486 U.S. at 164, 108 S.Ct. at 1700, 100 L.E.2d 140. Similarly, we apply the abuse of discretion standard of review in this case. Consequently, we pause to review the contours of this standard of review. “Abuse of discretion,” although used and applied with great frequency by appellate courts, has been (…continued) potential conflict with at least one former client), as is present in this case. Alexis suggests in his brief that, because multiple representation and successive representation pose different dangers, different standards may apply. At oral argument, however, Alexis’s counsel conceded that the appropriate standard of review was abuse of discretion. Such a concession was proper because, even were we to acknowledge that conflict of interests may pose different dangers depending on the source of the conflict, the reasoning for our wide deference to the trial court’s determinations remains applicable regardless of the source of conflict. -18- described aptly as a “very general, amorphous term[] . . . .” North v. North, 102 Md. App. 1, 648 A.2d 1025 (1994). This perception is due, in large part, to the multitude of definitions for the term and, in some other part, to the necessity for its nature to change according to the legal context at issue. In regards to the multitude of varying definitions of “abuse of discretion,” as we recognized previously, “[o]ne of the more helpful pronouncements on the contours of the abuse of discretion standard comes from Judge . . . Wilner’s opinion in North v. North, 102 Md. App. 1, 648 A.2d 1025 (1994),” when he was the Chief Judge of the Court of Special Appeals. King v. State, 407 Md. 682, 697, 967 A.2d 790, 798 (2009). In North, Judge Wilner explained: “Abuse of discretion” . . . has been said to occur “where no reasonable person would take the view adopted by the [trial] court,” or when the court acts “without reference to any guiding rules or principles.” It has also been said to exist when the ruling under consideration “appears to have been made on untenable grounds,” when the ruling is “clearly against the logic and effect of facts and inferences before the court,” when the ruling is “clearly untenable, unfairly depriving a litigant of a substantial right and denying a just result,” when the ruling is “violative of fact and logic,” or when it constitutes an “untenable judicial act that defies reason and works