Opinion ID: 2576153
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Counsel's failure to present evidence regarding defendant's incompetence to stand trial

Text: Defendant next contends that Newman and Lucas both failed to present to the court evidence in their possession that would have raised a doubt concerning defendant's competence to stand trial. As noted above, during hearings held on May 8 and 10, 1989, outside the presence of the jurors and the prosecutor, defendant's advisory counsel Newman and Lucas expressed their belief that defendant might not be competent to waive counsel or to represent himself, and mentioned the existence of records from defendant's confinement at Atascadero State Hospital in 1972. Nonetheless, neither Newman nor Lucas submitted to the court any records or other evidence to substantiate these claims. The record reflects that defendant did not want to be examined by a psychiatrist and prevented his advisory attorneys from investigating a mental state defense. Further, in response to the court's question whether defendant wanted the court to appoint a psychiatrist to examine him, defendant specifically stated that he was not raising [ sic ] an incompetency hearing. Assuming for the sake of argument that it is within advisory counsel's role to bring to the court's attention evidence in support of a finding of incompetence even over a self-represented defendant's objection, on the present record we discern no prejudice from advisory counsel's failure to do so. The Atascadero records are not before us in the record on appeal. We thus have no way to determine whether those records would have caused the trial court to declare a doubt concerning defendant's competence to stand trial or to waive counsel. Accordingly, we reject defendant's contention.