Opinion ID: 784661
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Ineffective Assistance of Counsel at Culpability Phase

Text: 38 Hamblin contends that his counsel should have put on an expert pathologist to counter the testimony of the prosecution's expert. The Cuyahoga County Coroner testified that Lillian Merrick was killed by one or more blows to the head. Hamblin claims that an independent pathologist might have shown that death resulted from a single blow to the head intended only to disable the victim for purposes of robbing her, not to kill her — a less gory and disturbing scenario of the incident than that presented by the prosecution. The performance of counsel in this respect at the guilt phase was poor, to say the least, because of his failure to try to retain an independent expert, such as a pathologist, to investigate fully the position of the prosecution that the victim received numerous blows to the head, an inference not supported by the evidence in the record before us. He could perhaps have made a showing that there was only one blow to the head and hence raised a stronger inference of lack of intent to kill. But in the end we cannot know the answer because no expert has yet appeared to clarify the issue. Absent such evidence, we therefore cannot say that this failure was harmful to the defendant and that he was prejudiced by it. 39 The State also called a witness from the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation to explain electrophoresis, the technique by which the victim's blood was matched to the blood found on a jacket in Hamblin's home. Defendant claims that an expert witness could have explained that electrophoresis is unreliable, especially when performed on post-mortem samples, and such testimony would have raised doubts about its value in this case. This error was likely harmless given the physical evidence presented at trial to demonstrate defendant's guilt — Lillian Merrick's personal effects were found in the defendant's house and car and the gun found in the house matched that used to shoot the park ranger. Even if defense counsel had called expert witnesses to testify on electrophoresis, it would not likely have changed the outcome of the culpability phase.