Court Opinion

ID: 9705930
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 01:26:56.195862+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:26:22.689004
License: Public Domain

Justice VERNIERO,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I join in the Court’s persuasive opinion rejecting defendant’s arguments concerning the guilt phase of his prior capital trial. I write only to register my disagreement on the narrow but critical question concerning alleged ineffective assistance of counsel during the prior trial’s penalty phase. I do not believe that defendant has satisfied either prong of the test traditionally used to grant relief on such questions. Hence, I cannot sustain his application for post-conviction relief (PCR).
*221When submitting a claim that a trial counsel has been constitutionally ineffective and that such ineffectiveness is sufficient to set aside a settled verdict, a defendant bears the burden of demonstrating his entitlement to relief. We have described it as a “considerable burden.” State v. DiFrisco, 174 N.J. 195, 245, 804 A.2d 507 (2002). The first prong of the test requires that “counsel’s acts or [omissions] fall outside the wide range of professionally competent assistance considered in light of all the circumstances.” Id. at 218, 804 A.2d 507 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Assuming he or she can clear that hurdle, a capital defendant must “demonstrate prejudice by showing a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the jury’s penalty-phase deliberations would have been affected substantially.” Id. at 219, 804 A.2d 507 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).
Within that framework, “a reviewing court must assess the performance of counsel with a heavy measure of deference to counsel’s judgments.” Id. at 220, 804 A.2d 507 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). We must view attorney competence from the perspective of the- circumstances that existed at the time of the alleged errors, not how things might appear today “under the distorting effects of hindsight.” Id. at 221, 804 A.2d 507 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). In short, consistent with the proper functioning of mm capital system, “a defendant is entitled to competent counsel, not perfect counsel.” Id. at 220, 804 A.2d 507.
As for the first prong, counsel’s decision not to call Dr. Gerald Cooke for the purpose of establishing the mental-or-emotional-disturbance mitigating factor (the 3c(5)(a) factor) was not so wide of the mark to rise to the level of constitutional ineffectiveness. That factor would have focused attention on the horrific manner in which defendant killed his victim, something counsel presumably sought to avoid in both the guilt and penalty phases of trial. It also would have been inconsistent with defendant’s denial defense, the pursuit of which the Court correctly concludes did not consti*222tute deficient performance in the guilt phase. The same jurors sat in both the guilt and penalty phases of trial, making consistency an important element of defendant’s overall strategy.
In other words, I am in accord with the PCR court below that, given the nature of defendant’s acts, his defense was saddled with difficult choices, all of which had pitfalls. In hindsight I acknowledge that counsel could have made different choices or pursued different strategies. But hindsight is not the test. Under the standard of deference required in this setting, defendant’s attorneys were not so deficient that they breached constitutional standards. Rather, they pursued a mitigation strategy that emphasized defendant’s troubled upbringing and positive relationship with his daughter, deflecting attention from the murder itself.
Even if counsel had acted in a constitutionally deficient manner, I do not believe under the second prong of the analysis that those errors substantially affected the jury’s deliberations. Without Dr. Cooke’s testimony, various jurors had found a total of ten mitigating factors as separately itemized on the verdict sheet. Finding also that defendant had killed his victim for pecuniary gain, jurors then concluded that that singularly-powerful aggravating factor outweighed the ten mitigating factors beyond a reasonable doubt. Under those circumstances, I remain unconvinced that the establishment of an eleventh mitigating factor, the 3c(5)(a) factor now advocated by current counsel, would have substantially affected the jury’s deliberations.
Similarly, irrespective of whether counsel were deficient in not better informing themselves concerning the 3e(5)(a) factor, the fact remains that, had counsel ultimately determined to establish that factor, the State likely would have responded with potent rebuttal evidence. Such evidence would have included information concerning defendant’s sexual relationship with his sister and his violent acts as a child. As the State succinctly explains in its brief:
The issue is not, as defendant argues, whether the information [concerning defendant’s incestuous relationship with his sister, Crystal Charette] would have *223changed Dr. Cooke’s diagnoses. The real issue was whether the damaging information would be revealed on the State’s rebuttal.
Dr. Cooke’s cross-examination below [at the PCR hearing] shows that damaging information would have been elicited to attack the e(5)(a) mitigating factor. Defendant’s psychiatric condition would have been rebutted with evidence that he was simply anti-social. Defendant’s bad acts as a child, including setting his grandmother’s house on fire, derailing a train, cruelty to animals and his numerous acts of thievery, and his bad acts as an adult, including his adult convictions for fraud and his sexual relationship with Crystal, would have been relevant to explain defendant’s anti-social disorder.
I therefore agree with the PCR court that “[w]hatever the positive effects of finding [the 3c(5)(a) factor] might have been, they would have been nullified by the negative features of such testimony.” This Court previously has rejected ineffective-assistance claims on similar grounds. See, e.g., State v. Martini, 160 N.J. 248, 262, 734 A.2d 257 (1999) (rejecting ineffective assistance claim related to penalty phase of capital trial and observing that “the presentation of evidence of limited mitigating value would have opened the door to powerful countervailing testimony that could have swayed the jury against defendant”); DiFrisco, supra, 174 N.J. at 246, 804 A.2d 507 (concluding that defendant was not prejudiced by counsel’s failure to establish certain mitigating factors because “the unfavorable aspects of the available mitigation evidence significantly diminished its usefulness to defendant”).
In sum, defense counsel presented eight witnesses during the penalty phase and established ten mitigating factors under the catch-all category of N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3c(5)(h). The Court finds constitutional ineffectiveness in counsel’s failure to call one additional witness for the purpose of establishing one additional mitigating factor. Given the reality that the omitted factor would have carried negative features from defendant’s perspective, I see nothing in our prior decisions or in the circumstances of this case requiring the Court’s holding. Of all our tasks, none is more serious than reviewing a death sentence. In that respect, we must administer New Jersey’s capital system by carefully adhering to all constitutional and statutory standards. By the same token, the judiciary must uphold a death sentence when a ease comports with *224those standards, such as the case here. In so doing, I would conclude that defendant has not satisfied the two-prong test needed for relief. To the extent that the Court holds otherwise, I respectfully dissent.
Chief Justice PORITZ and Justice LaVECCHIA join in this opinion.
For affirmance in partjreversal in part/remandment — Justices LONG, ZAZZALI, ALBIN and WALLACE — 4.
For concurrment in part/dissentment in part — Chief Justice PORITZ and Justices VERNIERO and LaVECCHIA — 3.