Opinion ID: 78507
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Failure to request a competency hearing or discover Pardo's medical infirmity

Text: Pardo contends that, although his attorney, Guralnick, objected to Pardo's testimony and believed that Pardo was incompetent to understand how his statements during the penalty phase would effect him, Guralnick failed to move for a competency hearing. He maintains that the appointed experts observations of Pardo's physical state should have put the experts and Guralnick on notice of his medical condition. He argues that a competency hearing would have permitted him the opportunity to test the experts' findings in an adversarial setting. He asserts that the Florida Supreme Court's ruling on this issue is an unreasonable application of United States Supreme Court precedent and that the district court overlooked the facts in concluding that the Florida court was not unreasonable. The Florida Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's summary denial of this issue. It held that in light of the experts' conclusions that Pardo was competent there was no reason to hold an evidentiary hearing, and that his trial counsel acted well within the range of reasonable professional assistance in declining to request .. . a competency determination. Pardo III, 941 So. 2d at 1063. Pardo's counsel did not render constitutionally deficient performance in failing to alert the experts to a condition for which physical symptoms first appeared while Pardo was detained pending trial, and that was not diagnosed until after Pardo was convicted and sentenced. Id. at 1064. The district court affirmed, finding that it was not an unreasonable application of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S. Ct. 2052 (1984) because it was predicated on the trial court's investigation of Pardo's competency through the evaluations and Pardo's attorney's reasonable reliance on the four experts reports in determining not to seek a competency hearing. R1-15 at 16. Pardo's counsel's duty was to conduct a reasonable investigation or to make a reasonable decision that an investigation was unnecessary. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 691, 104 S. Ct. at 2066. In any ineffectiveness case, a particular decision not to investigate must be directly assessed for reasonableness in all circumstances, applying a heavy measure of deference to counsel's judgments. Id. The record reflects that Pardo's counsel investigated Pardo's mental health and, after perceiving of issues with Pardo's mental health, requested the appointment of a mental health professional for an evaluation. Pardo's counsel also had Pardo evaluated on four different days by another mental health professional and reported to the trial court that none of the doctors had found Pardo to be incompetent. Pardo was also evaluated by three additional experts who each testified that Pardo was competent. Based on five experts' testimony that Pardo was competent, Pardo's counsel made a reasonable investigation of Pardo's mental state. Neither the fact of Pardo's actions contrary to his attorney's advice nor the physical manifestations of his thyroid condition equate to incompetence to stand trial. See Medina, 59 F.3d at 1107 ([N]ot every manifestation of mental illness demonstrates incompetence to stand trial.) The district court did not err in finding that the Florida court's decision was not contrary to or an unreasonable application of Supreme Court precedent.