Ineffective assistance; People v Trakhtenberg; Value of stolen property; M Crim JI 22.1; Receiving & concealing value threshold; MCL 750.535(3)(a); Prejudice probability; Strickland v Washington

The court held that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to meaningfully contest the fair-market-value element by developing evidence and cross-examination about depreciation when the value threshold was close and the owner’s testimony concerned purchase prices from years earlier. Defendant was stopped in 2022 with a power washer and generator that had been reported stolen, and he was tried for receiving and concealing property worth “$1,000 or more but less than $20,000.” The owner testified he paid about $400 for the power washer and about $1,000 to $1,100 for the generator “sometime between 2015 and 2017,” and he acknowledged there was “most likely some depreciation” between purchase and theft. Defense counsel asked whether it was “possible that these two items today would be worth less than $1,000,” the prosecutor objected as speculative, and counsel withdrew the question without obtaining a ruling, and no evidence of the items’ fair market value at the time of the offense was introduced even though the jury was instructed on a lesser $200-to-$1,000 option. On appeal, the court emphasized that “the test for the value of property is the reasonable and fair market value of the property at the time” of the crime (M Crim JI 22.1), and it concluded that once the owner testified to older purchase prices and depreciation, counsel “should have focused the testimony and evidence on the depreciated value at the time of the theft.” The court identified reasonable steps counsel could have taken, including pressing for a ruling and rebutting the speculation objection, probing the owner’s lack of “basis in fact” to claim the combined value at the time of theft exceeded $1,000, and seeking a short continuance to obtain valuation evidence. The court found no “sound trial strategy” in relying on closing-argument assertions alone, and it found prejudice because with a threshold “close” to $1,000 and likely depreciation, there was a “reasonable probability” the jury would have convicted only of the lesser offense had it heard value-at-the-time evidence. Reversed and remanded.