Opinion ID: 1426947
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 14

Heading: Failing to present expert testimony.

Text: Leonard says that his counsel were ineffective during the penalty phase in failing to call an expert on prison conditions and the possibility of rehabilitation. He criticizes their relying on convict witnesses, who presented evidence of a violent convict code which only prejudiced him. Although some evidence of a convict code was admitted during the penalty phase, it was not, as Leonard implies, the sole or even main theme of the defense. Leonard does not consider that his counsel called his mother and father to testify for him, presented further inmate testimony on Wright's bad character, and established that on one occasion Leonard and a black inmate had been mistakenly released from their cells simultaneously without incident. Leonard has failed to demonstrate that presenting some kind of penal expert would have changed the result of the penalty phase or that his counsel performed unreasonably in presenting mitigating evidence.