Opinion ID: 3163630
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: habeas petition claims

Text: Claims of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel are appropriately presented in a petition for writ of habeas corpus. Dufour v. State, 905 So. 2d 42, 70 (Fla. 2005). Consistent with the Strickland standard, in determining whether to grant habeas relief for ineffective assistance of appellate counsel, this Court makes the following inquiries: [F]irst, whether the alleged omissions are of such magnitude as to constitute a serious error or substantial deficiency falling measurably outside the range of professionally acceptable performance and, second, whether the deficiency in performance compromised the appellate process to such a degree as to undermine confidence in the correctness of the result. Schoenwetter v. State, 46 So. 3d 535, 563 (Fla. 2010). The defendant bears the burden of “alleging a specific, serious omission or overt act upon which the claim of ineffective assistance of counsel can be based.” Id. (quoting Freeman v. State, 761 So. 2d 1055, 1069 (Fla. 2000)). Ineffective assistance of appellate counsel claims “may not be used to camouflage issues that should have been presented on direct appeal or in a postconviction motion.” Id. - 36 - Further, appellate counsel cannot be deemed ineffective for not pursuing a meritless claim. See id. (“If a legal issue would in all probability have been found to be without merit had counsel raised the issue on direct appeal, the failure of appellate counsel to raise the meritless issue will not render appellate counsel’s performance ineffective.” (internal citation omitted)). A. Failure to Raise Issue of Admissibility of Incriminating Statement Boyd argues that the trial court erred, in violation of his constitutional right against self-incrimination, when it denied his motion to suppress the statement he made to police during custodial interrogation, to wit: “What took you so long to catch me?” It is further asserted that because, according to Boyd, trial counsel preserved the error for appellate review, appellate counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to raise the issue on direct appeal. Assuming trial counsel properly preserved the alleged error and that appellate counsel’s failure to raise it satisfied the deficiency prong, such lack in performance does not undermine our confidence in the correctness of the result of the direct appeal proceedings. As indicated in our direct appeal decision, we found competent, substantial evidence to support Boyd’s conviction of sexual battery: The State presented substantial evidence that Boyd sexually battered Dacosta, including evidence that Boyd and Dacosta did not know each other before she encountered Boyd while looking for a ride back to her vehicle after obtaining gas at the Texaco station; that Boyd’s semen was on Dacosta’s inner thighs; that Dacosta’s blood was in Boyd’s apartment; and that Boyd’s DNA was in material found - 37 - under Dacosta’s fingernails. The State also presented testimony establishing the chain of custody of the evidence collected, providing evidence against Boyd’s theory that Detective Bukata planted evidence so that it would match Boyd’s and Dacosta’s DNA. Bruising on Dacosta’s inner thighs and vaginal area was consistent with either consensual or nonconsensual intercourse. Dacosta was last seen alive with Boyd. Boyd, 910 So. 2d at 181. This same evidence, in addition to evidence “that Dacosta was stabbed with a Torx screwdriver thirty-six times in the chest and four times in the head” and “had twelve wounds on her right hand that were consistent with defensive wounds,” supported our determination that there was also competent, substantial evidence to uphold the jury’s guilty verdicts for armed kidnapping and premeditated murder. Id. at 182-84. Finally, we determined that, based on Boyd’s convictions of sexual battery and armed kidnapping, the record on appeal further supported the first-degree murder conviction on the basis of felony murder. Id. at 182. Therefore, even had Boyd’s statement: “What took you so long to catch me?” not be adduced at trial, his convictions and sentence of death would have been upheld, given the overwhelming amount of remaining evidence establishing Boyd’s guilt. See Williamson v. State, 123 So. 3d 1060, 1056-66 (Fla. 2013) (“[T]o establish prejudice under Strickland, . . . a court hearing an ineffectiveness claim must consider the totality of the evidence before the judge or jury, and a verdict or conclusion only weakly supported by the record is more likely to have - 38 - been affected by errors than one with overwhelming record support.” (citation omitted)); Simmons v. State, 105 So. 3d 475, 492 (Fla. 2012) (holding that, even if trial counsel’s stipulation that defendant was source of semen found inside victim’s body constituted deficient performance, no prejudice could be shown in light of overwhelming evidence of guilt, including evidence of victim’s blood found inside defendant’s car; testimony of eyewitnesses who had seen victim screaming for help from defendant’s car on the night of the murder; and the fact that tire tracks of defendant’s car were found near the location where victim’s body was found). Accordingly, Boyd is not entitled to relief on this claim. B. Failure to Raise Fundamental Error as to Improper Comment Boyd raises his previous ineffectiveness claim for failure to properly challenge a penalty phase spectator’s outburst: “You raped me,” see Section II.B.2., supra, but under the guise of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel for failure to raise the claim on direct appeal. Because, as noted, defense counsel did not preserve the issue for appeal during the penalty phase of trial, appellate counsel cannot be ineffective for failing to raise the issue on direct appeal unless the claim involves fundamental error. See Archer v. State, 934 So. 2d 1187, 1205 (Fla. 2006). An error is fundamental if it “reaches down into the validity of the trial itself to the extent that a verdict of guilty could not have been obtained without the assistance of the alleged error.” Rodriguez v. State, 919 So. 2d 1252, 1282 (Fla. - 39 - 2005). Concerning improper comments made in the penalty phase, to be fundamental error the comments “must be so prejudicial as to taint the jury’s recommended sentence.” Fennie v. State, 855 So. 2d 597, 609 (Fla. 2003) (citing Thomas v. State, 748 So. 2d 970, 985 n.10 (Fla. 1999)). The cases to which Boyd cites for support are factually distinguishable to the present circumstances and, thus, are uninstructive. In Arbelaez v. State, 626 So. 2d 169 (Fla. 1993), for instance, the murder victim’s mother, upon being called by the State to testify, was crying during the administration of the oath. Id. at 176. The prosecutor requested a break for the mother to compose her emotions, after which time she then called the defendant a “murderer” and a “son of a bitch” in Spanish while the jury was still present. Id. Boyd also likened the facts of this case to those in Evans v. State, 995 So. 2d 933 (Fla. 2008), where the defendant raised a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to object to a juror’s participation in the trial. Id. at 945. Particularly, the defendant asserted that he was prejudiced when the juror interjected herself into the trial as an unsworn witness to answer a question concerning a traffic light that was germane to the defense’s theory of the case. Id. Neither of these decisions contemplates a situation in which the defendant incited the complained-of outburst. Id. To the contrary, Boyd goaded the spectator by partially standing while on the witness stand and twice pointing at her while insisting she was the source of - 40 - Boyd’s semen that law enforcement officers collected in the State’s attempt to convict him of a prior sexual battery charge. The record does not reflect that the spectator was causing any disruption during the penalty phase proceeding, or that observers other than the State or Boyd knew of her presence. In addition, before the asserted outburst, the jury was twice informed that Boyd was the subject of prior sexual battery charges. And, although the jury could have easily inferred that the subject spectator was the alleged victim from at least one of the charges, there was no reasonable basis upon which to believe that Boyd actually committed the offense given that the jury was also informed of his acquittals from all prior charges. In light of these circumstances, whatever prejudice that Boyd may have suffered as a result of the outburst is self-inflicted. Further, we are not convinced that the jury unanimously recommended the sentence of death only with the assistance of this particular incident. Accordingly, we deny this claim as meritless. See Schoenwetter, 46 So. 3d at 563; Rutherford v. Moore, 774 So. 2d 637, 644 (Fla. 2000) (“The failure to raise meritless claims does not render appellate counsel’s performance ineffective.”).