Opinion ID: 498417
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Failure to Adequately Investigate Laws' Psychological Background.

Text: 72 Laws makes the argument, maintained throughout the state court post-conviction proceedings, that his trial counsel failed to adequately investigate his past psychiatric treatment record and to explore a possible psychologically-based defense. Laws had undergone a psychiatric examination in the Mississippi State Hospital in 1974-75 while serving time in the Mississippi Penitentiary on an aggravated assault charge. Trial counsel, however, relied on a psychiatric exam of Laws conducted on September 22, 1981, at the Fulton State Hospital in connection with one of the two other capital murder charges which had been brought against Laws. The Fulton State Hospital examination, which took into account Laws' prior Mississippi examination, concluded that Laws was mentally capable of standing trial, and that he was able to know and appreciate the nature, quality and wrongfulness of the murders when he had committed them and had been capable of conforming his conduct to the requirements of the law. The record regarding this issue at the Rule 27.26 hearing is as follows: 73 Q. What were the results of this examination that you were aware of before the trial? 74 A. The findings were, from Roman Numeral VIII, that the accused had no mental disease or defect within the meaning of Section 552.010, and that Leonard had the capacity to understand the proceedings against him and knew and appreciated the nature and wrongfulness of his conduct. 75 Q. And do they also, on page four of this document, talk about an evaluation in Mississippi and what the diagnosis there was? 76