Opinion ID: 2062476
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Psychosocial Family Background Investigation

Text: Gilliam claims, Daneman did not conduct, nor did he hire anyone to conduct, an investigation into Petitioner's family background. Instead, he relied upon interviews conducted by [graduate] social work students from the University of Maryland. The students interviewed Petitioner's mother, sister, aunt and a friend. The graduate students also interviewed Gilliam on six occasions, and from these interviews prepared a twenty-two page psychosocial report which was admitted at the sentencing hearing. Following the sentencing hearing and in preparation for the post conviction hearing, the Office of the Public Defender hired Mr. Hans Selvog, an expert with a Master's Degree in social work, to review the first psychosocial history and to do a second psychosocial investigation of Gilliam's family background. This second psychosocial investigation contained the following: Throughout the initial four years of his life, Tyrone Gilliam Jr. witnessed extreme violence between his parents. Both his mother and father were capable of inflicting injury and their fierce and unpredictable outbursts created a home environment that was threatening, confusing and insecure. Further, the ongoing violence between the parents elicited the constant fear from Tyrone Jr. and his sister that at any moment they too might suffer the same brutalization. After his parents' final separation, which followed a particularly explosive episode, Tyrone Jr.'s existence became even more unstable as he moved with his mother and sister to many different residences during the next four years. And the trauma he had suffered when his parents were together did not end after their separation; he continued to be subjected to a fearful and brutal environment while cared for at his maternal grandmother's home. Here his step-grandfather viciously abused his wife, children and grand-children. And on top of this were the constant sexual attacks Tyrone Jr. was subject to in this house and as well as at the hands of a babysitter. Gilliam now challenges the adequacy of the twenty-two page psychosocial report prepared by the graduate students from the University of Maryland School of Social Work. That report states, incidentally, that the graduate students who compiled the report worked in conjunction with the Death Penalty Defense Unit of the Office of the Public Defender, Baltimore City. Gilliam has failed to show that Daneman's representation in conjunction with securing a psychosocial family background investigation was inadequate. Daneman had a right to rely on, and did rely on, the graduate social work students in connection with the volunteered assistance of the Public Defender's Office. The twenty-two page psychosocial report they sent to Daneman did not appear to be inadequate. Even if counsel who fails to investigate a capital defendant's background might be deemed ineffective, see, e.g., Harris v. Dugger, 874 F.2d 756, 763 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 493 U.S. 1011, 110 S.Ct. 573, 107 L.Ed.2d 568 (1989), Daneman met his obligation by securing a background investigation by the graduate students recommended by the Office of the Public Defender. Cf. Mitchell v. Kemp, 762 F.2d 886, 889-90 (11th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 483 U.S. 1026, 107 S.Ct. 3248, 97 L.Ed.2d 774 (1987). Further, even if we were to assume the graduate student's psychosocial family background investigation was inadequate, Gilliam was not denied any constitutional right and is not entitled to a new sentencing. See Poyner v. Murray, 964 F.2d 1404, 1418-19 (4th Cir.) (claim of ineffective assistance of expert witness does not assert a cognizable constitutional violation), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 113 S.Ct. 419, 121 L.Ed.2d 342 (1992).