Opinion ID: 180652
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Failure to Call Lay Witnesses at Sentencing Regarding Moormann's Childhood

Text: Moormann argues his appellate counsel provided ineffective assistance by not asserting a claim on direct appeal that trial counsel's failure to call any lay witnesses at the penalty phase to testify about Moormann's troubled childhood and adolescence constituted ineffective assistance. Moormann contends that reasonably competent trial counsel would have conducted a more thorough investigation into Moormann's past by interviewing family members, neighbors, fellow students, former doctors, teachers, and foster families, and gathering social, family, and criminal justice records. From such an investigation, Moormann asserts, trial counsel would have gleaned critical mitigation evidence about Moormann's background that could have been presented to the trial judge at sentencing through the testimony of lay witnesses. Moormann contends this evidence would have spared him from a capital sentence. In support of this claim, Moormann proffered in these habeas proceedings numerous records and documents concerning his biological mother, his foster care and adoption, and his education that were not presented to the trial court at sentencing. Moormann also proffered declarations from one of his foster parents, a former classmate, two educators from his elementary school, and multiple medical professionals who treated him as a child or adolescent. These declarations indicate Moormann had a troubled childhood; that he suffered from behavioral, mental, social, and emotional problems; and that others in the community generally considered him to be strange or abnormal. Two of the declarations briefly discuss Moormann's relationship with Roberta, but neither provides firsthand information about sexual abuse. The Supreme Court held in Strickland that counsel has a duty to make reasonable investigations or to make a reasonable decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary. 466 U.S. at 691, 104 S.Ct. 2052. Even if trial counsel for a capital defendant conducts an investigation into mitigating evidence that is unreasonable under prevailing professional norms, however, counsel's failures to uncover and present additional mitigation evidence at the penalty phase must still prejudice the defendant before counsel's inadequate performance will be found to constitute a Sixth Amendment violation. See Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 534, 123 S.Ct. 2527, 156 L.Ed.2d 471 (2003). To assess prejudice, we reweigh the evidence in aggravation against the totality of available mitigating evidence. Id.; see also Stankewitz v. Woodford, 365 F.3d 706, 716 (9th Cir.2004) ([A] penalty phase ineffective assistance claim depends on the magnitude of the discrepancy between what counsel did investigate and present and what counsel could have investigated and presented.). The problem here is that essentially all of the material information from the potential lay witnesses identified by Moormann during these habeas proceedings was actually before the sentencing court during the penalty phase of Moormann's trial. Extensive evidence of Moormann's history of behavioral, mental, social, and emotional difficulties was presented at trial, and trial counsel requested the court consider this evidence in mitigation of Moormann's crime during the penalty phase. The evidence included the testimony of Dr. Daniel Overbeck, Moormann's psychological expert, who reviewed Moormann's medical, psychological, school, jail, parole, prison, and police records, and testified about Moormann's mental health background from the age of two through the time of trial. Trial counsel also submitted a packet of sentencing materials to the court that included a letter from a family physician who had known Moormann since he was twelve years old, and a letter from Moormann's fourth grade teacher. The letter from the teacher provided a summary of Moormann's difficulties as a child and student, and attached a report from a doctor who had evaluated Moormann when he was in the fifth or sixth grade. We therefore agree with the district court that even if trial counsel acted unreasonably by not conducting a more thorough investigation into Moormann's childhood background, the failure to present lay witness testimony on the subject at sentencing did not prejudice Moormann. Despite the cumulative nature of the new evidence as it relates to Moormann's mental state, Moormann contends its absence nevertheless prejudiced him because it would have tended to make his allegations that Roberta sexually abused him more believable. The record, however, does not bear out this assertion. None of the declarations from the potential new lay witnesses proffered by Moormann in these habeas proceedings provides any corroboration of Moormann's allegations that Roberta sexually abused him as a child. At most, the declarations describe an overly protective mother who had an odd relationship with her son. Moormann does not point to a single potential lay witness who knew him as an adolescent or child that could testify to facts supporting his allegations of sexual abuse. The new documents Moormann proffered to the district court in these habeas proceedings did provide a more detailed account of his background, particularly with respect to his biological mother. This evidence, however, was cumulative of the evidence already before the trial court at sentencing. Moreover, the evidence was most relevant to show as a mitigating factor that Moormann's capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct or to conform his actions to the law was significantly impaired. See Ariz.Rev.Stat. § 13-703(G)(1) (West Supp.1982-83); State v. Mauro, 159 Ariz. 186, 766 P.2d 59, 81 (1988) (reducing capital sentence to life sentence because significant impairment of defendant's capacity to control his conduct was a sufficiently substantial mitigating circumstance to outweigh the two aggravating factors found by the trial court). Yet the trial court found this mitigating factor to have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt on the basis of the evidence it already had before it. The new material would not have affected the result because the court found the three aggravating factors  conviction of a previous offense for which a life sentence could be imposed; pecuniary motive; and the especially cruel, heinous, or depraved manner in which the crime was committedoutweighed the single mitigating factor. Thus, there is no reasonable probability that the cumulative evidence identified in these habeas proceedings would have affected the sentence imposed by the trial judge. Moormann therefore suffered no prejudice at the penalty phase of his trial. See Wong v. Belmontes, ___ U.S. ___, 130 S.Ct. 383, 388, 175 L.Ed.2d 328 (2009). Even assuming there was a plausible argument that trial counsel should have done more, there was no reasonable probability that the Arizona Supreme Court would have reversed Moormann's capital sentence, even if appellate counsel had raised the issue on direct appeal. The Arizona Supreme Court agreed with the trial court that the State proved beyond a reasonable doubt the three aggravating factors, and held that these aggravating factors outweighed the single mitigating circumstance established by Moormann. Moormann I, 744 P.2d at 688. Since the potential lay witnesses identified by Moormann in these habeas proceedings could only offer mitigating evidence cumulative of the one mitigating factor the trial judge had already found, and the remaining information was cumulative of information already before the sentencing court, there is no reasonable probability the Arizona Supreme Court would have concluded trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance at the penalty phase by not presenting such evidence. Appellate counsel's failure to raise this claim on direct appeal did not prejudice Moormann, and there was no Fourteenth Amendment due process violation. See Smith, 528 U.S. at 285-86, 120 S.Ct. 746.