Opinion ID: 2162009
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The government's response.

Text: In response to Dobson's motion, the government asserted that Dobson had demonstrated neither deficient performance on the part of his counsel nor prejudice in the Strickland [8] sense. The government further argued that no hearing on the motion was required. With its response, the government submitted an affidavit from Dobson's trial attorney. In that affidavit, counsel explained that, thirteen years after the fact, he had little memory of specific events which occurred during [Dobson's] trial. The affidavit continued as follows: I have no specific recollection of my reasons for not calling these witnesses. My notes indicate that presenting an alibi defense through these witnesses would necessarily have put one or more incidents of Mr. Dobson's prior criminal conduct before the jury, because the witnesses claimed to recall the date in question as one month after Mr. Dobson was released from jail. I believed then (and believe now) that evidence indicating prior criminal conduct is often highly prejudicial to a defendant. My notes also indicate that the government's case was based on the testimony of a single eyewitness, Mr. Edward Sawyer, and that there was some question as to the reliability of his identification. Based on my general experience in defending criminal cases, I expect that my decision whether to put on an affirmative defense would have depended in large part on my evaluation during trial of the strength of Mr. Sawyer's testimony. The witnesses in question were under subpoena and available to testify. Thus, it is not likely that I simply forgot to call them.