Ineffective assistance of counsel; Failure to investigate; Failure to call witnesses; Failure to consult an expert; Distinguishing People v Ackley

Rejecting defendant’s claims that his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to investigate, call witnesses, or consult an expert, the court affirmed his CSC I and II convictions. As to the claim for not investigating “the history of sexual abuse accusations made in” the victim’s (D) household, nothing in the record indicated “what new information such an investigation would have found.” Further, no evidence in the record showed “that trial counsel in fact failed to investigate other sexual abuse allegations or whether trial counsel did investigate but found nothing he considered helpful.” The court added that, even assuming such evidence existed, trial counsel could reasonably have thought it would increase sympathy for D “and her siblings or made the jury more likely to believe that sexual abuse was commonplace in the house” and thus, that defendant, D’s stepfather, was guilty. As to the failure to call witnesses to testify about those other allegations, there was “slightly more information in the record about a potential witness” as to an earlier investigation into allegations by D’s half-sisters, “which did not result in criminal charges against defendant. Trial counsel stated on the record that he had police reports showing that the sisters’ allegations were definitely unfounded, and that he was hoping to hear back from a detective who could testify about that investigation. However, trial counsel then said that such a witness might not be necessary if the prosecution would stipulate that defendant was never charged for those allegations. The prosecution agreed to do so.” As to the failure to consult an expert claim, while defendant pointed to Ackley, that case differed “in important ways. First, in Ackley, expert testimony about a victim’s injuries was the gravamen of the prosecution’s case, and would ‘require a response.’” There was no prosecution expert here. Secondly, the defendant in Ackley “developed a record showing both that an expert in the relevant field agreed with the defense theory of the case, and that the defense counsel had failed to follow up when given the name of a specific qualified expert who might be willing to testify.” Defendant here did not provide “any proposed expert testimony,” making the value of any such testimony “at best speculative.”