Opinion ID: 1791
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Defense Counsel's Testimony

Text: English's trial attorney, Elias Escobedo, testified at the evidentiary hearing as to his reasons for not offering Ceruti as a witness. Escobedo provided several reasons as to why he chose not to call Ceruti. First, he was concerned about the threats of violence Ceruti had allegedly made to Lamont and Whitehouse: During the course of the trial, there was testimony that was being elicited by a Daniel Lamont.... During the course of the trial, Mr. Lamontthe prosecution was questioning him on direct-examination, and Mr. Lamont was going to, at least based on my impression of his testimony at the time, was going to talk about Ms. Ceruti threatening him and I don't want to say assaulted him, but she was threatening him if he testified.... The threats were basically that if [Whitehouse] testifiedmy interpretation of what he was saying, was that he was going to be injured or that he would be hurt. That Ms. Ceruti was going to send individuals to his home or residence, and that these individuals would hurt him, injure him if he were to testify.... My expectation was that if [Ceruti] were called as a witness, there would be testimony that came in, first of all, about the threats that she had made toward Mr. Lamont, as well as... [Whitehouse]. Escobedo also claimed that he did not learn about Ceruti's threats made to Whitehouse until the day of or the day before Whitehouse testified at trial; the transcript does not reflect when he learned of Ceruti's threats toward Lamont. Second, Escobedo was concerned that Ceruti allegedly offered sexual favors to Whitehouse in return for him changing his testimony. According to Escobedo, my recollection is he also said that she had offered to have sex with him. [11] Third, Escobedo testified that he was concerned that Ceruti would lie if he allowed her to testify. [M]y concern was that there would be perjured testimony presented to the Court. Later in the hearing, when asked directly by the district court why he thought Ceruti would commit perjury, Escobedo stated that it was simply based on his experience as a lawyer, as well as her discussions with me about the events in question and about the threats to the witnesses.... I started questioning her, because I became concerned with respect to what was going on outside of the meetings that I was having with her and Billy English with respect to the trial preparation, that I was not aware of.... Escobedo claimed that he did not learn of this problem until after the start of trial, and that he never would have mentioned Ceruti in his opening statement if he had known about it. Finally, Escobedo testified that he was concerned about Lamont's testimony that Ceruti had planted a knife by the door of the bedroom where Higdon had hid after the fight. Besides the alleged threats of violence toward Whitehouse, Escobedo was never directly asked when he learned about each potential problem with Ceruti's testimony that concerned him. Escobedo did admit, however, that he had not talked to anyone other than English and Ceruti about the case outside of any discussions in the courthouse during the trial.