Opinion ID: 4527425
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Post-Conviction Review

Text: [¶11] Watson filed a petition for post-conviction review in April 2017. See 15 M.R.S. § 2129 (2018). He claimed that his trial attorney provided ineffective assistance of counsel when he introduced into evidence the video of the victim’s interview with police, which included her “detailed and highly 7 prejudicial allegations.”4 Watson argued that introducing the videotaped recording of the entire interview was “unnecessary . . . to provide evidence supporting [the victim’s] potential motive to fabricate the allegations.” The post-conviction court (Penobscot County, Lucy, J.) held an evidentiary hearing on January 23, 2019, and denied Watson’s petition in an order entered on May 30, 2019. The court made the following findings, which are supported by evidence presented at the post-conviction hearing. See Fahnley v. State, 2018 ME 92, ¶ 4, 188 A.3d 871. [¶12] At the evidentiary hearing, Watson and his trial attorney agreed that the information that the victim provided in the interview was the “same” as, and consistent with, her testimony at trial. The post-conviction court found that trial counsel had two rationales for playing the video of the interview for the jury: first, to support the defense theory that the detective failed to thoroughly interview the victim and, second, to show that the victim had motive to fabricate her allegations because of a custody dispute between Watson and her grandparents, whom the victim resided with at the time. 4 Watson also alleged ineffective assistance of counsel for (1) trial counsel’s failure to obtain a forensic evaluation of Watson’s computers that had been seized by the State, and (2) trial counsel’s failure to call a witness who would potentially offer exculpatory evidence. The post-conviction court was unpersuaded by these allegations, and we denied Watson’s request for a certificate of probable cause to appeal the post-conviction court’s determinations on these issues. See M.R. App. P. 19. 8 [¶13] Trial counsel testified at the post-conviction hearing that the theory of the defense’s case, which he claimed “Watson was a big proponent of,” was that the victim’s allegations were motivated by a custody dispute. According to trial counsel, the victim’s statement in the video interview about staying and living with her grandparents supported the defense’s argument that she had motive to fabricate the allegations so that she could remain with her grandparents. [¶14] The post-conviction court also found that trial counsel played the video as “part of his overall strategy to discredit the State’s investigation,” intending to show that the victim’s direct-examination testimony at trial was the same as what was said during the interview in which the detective failed to ask important questions. The court also found that the purpose of playing the video after the victim’s testimony was not to highlight inconsistencies in her story but to show the jury that this “[t]wenty-minute interview was the entirety of the State’s investigation, and that the victim’s story did not bear scrutiny under cross-examination . . . .” Trial counsel believed that showing the video “would demonstrate that the victim’s trial testimony was simply a repeat of the limited information covered in the . . . interview.” 9 [¶15] The court found that this strategy was “ultimately unsuccessful because [Watson] was convicted by the jury . . . . [who] must have unanimously found that the victim’s testimony was credible . . . .” The post-conviction court determined that trial counsel’s decision to play the victim’s video-recorded interview did not fall outside of the wide range of reasonable professional assistance, see Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 689 (1984), and denied Watson’s petition. The court concluded: Regardless of the outcome, after considering all of the issues and evidence, the court is not persuaded that trial counsel’s representation “fell below an objective standard of reasonableness” or was otherwise constitutionally ineffective. [¶16] Watson sought a certificate of probable cause to appeal the court’s denial of his petition for post-conviction review. See 15 M.R.S. § 2131(1) (2018); M.R. App. P. 19(a)(2)(F). We granted the certificate of probable cause limited to the question of whether trial counsel was ineffective “by playing at trial a video of the interview between the victim and police.” See M.R. App. P. 19(f).