Ineffective assistance of counsel; Failure to investigate & present evidence of the victim’s prior assaultive criminal history; People v Anderson; Other acts evidence; MRE 404(b)(1); Relevance; People v Harris; Right to present a defense; Denial of defense counsel access to jail calls that were reviewed by a detective; MRE 403; Sufficiency of the evidence; Self-defense; Use of deadly force; MCL 780.972(1)(a)

The court held that defense counsel was not ineffective for failing to investigate and present evidence of the victim’s (S) prior assaultive criminal history. Further, defendant was not denied his right to present a defense because defense counsel was denied access to jail calls reviewed by a detective. The court also rejected his self-defense claim and concluded there was sufficient evidence to support his convictions. Thus, it affirmed his AWIM, CCW, and felony-firearm convictions. The case arose from his altercation with a co-worker, S. Defendant first argued that defense counsel was ineffective for failing “to investigate and introduce evidence of [S’s] assaultive criminal history, which would have supported defendant’s” self-defense claim. But given that there was “no indication that defendant was aware of [S’s] assaultive criminal history at the time of the incident, any evidence of such was irrelevant to defendant’s state of mind when he shot” S. Because the evidence would have been inadmissible, defense counsel was not ineffective for failing to present it. The court added that under the circumstances, it was unlikely the evidence would have changed the jury’s verdict. As to his right to present a defense claim, “considering the time it would take for the detective to compile the ‘random’ jail calls, and the time that it would take for defense counsel to review them,” the court concluded “the trial court did not err by determining that the minimally probative value of potentially impeaching the detective was substantially outweighed by precluding undue delay and wasting time.” As to his self-defense claim, he “testified that he was ‘scared for [his] life’ because he thought that [S] was going to reverse and strike defendant with his vehicle.” However, S “testified that he reversed ‘slow’ because defendant was trying to tell him something, and [S] could not hear him. [S] explained that he looked out his rear window to ensure he did not harm defendant while reversing because [S] was ‘not trying to hit [defendant] or anything.’ Four eyewitnesses also testified that they did not see [S] attempt to hit or run defendant over with his vehicle. Moreover, multiple eyewitnesses described the initial altercation as ‘verbal,’ which defendant escalated when he shot [S] multiple times[.]”