Court Opinion

ID: 9473524
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:32:07.717286+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:34.818627
License: Public Domain

CONTIE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Since the record in this case plainly discloses that petitioner’s conviction was obtained through the efforts of appellate counsel which were both unreasonable and prejudicial, our Constitution and the expressed intention of our legislators, 28 U.S.C. § 2254, requires that the writ of habeas corpus be granted.
The Supreme Court has recently affirmed our conclusion that “[a] first appeal as of right ... is not adjudicated in accord with due process of law if the appellant does not have the effective assistance of an attorney.” Evitts v. Lucey, — U.S.-, 105 S.Ct. 830, 836, 83 L.Ed.2d 821 (1985) (footnote omitted); Lucey v. Kavanaugh, 724 F.2d 560 (6th Cir.1984). However, since in Lucey the parties stipulated that counsel was ineffective, the Court concluded that “[w]e therefore need not decide the content of appropriate standards for judging claims of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel.” Id. at 833-34 (citing Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. -, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984) and United States v. Cronic, — U.S.-, 104 S.Ct. 2039, 80 L.Ed.2d 657 (1984)).
The standards articulated in Strickland, although designed for trial-type proceedings, can be adapted for application to appellate ineffectiveness claims and have guided other courts.1 Strickland provides that “[t]he benchmark for judging any claim of ineffectiveness must be whether counsel’s conduct so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process that the trial [appeal] cannot be relied on as having produced a just result.” 104 S.Ct. at 2064. Strickland requires a two-part nonsequential analysis into the attorney’s performance and the prejudice resulting therefrom. Id.
On the performance prong, “the defendant must show that counsel’s representation fell below an objective standard of reasonableness.” Id. at 2065. However, “[j]udicial scrutiny of counsel’s performance must be highly deferential____ A fair assessment of attorney performance requires that every effort be made to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight, to reconstruct the circumstances of counsel’s challenged conduct, and to evaluate the *196conduct from counsel’s perspective at the time.” Id.2
Second, “[t]he defendant must show that there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different. A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.” Id. at 2068. However, “[t]he result of a proceeding can be rendered unreliable, and hence the proceeding itself unfair, even if the errors of counsel cannot be shown by a preponderance of the evidence to have determined the outcome.” Id. In cases of error by appellate counsel, an evaluation of prejudice will involve deciding whether the result of the appeal would have been different had counsel acted competently.
In judging the reasonableness of counsel’s decision not to raise a particular issue, courts have emphasized that “counsel’s failure to raise issues on appeal that only later gain ‘judicial recognition’ does not constitute ineffectiveness.” Francois v. Wainwright, 741 F.2d 1275, 1285 (11th Cir.1984); Branch v. Cupp, 736 F.2d 533, 537 (9th Cir.1984). Further, “counsel need not brief issues reasonably considered to be without merit.” Alvord v. Wainwright, 725 F.2d 1282, 1291 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 105 S.Ct. 355, 83 L.Ed.2d 291 (1984); O’Guin v. Foltz, 715 F.2d 397, 401 (6th Cir.1983). Neither of these propositions excuses counsel’s failure to raise the malice issue on appeal, however, since three Court of Appeals decisions had held that failure to instruct on malice was reversible error before petitioner’s appeal had been submitted on June 6, 1977. These decisions came, respectively, eight months (People v. Fountain, 71 Mich.App. 491, 248 N.W.2d 589 (1976)), two months (People v. Terry Burton, 74 Mich.App. 215, 226, 253 N.W.2d 710 (1977)), and seven weeks (People v. Martin, 75 Mich.App. 6, 12-13, 254 N.W.2d 628 (1977)) prior to submission of petitioner's appeal. Further, petitioner alleges that he informed counsel of the Fountain decision four to five months before the case was submitted on appeal. Therefore, the malice issue is not one which only later gained judicial recognition nor is it one which might be said to be without merit.
That petitioner’s trial counsel may have been negligent in failing to demand an instruction on malice at trial does not excuse the incompetence of appellate counsel. Appellate counsel need not raise errors that the appellate court will not consider due to a procedural default such as failure to object at trial. Smith v. Wainwright, 741 F.2d 1248, 1260 (11th Cir.1984); Francois, 741 F.2d at 1285. However,
there may be some cases in which trial counsel’s failure to preserve error will not excuse appellate counsel’s failure to raise the error, if, for example, the state appeals courts only sporadically apply the procedural bar, or if the error is of such magnitude that the appellate court would likely consider it plain or fundamental error.
Id. at 1286. Therefore, whether an appellate counsel acts reasonably in failing to raise errors not first raised at trial requires consideration of a state’s procedural rules.
M.C.L.A. § 768.29 provides in pertinent part that “[t]he failure of the court to instruct on any point of law shall not be ground for setting aside the verdict of the jury unless such instruction is requested by the accused.” However, this procedural bar has not been consistently applied, especially in criminal cases with respect to questions of intent.
It is settled law of this State that the trial judge should instruct the jury in criminal cases as to general features of the case, define the offense and indicate that which is essential to prove to estab*197lish the offense, even in the absence of request. A case may be reversed because the charge omits a legally essential ingredient____ Similarly, without a request, a case may be reversed because of an erroneous or misleading charge as opposed to one which merely omits a pertinent though not legally necessary point____ Defendant has a right to have a properly instructed jury pass upon the evidence.
People v. Liggett, 378 Mich. 706, 714, 148 N.W.2d 784 (1967) (emphasis added); People v. Townes, 391 Mich. 578, 587, 218 N.W.2d 136 (1974); People v. Allen, 109 Mich.App. 147, 159, 311 N.W.2d 734 (1981).
Accordingly, in light of the courts’ interpretation of the procedural bar and the Fountain, Martin, and Burton cases, it is clear that reasonably competent counsel familiar with Michigan law would have raised the malice issue despite the absence of an exception below. It is likewise clear that petitioner was prejudiced by counsel’s failure to raise the issue. This conclusion is compelled by the fact that Judge Bronson who concurred in the Fountain decision also sat on the panel that considered petitioner’s appeal and by the fact that a trial court’s failure to instruct on an element of the crime is not subject to harmless error analysis under Michigan law. People v. Allensworth, 401 Mich. 67, 71, 257 N.W.2d 81 (1977). This establishes at a minimum the reasonable probability demanded by Strickland that the result of the proceeding would have been different. Therefore, since petitioner is being held in custody in violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the writ of habeas corpus should be granted as required by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a).3
The majority’s construction of the due process guarantee of effective assistance of appellate counsel in light of Lucey effectively limits that case to its particular facts. However, if the principles enunciated therein have any meaning beyond those facts, they certainly apply to the instant case. Rejecting so severe a limitation on recent precedent, I dissent.

. Courts assessing the alleged ineffectiveness of appellate counsel have followed the standards enunciated in Strickland or standards reasonably similar thereto. Schwander v. Blackburn, 750 F.2d 494, 502 (5th Cir.1985); Mitchell v. Scully, 746 F.2d 951, 954 (2d Cir.1984); Cape v. Francis, 741 F.2d 1287, 1301-02 (11th Cir.1984); Parton v. Wyrick, 704 F.2d 415, 416-17 (8th Cir.1983).

. In Jones v. Barnes, 463 U.S. 745, 103 S.Ct. 3308, 77 L.Ed.2d 987 (1983), the Court found that the Constitution does not give an indigent the right to compel appointed counsel to raise all colorable or nonfrivolous points requested by the client if the attorney, in his professional judgment, declines to present those points. Id. at 3312, 3314. In this case, regardless of whether Bowen requested counsel to raise the issue of the absence of an instruction on malice, counsel was required to do so in order to render the assistance guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment.

. Whatever action the Michigan Supreme Court would have taken with respect to petitioner's case is irrelevant. Petitioner’s contention is that he was deprived of effective assistance of counsel before the Michigan Court of Appeals, not the Supreme Court. While the fact that the Michigan Supreme Court might have been more likely to have considered petitioner’s appeal had counsel raised the absence of an instruction on malice indicates an increased likelihood of prejudice, this is not dispositive of the prejudice inquiry in this case.