Handling of jury questions; Waiver; People v Kowalski; Abandoned ineffective assistance of counsel claim

Holding that defendant’s claim related to the handling of jury questions was waived and that he abandoned his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the court affirmed his CCW convictions. He argued on appeal “that the trial court erred in refusing to answer questions that were asked by the jury and such error interfered with the jury’s power to nullify. In the alternative,” he asserted he was denied “the effective assistance of his standby counsel who did not object to the claimed error.” As to his first argument, the trial court instructed “the jury that it ‘received all of the instructions and law in this case. That’s all we have. I don’t have any additional legal instructions for you.’ The trial court then asked defendant if he was ‘satisfied with [the court’s] instructions to the jury,’ and defendant replied, ‘Yeah.’” As a result, he admitted “that ‘[t]his issue was certainly not preserved and in fact the defendant voiced approval of the response crafted by the judge . . . .’” Given that he “expressly approved of the trial court’s response to the jury’s questions, defendant has waived any argument that the instructions were erroneous.” As to his second argument, “by not including his claim of ineffective assistance of standby counsel in his statement of the questions presented,” he abandoned that claim.