Right of self-representation; People v Dunigan; Waiver of right to counsel; MCR 6.005(D); Credibility; “Competence”; People v Anderson; Equivocality; Hearsay; MRE 801(c); MRE 802; Police radio transmissions; People v Eady; Present sense impression exception; MRE 803(1); Excited utterance exception; MRE 803(2); Ineffective assistance of counsel; Smith v Spisak; Failure to make a futile objection; People v Gist

The court held that the trial court did not violate defendant’s right of self-representation or his right to a fair trial, and did not err by allowing the prosecution to present hearsay testimony. He was convicted of two counts of armed robbery and one count of fourth-degree fleeing and eluding a police officer. The trial court sentenced him as a fourth-offense habitual offender to concurrent terms of 30 to 45 years for each armed robbery and 2 to 15 for fleeing and eluding. On appeal, the court rejected his argument that the trial court violated his constitutional right to self-representation. “Given defendant’s equivocal assertion of the right to represent himself, deferring to the trial court’s credibility determinations regarding defendant’s ability to comprehend the risks of self-representation and his competence to represent himself, and mindful of the presumption against waiver of the right to counsel,” the trial court did not err by finding he did not validly waive his constitutional right to counsel. The court also rejected his claim that the trial court’s evidentiary decisions violated his right to a fair trial by depriving him of the meaningful opportunity to present a defense and to confront the witnesses against him, noting he “failed to establish that the trial court’s evidentiary decisions constituted abuses of the trial court’s discretion or violations of his right to a fair trial.” He was able to “use affidavits in an attempt to impeach [a detective’s] credibility, as well as to cross-examine the detective regarding his [] entry into defendant’s impounded car. The trial court’s instruction about the lawfulness of the searches of defendant’s car did not bar the jury from concluding that, during one of those lawful entries, someone planted cash in defendant’s red hoodie.” Finally, the court rejected his contention that the trial court erred by allowing the prosecution to present extensive hearsay testimony, and that his defense counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to object to it. It found that “[m]uch of the testimony to which defendant objects arguably fell under the present sense impression or the excited utterance exceptions to the hearsay rule.” And even if any of the evidence constituted inadmissible hearsay, “its admission was harmless, given that the same facts were established by evidence that was not hearsay.” Further, any objection by counsel would have been futile. Affirmed.