Opinion ID: 2022261
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Counsel's Performance at the Sentencing Hearing

Text: Allen makes a two-pronged argument urging this Court to vacate his sentence and remand for a new sentencing hearing based on his counsel's performance at the final sentencing hearing. The grounds of this argument are that counsel allowed the trial court to consider false evidence by failing to object or to rebut. The allegedly false evidence included, inter alia, documentation that Allen possessed normal intelligence, completed the eleventh grade, and came from a nurturing and loving family. These statements were contained in the pre-sentence report, which contained reports from Allen's prior convictions and parole applications. The State counters that the evidence was neither false nor unreliable and that Allen fails to show the falsity of the challenged evidence. Essentially, the State responds that no error was committed under Johnson v. Mississippi, 486 U.S. 578, 108 S.Ct. 1981, 100 L.Ed.2d 575 (1988) (death sentence vacated when a charged aggravator was premised on materially inaccurate, prejudicial evidence), and thus the sentence must stand. Neither party persuades us. The State correctly points out that this case is not similar to Johnson, [15] but it misses the crux of Allen's argument. Nevertheless, we conclude that Allen was not deprived of effective assistance of counsel by his attorney's response to the challenged evidence. The gravamen of Allen's claim is that his trial attorney abandoned him by not challenging the allegedly untrue evidence. There was no reason for defense counsel or the trial court to doubt the veracity of the evidence Allen now challenges. All of the statements regarding Allen's I.Q. and level of education were contained in official documents pertaining to Allen's prior offenses and applications for parole. [16] These documents are entitled to a high degree of credibility. If a factfinder is to discredit such evidence, then the claimant must offer some credible evidence tending to show the unreliability of the challenged statements. [17] In the absence of evidence of misconduct or error in the administration of tests or the preparation of documents, trial counsel is not ineffective for not attempting a futile endeavor. Likewise, trial counsel had no reason to doubt the veracity of evidence about Allen's home and family life contained in the same official documents. Present counsel writes, Trial counsel did not inform the court the evidence before it was false and, had counsel known the evidence was false, there exists no sound strategy reason for failing to inform the court of the `truth'. (Appellant's Br. at 145.) This argument, however, runs contrary to the testimony Allen's sister April [18] and his mother Ruby [19] provided during the sentencing hearing before the judge. It is clear that Allen was not denied effective assistance of counsel because of a failure to object to the admission of statements found in government documents which were identical in content to those of his own mother and sister. [20]
Allen argues that he was denied the assistance of counsel at the critical motion to correct errors stage. This is an attempt to fit his case under United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 104 S.Ct. 2039, 80 L.Ed.2d 657 (1984), and thereby avoid Strickland analysis. In Cronic, the Supreme Court indicated it had uniformly found constitutional error without any showing of prejudice when a defendant was denied the assistance of counsel at a critical stage of the proceedings. Id. at 659 n. 25, 104 S.Ct. at 2047 n. 25. If the motion to correct errors is a critical stage of the proceedings, then Allen's claim has merit. The motion to correct errors was once a critical stage in Indiana practice because of its jurisdictional role in marshalling the issues for appeal. It is, however, no longer critical for this purpose. Thus, a claim under Cronic cannot be sustained when a defendant is denied counsel, either actually or constructively, at the motion to correct errors stage. Allen's claim is unusual in that it straddles a rule change: the motion to correct errors was still a jurisdictional stage of the proceedings at the time of his trial. Since then, we have amended Trial Rule 59 so that the motion to correct errors is no longer a condition precedent to appellate jurisdiction. We took stock of the rule change and immunized Allen from procedural default by specifically affirming Allen's right to raise any and all issues on appeal when we removed David Sexson and appointed new counsel and struck Sexson's brief. As a result, even though the motion to correct errors was a critical stage at the time of Allen's conviction, the prejudice owing to any lack of representation has been removed. [21]