Opinion ID: 6357297
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Michael Sherman's Deficient Performance

Text: As we previously explained, the reasonableness of Sherman's decision not to investigate whether Georgeann  Dowdle's beau could provide testimony favorable to the petitioner's alibi defense turns on the facts of the case and, more particularly, the circumstances pertaining to that defense and the potential witness. In light of the various relevant factors-the importance of the petitioner's alibi defense, the significance of Denis Ossorio's testimony to that defense, the ease with which Ossorio could have been located, and the gravity of the charges and potential punishment that the petitioner faced-it is abundantly clear that Sherman's decision to disregard Dowdle's grand jury testimony about her beau, a decision based solely on Sherman's belief that any inquiry into that subject matter would have been fruitless, was unreasonable. First, as Sherman testified, and the state conceded at trial, the petitioner's alibi was his primary defense to the state's case against him. This is because, although the state contended that it was possible that the victim was murdered as late as 1 a.m. on October 31, 1975, the substantial weight of the evidence indicated that the murder most likely was committed between 9:30 and 10 p.m. on October 30. Consequently, because the state was required to disprove the petitioner's alibi beyond a reasonable doubt; see, e.g., State v. Butler , 207 Conn. 619 , 631, 543 A.2d 270 (1988) (defendant in criminal case is entitled to instruction that state must rebut alibi defense beyond reasonable doubt); if the jury believed the petitioner's alibi witnesses-indeed, even if the petitioner's witnesses merely raised a reasonable doubt in the jurors' minds as to the petitioner's whereabouts between 9:30 and 10 p.m.-there is a good likelihood that the petitioner would have been acquitted. The importance of the petitioner's alibi defense is underscored by how vigorously the state sought to discredit it. The state's attorney claimed that it had been concocted by the Skakel family and founded on the  perjurious testimony of the petitioner's alibi witnesses. The state's attorney spent a considerable amount of time, both in adducing testimony from the state's witnesses and in cross-examining the petitioner's witnesses, as well as during closing argument, attempting to demonstrate that the petitioner's alibi had been fabricated. It is likely that the state's attorney challenged the petitioner's alibi so aggressively because, as the Supreme Court of New Jersey has observed, few defenses have greater potential for creating reasonable doubt as to a defendant's guilt in the minds of the [jurors than an alibi]. (Internal quotation marks omitted.) State v. Porter , 216 N.J. 343 , 353, 80 A.3d 732 (2013). Conversely, the state's attorney made no effort to establish any narrative to explain how the victim could have been murdered after 11 p.m. In particular, the state's attorney never presented any evidence  as to why the victim would have remained out past her curfew in cold weather, where she could have been between 9:30 and 11 p.m., with whom she could have been during that period of time, or why the extensive police investigation into her whereabouts never yielded a single credible piece of information relating to those matters. Because the state's attorney adduced no such evidence, his closing argument contained no mention of any scenario pursuant to which the murder could have occurred as late as 11 p.m. Second, it could hardly have been easier for Sherman to have ascertained that Ossorio had critical alibi testimony to offer, such that even the most rudimentary of inquiries would have led Sherman directly and immediately to Ossorio. See, e.g., Rompilla v. Beard , supra, 545 U.S. at 389 , 125 S.Ct. 2456 (explaining that [t]he unreasonableness of attempting no more than [counsel] did was heightened by the easy availability of the [material evidence]). Upon reading Dowdle's grand jury testimony and learning that her beau was with her at the Terrien  residence on the evening of October 30, 1975, all Sherman had to do was pick up the telephone and ask Dowdle-one of the petitioner's own alibi witnesses-to identify her beau. And, then, after learning that her beau was Ossorio, it would have been easy for Sherman to locate and speak to him-indeed, a look in the telephone listings and another telephone call would have sufficed-because he lived just a few miles from Sherman's office. As in all criminal cases that involve the issue of defense counsel's failure to interview a potential witness to ascertain what he or she has to say, counsel has no absolute obligation to actually track down the witness, only that he put in a reasonable effort to do so. Avery v. Prelesnik , 548 F.3d 434 , 438 (6th Cir. 2008), cert. denied, 558 U.S. 932 , 130 S.Ct. 80 , 175 L.Ed.2d 234 (2009) ; see also id. (There is no reason based on professional judgment why [trial counsel] would not have pursued speaking to [the potential alibi witness]. The [trial] court correctly concluded that [trial counsel] was under a duty to reasonably investigate, which entails, at the bare minimum, asking for [the potential alibi witness' telephone] number or address and reasonably attempting to contact him. [Internal quotation marks omitted.] ). In the present case, the most elementary and obvious of inquiries by Sherman or his investigator would have revealed that Ossorio was a critical alibi witness, and Sherman's unwillingness to take even those modest steps unreasonably deprived the petitioner of Ossorio's crucial trial testimony. Consequently, this is not a case that required Sherman to devise a plan to balance limited resources in accord with effective trial tactics and strategies. Harrington v. Richter , supra, 562 U.S. at 89 , 131 S.Ct. 770 ; see also Rogers v. Zant , 13 F.3d 384 , 387 (11th Cir.) ([the] correct approach toward investigation reflects the reality that lawyers do not enjoy the benefit of endless time, energy  or financial resources), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 899 , 115 S.Ct. 255 , 130 L.Ed.2d 175 (1994). Taking his investigation into Ossorio's identity, whereabouts and possible testimony one step at a time, Sherman would have been able to successfully complete the investigation in two easy steps and at negligible expense. But, even if that were not so painfully apparent, the petitioner paid Sherman more than $1.5 million in legal fees, and so the cost of undertaking reasonable steps to locate Ossorio, a potentially critical witness, certainly was not an issue. Third, the significance of Ossorio's testimony to the petitioner's alibi cannot be overstated: unquestionably, it was essential to the defense. That testimony, which  the habeas court expressly credited, placed the petitioner at the Terrien residence during the relevant time frame on the evening of October 30, 1975, thereby fully corroborating the testimony of the petitioner's other alibi witnesses. But Ossorio's testimony, while corroborative, certainly was not cumulative, because the petitioner's other alibi witnesses were either siblings or cousins of the petitioner. Although Ossorio was friendly with Dowdle in the mid-1970s, there is no indication that he had maintained any ties to her or the Skakel family over the years, and, thus, he would have been an independent and unbiased witness with no motive to lie about seeing the petitioner at the Terrien home on the evening of October 30. The state's attorney emphatically and persistently maintained that the jury should not credit the petitioner's alibi because all of the alibi witnesses were closely related to the petitioner and were lying to protect him. In light of this contention by the state, credible testimony from Ossorio would have been absolutely critical, both to establish the credibility of the alibi generally and to demonstrate the credibility of the petitioner's witnesses more specifically. Indeed, if believed, Ossorio's testimony would have disproved the state's attorney's contention that the Skakel  family had created the fictitious alibi to protect the petitioner and then continually lied, under oath and otherwise, in furtherance of the fraudulent scheme. Thus, with respect to the petitioner's alibi defense, the quantum of evidence already known to Sherman-evidence marked by the weakness inherent in any alibi defense comprised solely of the testimony of family members-should have prompted Sherman to investigate the lead provided by Dowdle. See, e.g., Wiggins v. Smith , supra, 539 U.S. at 527 , 123 S.Ct. 2527 ([i]n assessing the reasonableness of an attorney's investigation ... a court must consider not only the quantum of evidence already known to counsel, but also whether the known evidence would lead a reasonable attorney to investigate further). In addition, as we discussed previously, the state adduced testimony from Helen Ix, Andrea Shakespeare, and Julie Skakel in an effort to discredit the petitioner's alibi defense. Testimony from a neutral, objective and credible witness like Ossorio would have refuted the testimony of those state witnesses, testimony that undoubtedly appeared far more significant in light of the state's contention that the petitioner's alibi witnesses all were lying. In fact, it seems likely that the jury was influenced by the testimony of Ix, Shakespeare and Julie Skakel because the jury, during its deliberations, asked that the testimony of those witnesses, insofar as it related to the petitioner's alibi, be read back. 18 Along the same lines, Ossorio's testimony also would have refuted the state's attorney's claim that the alibi was an integral part of a broader Skakel family scheme to cover up for the petitioner. According to the state's attorney, this scheme was hatched immediately after the victim's murder and began with the disposal of  incriminating evidence and the trip to Windham, New York, continued with the petitioner's enrollment at Elan, and, thereafter, was exemplified by his allegedly self-serving statements to Richard Hoffman, the ghostwriter assisting the petitioner with his book, and finally culminated in the perjurious grand jury and trial testimony of the petitioner's alibi witnesses. Because the allegedly fraudulent alibi provided the  foundation for the state's attorney's claim of a grand family scheme, Ossorio's credible testimony demonstrating the validity of the alibi also would have debunked the state's attorney's broader conspiracy theory. Finally, as a general matter, an adequate pretrial investigation is required in all criminal cases. But common sense dictates that, when the stakes are highest-when the criminal charges are most serious, exposing the defendant to the most lengthy of prison terms-the importance of a thorough pretrial investigation is that much greater. In the present case, both the gravity of the charged offense-murder-and the magnitude of the potential maximum sentence-life imprisonment-are obvious. In such circumstances, the responsibilities of defense counsel are especially great, commensurate with the heightened exposure, concerns and expectations of the defendant. Defense counsel must be particularly attentive to detail, because the defendant's life is on the line. Of course, the gravity of the murder charge placed Sherman on notice that he needed to put appropriate time, thought and effort into the case. He clearly did not live up to professional norms, however, in failing even to contact Dowdle after reading her grand jury testimony and learning that her beau was at the Terrien home, with her, on the evening of October 30, 1975. In light of the foregoing, we agree with the habeas court that Sherman failed by a considerable margin to satisfy Strickland 's requirement that a decision to forgo or truncate a particular pretrial investigation must flow  from an informed, professional judgment. That standard cannot possibly be met when counsel fails to undertake any steps to investigate evidence relating to the very matter that he has identified as the critical flaw in his primary defense. Accordingly, the habeas court properly reached the only conclusion that the facts and law support: Sherman could not reasonably have elected simply to ignore Dowdle's testimony and do nothing to contact her former beau, because all of the other alibi witnesses were close relatives of the petitioner, and Sherman knew both that the state would argue that those witnesses were all lying to protect the petitioner, and that an independent alibi witness, with no ties to the petitioner or his family, would have enhanced the credibility of the alibi immeasurably. The respondent nonetheless makes several arguments as to why it was reasonable for Sherman not to investigate the identity of Dowdle's beau. The respondent contends that none of the petitioner's alibi witnesses ever mentioned seeing him at the Terrien house on the night of the murder, either in their statements to the police, in their grand jury testimony, or to Sherman directly. The respondent further asserts that, even when Sherman asked if there was anyone else who could verify the alibi, [the] petitioner, his cousins, and his brothers essentially told Sherman there was no need to look into the beau. (Internal quotation marks omitted.) An examination of these arguments readily demonstrates that they depend on facts that were not found by the habeas court, are immaterial to Sherman's professional obligations even if factually based, or are otherwise groundless. Contrary to the respondent's assertions, the habeas court made no finding as to whether the petitioner, Rushton Skakel, Jr., John Skakel or James Terrien told Sherman about the presence of another person at the Terrien home on the night of the murder, or whether  Sherman even asked those witnesses about the presence of another person at the Terrien home that evening. The petitioner testified at the habeas  trial that he had informed Sherman about Dowdle's boyfriend being present, whereas Sherman testified that the petitioner did not tell him about Ossorio's presence there. The habeas court made no finding either way, explaining, instead, that it made no difference whether the petitioner had informed Sherman about Ossorio because Sherman was on notice three years before trial, by virtue of Dowdle's grand jury testimony, that her beau was, in fact, at the Terrien residence. See footnote 17 of this opinion. Courts have consistently recognized that counsel reasonably cannot limit the pretrial investigation of a case to only those leads offered by the client himself. See, e.g., Rompilla v. Beard , supra, 545 U.S. at 381-83 , 125 S.Ct. 2456 (although petitioner was unwilling to assist counsel in pretrial preparation and was even actively obstructive by sending counsel off on false leads, counsel nevertheless had independent obligation to conduct thorough investigation); Daniels v. Woodford , supra, 428 F.3d at 1202-1203 ([e]ven though [the petitioner] refused to speak to his counsel, [counsel] still had an independent duty to investigate [and prepare] because [p]retrial investigation and preparation are the keys to effective representation of counsel [internal quotation marks omitted] ). Rather, counsel has an independent duty to investigate potentially important witnesses not suggested by the client, including, of course, potentially important alibi witnesses. See, e.g., Bigelow v. Haviland , supra, 576 F.3d at 288-89 (defense counsel could not reasonably assume that merely because petitioner had provided counsel with identity of alibi witness that there were no other such witnesses). As to the other witnesses, Sherman's testimony at the habeas trial was equivocal: when questioned whether he had asked Rushton Skakel, Jr., and John Skakel about the presence of anyone else at the Terrien home  that evening, Sherman responded, [p]robably, and when asked the same question about Terrien, he responded, I would assume I did. Thus, Sherman himself could not testify with any certainty that he had questioned those witnesses about the presence of another person at the Terrien home. In fact, the habeas court's findings are crystal clear that Sherman did not ask Dowdle this most basic of questions. When queried during the habeas trial whether he had asked Dowdle whether another person was present, Sherman responded, I would assume I did, the same response he gave to the same question posed to him about Terrien. The habeas court expressly found, however, that, if Sherman had made such an inquiry of Dowdle, she would have told him about Ossorio. This finding by the habeas court necessarily means that the habeas court found that Sherman did not ask Dowdle about the presence of another person, even though Sherman testified that he would assume he did so. In other words, contrary to the respondent's assertions, the habeas court specifically found that, although Dowdle testified under oath, both during the grand jury proceedings and again at the petitioner's criminal trial, that her boyfriend was at the Terrien home with her on the evening in question, Sherman never bothered to ask her about that person's identity. Furthermore, even if it is assumed that the petitioner's alibi witnesses did not tell Sherman about Ossorio's presence at the Terrien home on the night in question on their own initiative, their failure to do so is both readily explainable and irrelevant to the question at hand. By the time these witnesses were asked, twenty-seven years later, to recall the details of the events of October 30, 1975, they simply may have forgotten about Ossorio's presence at the Terrien home that evening. Indeed, Ossorio  testified that he was in the television room only intermittently, while Dowdle was putting her  child to bed. Cf. Bigelow v. Haviland , supra, 576 F.3d at 288 (counsel's duty to look beyond witnesses identified by client is especially significant when client may have trouble remembering them himself). And, even if one or more of the petitioner's witnesses did recall Ossorio being there that evening, there is no reason to believe that those witnesses appreciated the potential import of that information. In fact, it is obvious that even Dowdle, who knew that Ossorio was with her on the night in question, did not appreciate the potential significance of his presence at the Terrien home: she referred to her beau in her grand jury testimony and again at trial by happenstance, without any apparent awareness of his possible importance as a witness. Evidently, as far as Dowdle and the other alibi witnesses were concerned, their testimony placing the petitioner at the Terrien home that evening was sufficient to establish that he was present there, and, as nonlawyers, they had no reason to know that Ossorio potentially was a critically important witness because of the credibility issues inherent in an alibi predicated solely on the testimony of family members. In sum, the onus was not on the petitioner's alibi witnesses to divine what would have been important for Sherman to know; rather, it was Sherman's responsibility to elicit such information from them-or at the very least to recognize the significance of such information when witnesses like Dowdle divulged it of their own accord. The respondent next contends that, because the petitioner's siblings ... and his cousins supplied the police with the [petitioner's] alibi shortly after the murder, without ever mentioning Ossorio, and testified at the grand jury [proceedings] without mentioning Ossorio, Sherman had no reason to go looking for other alibi witnesses when those who claimed to be there never gave any indication anyone else could verify [the petitioner's] presence at Terrien's [home] that evening.  First, as we have explained, it is simply incorrect to assert that none of the petitioner's alibi witnesses mentioned Ossorio in their grand jury testimony. When asked about her recollection of the night in question, Dowdle mentioned Ossorio immediately, although not by name. Later, at the petitioner's criminal trial, the state's attorney himself asked Dowdle whether she previously had testified before the grand jury that she was at home with her husband on the night of the murder. Dowdle corrected the state's attorney, noting that the person she was with was merely a friend. For reasons we cannot fathom, neither the state's attorney nor Sherman ever saw fit to question Dowdle as to the identity of the person whom she was with that evening. Moreover, we do not agree with the respondent that Sherman had no reason to investigate Ossorio's identity simply because his name was not mentioned in any of the police reports prepared or witness statements taken in 1975. As we previously indicated, it is undisputed that the petitioner never was considered a suspect in the victim's murder before the mid-1990s but, rather, was only a potential witness. Indeed, the state's attorney acknowledged this fact at trial, pointing out that, until the 1990s, no witness ever had been asked about the petitioner's whereabouts or movements on the night of the murder because the police never suspected his involvement in the crime. Nor is there any evidence to suggest that anyone else who was at the Terrien home on the night of the murder was ever considered a suspect. Consequently, there was never any reason for the police to seek a complete accounting of all individuals who were present at the Terrien home on the evening of October 30, 1975. In fact, the respondent does not identify a single police report suggesting  that such a question had been asked. 19 In such circumstances,  therefore, the fact that Ossorio's name did not surface until decades after the victim's murder, more or less unexpectedly, is entirely understandable. In sum, the fact that Ossorio's identity came to light for the first time during and exclusively from Dowdle's grand jury testimony reasonably could have given Sherman a reason to question whether Dowdle's testimony was accurate in this regard. Nevertheless, his obligation was to undertake some effort to answer that question rather than to dismiss it out of hand, given its potential significance. In addition to the late timing of Ossorio's identity coming to light, the respondent argues that, even after it did, it was reasonable for Sherman to infer that Ossorio either saw nothing or would remember nothing about events that had occurred decades earlier. Specifically, the respondent argues that, because Dowdle indicated in her grand jury testimony that she mostly stayed in the library that evening and did not recall seeing the Skakel brothers herself, Ossorio, too, did not have occasion to see who was watching television in an adjacent room. This argument is unavailing for two reasons. First, it is based on sheer speculation that Ossorio stayed in the library all evening, even when Dowdle was out of the library putting her daughter to bed. The fact is that Sherman had no idea whether Ossorio stayed in the library, wandered around the house, spent time in the television room or otherwise ran into the petitioner or his brothers during the hour and one half or so that they were all together at the Terrien residence. Of course, the only way for Sherman to have found out is to have asked Dowdle or Ossorio, but, inexplicably, he made no effort to do so. More fundamentally, however, the respondent's argument is unavailing because it is factually inaccurate. See, e.g., Wiggins v. Smith , supra, 539 U.S. at 526-27 , 123 S.Ct. 2527 (noting  that rationale utilized by state to justify counsel's [failure to pursue] mitigating evidence resembles more a post hoc rationalization of counsel's conduct than an accurate description of [counsel's] deliberations prior to [trial]). At the petitioner's criminal trial, Sherman vigorously disputed the state's contention that Dowdle had only heard her Skakel cousins on the night in question, and had not seen them. When Dowdle could not recall whether she had seen them, Sherman presented Dowdle with a copy of a 1975 police report indicating that, when she was interviewed by the police shortly after the murder, she told them that she had observed three of her Skakel cousins, including the petitioner, at the Terrien home that evening. Although the police report did not refresh her memory with respect to this issue, Dowdle testified that whatever she had told the police in 1975 would have been the truth. Accordingly, Sherman's position at trial-that Dowdle did, in fact, see the petitioner on the night in question-belies the respondent's assertion that Sherman's failure to investigate Ossorio's identity was based on his reasoned belief at the time of trial that, like Dowdle, Ossorio did not see the Skakel brothers on the night in question. Thus, although Sherman reasonably could have questioned whether Ossorio would remember whether the petitioner was at the Terrien home on October 30, 1975, Sherman could not reasonably rule out that possibility without making some inquiries. Indeed, from its inception, this case concerned events long in the past, forcing both the state and the defense to  do their best to develop facts based largely on distant memory and recall. It is not an exaggeration to say that this case could not have been brought but for the state's ability to locate witnesses who could remember and testify about events that had occurred decades earlier. Sherman's task in defending the petitioner necessarily required him to undertake the same investigation. His failure to do so  with respect to Ossorio, merely because he did not think that Ossorio would be able to provide any useful information, was plainly deficient by any reasonable measure. 20