Opinion
110,850.
10-31-2014
Kenneth ADAMS, Appellant, v. STATE of Kansas, Appellee.
Sam S. Kepfield, of Hutchinson, for appellant. Natalie Chalmers, assistant solicitor general, for appellee.
Sam S. Kepfield, of Hutchinson, for appellant.
Natalie Chalmers, assistant solicitor general, for appellee.
Before POWELL, P.J., LEBEN, J., and HEBERT, S.J.
MEMORANDUM OPINION
PER CURIAM.
Kenneth Adams appeals the district court's denial of his habeas corpus motion. He argues that his trial counsel was ineffective and that, as a result, he was convicted of several drug-related crimes in violation of his constitutional rights. Specifically, he alleges that his counsel failed to go over a video of his roommate's arrest—which led to Adams' convictions—before a pretrial hearing, failed to introduce the video at trial, and failed to cross-examine witnesses about the video. Adams claims that the video proves that his roommate, Rachel Nelson, never implicated him as a drug user or manufacturer and that the police lied when they said that she did on their request for a search warrant. But the video wasn't a complete record of the State's communication with Nelson, and Nelson testified that she had told the police that Adams used and manufactured drugs. Because the video would not have exonerated Adams and was not otherwise relevant, his counsel's decision not to use the video was within the wide range of reasonable choices counsel may constitutionally make. The district court correctly held that Adams' counsel's performance was adequate and could not be the basis for habeas corpus relief. We therefore affirm the district court's judgment, which dismissed Adams' K.S.A. 60–1507 motion.
Factual and Procedural Background
In 2008. Adams was arrested after an investigation that began when police stopped Nelson for running a slop sign. The police believed that Nelson was intoxicated, and she later admitted to drinking alcohol and using methamphetamine. After her arrest, the police searched Nelson's car and found a list of supplies used to manufacture methamphetamine. Though she first stated that the manufacturing was done in another stale, she eventually admitted that some of the items from the list could be found at the house she shared with Adams in Kansas. Based on her statements, the police obtained a warrant to search the home where Nelson and Adams lived. At the home, the police discovered an operational meth lab. Accordingly, they arrested Adams and charged him with six drug-related crimes, including the possession and manufacture of methamphetamine.
Adams moved to suppress the evidence obtained by the search based on his belief that Nelson had not made any statements about the house when she was arrested and that the police had fabricated the statements that tied methamphetamine to his home. The police had videotaped Nelson's traffic stop and arrest, and Adams alleged that the video did not show Nelson making any statements that indicated he produced methamphetamine. But the video wasn't introduced at trial, and Nelson testified that she had told the police alter she had been arrested that she and Adams had used methamphetamine and that Adams had manufactured it.
A jury convicted Adams on all six charges, and he was given a controlling prison sentence of 148 months. He appealed both his sentence and conviction to this court, which affirmed the district court. See State v. Adams, 43 Kan.App.2d 842, 232 P.3d 347 (2010), aff'd in part, rev'd in part 294 Kan. 171, 273 P.3d 718 (2012). On further review before the Kansas Supreme Court, that court upheld Adams' conviction but found he had been sentenced erroneously. State v. Adams, 294 Kan. 171, 185–87, 273 P.3d 718 (2012). It remanded his case to the district court for resentencing, but the new sentence ultirnatcly entered did not change Adams' controlling prison term of 148 months. See 294 Kan. at 185–87.
In 2012, Adams filed a habeas claim under K.S.A. 60–1507, arguing that the State of Kansas was subjecting him to continuing manifest injustice because his trial counsel, Robert Slinkard, had been ineffective. Adams argued generally that Slinkard was ineffective because he didn't review certain evidence with him—namely, the video of Nelson's arrest—before his pretrial—motion hearing and didn't effectively cross-examine the State's witnesses.
The district court held an evidentiary hearing on Adams' motion, where Adams and Slinkard testified. Slinkard said that Adams claimed that the officers in the case had attributed statements to Nelson that she didn't make in order to obtain a search warrant for their home. Accordingly, Slinkard said that he had filed a motion to suppress after reviewing all of the State's evidence with Adams. He stated that at the hearing on that motion, he had presented the testimony of witnesses and asked questions he had prepared with Adams that attempted to show that the State had relied on false information.
Slinkard said he had reviewed the evidence and trial strategies with Adams before each prehearing conference and before trial. Slinkard also said that he had filed numerous pretrial motions on Adams' behalf; those motions included one to suppress the evidence the officers found in Adams' home, one to prevent Adams' criminal history from being mentioned in front of the jury, and one to have Nelson classified as Adams' spouse so that marital privilege would limit what she could testify about. Slinkard said he had participated in a special hearing on these motions. Slinkard said he had filed every motion Adams had asked him to, contested every ruling that he could, and couldn't think of anything he should have or could have done differently to help Adams prevail.
Adams also testified. He admitted that Slinkard had filed a motion to suppress the evidence obtained from the search and that he had argued on Adams' behalf at the hearing on the motion. Adams also said, however, that he had not seen the video of Nelson's traffic stop before the motion hearing, even though he thought Slinkard had seen it. Adams said that Slinkhard should have used the video at trial because it showed that Nelson never made the statements implicating Adams that the police used to obtain a warrant for his home. Adams also said that his attorney didn't ask Nelson about the inconsistencies between what she had said on the video and what the police said she had told them when they were requesting a warrant.
Adams admitted that he had met with Slinkard numerous times and that Slinkard had gone over the majority of the evidence and trial strategy with him. Adams also admitted that he had no evidence that the police had lied on their affidavit or that Nelson hadn't implicated him after the in-car camera stopped recording. Further, Adams admitted that Nelson had testified at his trial that she had told the police they had supplies to manufacture methamphetamine at their house.
After hearing the evidence, the district court held that Slinkard's performance-while perhaps imperfect—was constitutionally adequate. The court noted that it did not appear that Slinkard “could have done any more that would have had an effect on the outcome of the case.” Accordingly, the court denied Adams' K.S.A. 60–1507 habeas corpus motion. Adams has appealed to this court.
Analysis
Dismissal of Adams' Habeas Corpus Petition Was Proper.
Adams argues that the district court erred by denying his K.S.A. 60–1507 motion. Adams contends that his trial counsel was ineffective and that his counsel's ineffectiveness entitles him to relief. When the district court has held an evidentiary hearing-as it did here-this court reviews the district court's decision to see whether the district court's factual findings are supported by substantial evidence and whether its factual findings support its conclusions of law. Ludlow v. State, 37 Kan.App.2d 676, 686–87, 157 P.3d 631 (2007). We then independently review its legal conclusions, without any required deference. Thompson v. State, 293 Kan. 704, 715, 270 P.3d 1089 (2011).
When a defendant seeks to set aside the result of a criminal trial on the ground that his or her defense attorney provided ineffective assistance, the defendant has the burden to show (1) that the attorney's work was below minimum standards and, thus, was constitutionally deficient; and (2) that the attorney's substandard work prejudiced the defense. Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984) ; Mattox v. State, 293 Kan. 723, Syl. ¶ 1, 267 P.3d 746 (2011). An attorney's performance was deficient if it fell below an objective standard of reasonableness considering ail the circumstances. Bledsoe v. State, 283 Kan. 81, 90, 150 P.3d 868 (2007). Courts evaluating an attorney's performance must indulge a strong presumption that the attorney's conduct fell within the wide range of reasonable assistance an attorney might provide and must attempt to eliminate the impact of hindsight by looking at the attorney's conduct from the attorney's perspective at the time. 283 Kan. at 90.
Under the second prong, a party has been prejudiced by trial counsel's deficient performance if he can show that there is a reasonable probability that the outcome of the trial would have been different if he had been appropriately represented. 283 Kan. at 90. A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the trial's outcome. State v. Bricker, 292 Kan. 239, 246, 252 P.3d 118 (2011).
The district court held that Adams had failed to establish both required prongs. First, it held that Adams' counsel's performance was adequate. Substantial evidence supports this conclusion: Slinkard met with Adams many times while preparing for trial, filed numerous motions on Adams' behalf and on Adams' request, cross-examined witnesses, participated in numerous hearings, and went over most of the evidence in the case with Adams as soon as he could.
Adams' primary argument on appeal appears to be that Slinkard was ineffective because he didn't go over the video of Nelson's traffic stop with him before the hearing on the motion to suppress and because he didn't introduce the video at trial. Adams contended in the district court that the fact that Nelson did not implicate him while being videotaped was proof that she never implicated him at all, which in turn meant that the police must have made up the information they provided to the judge to get a search warrant for Adams' home.
But, as the district court noted, introducing the video would not have proved that Nelson did not implicate him. It merely would have shown that she didn't implicate him while being recorded. Adams even admitted at his hearing that just because Nelson hadn't implicated him on video did not mean that she hadn't implicated him at some other time before the warrant was issued.
Slinkard's decision not to introduce this video was entirely reasonable because it did not prove that the police had lied to get a warrant and therefore didn't help Adams' case. Though Adams may have wished for a different outcome at trial, no evidence we have located in the record-and certainly no evidence cited in Adams' appellate brief—suggests that Slinkard's performance fell outside the wide range of reasonable representation a defendant is guaranteed by the constitution. The district court therefore correctly held that Adams failed to establish that his counsel was ineffective under the first element of the Strickland test.
Further, Adams failed to show that he had been prejudiced by his counsel's performance, the second element of the Strickland test. With only one exception, a failure to establish prejudice is fatal to an ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim. That exception applies when counsel completely abandons a client and the character of the adversarial process is so undermined as to be fundamentally unfair. See United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 656–57, 104 S.Ct. 2039, 80 L. lid.2d 657 (1984); State v. Adams, 297 Kan. 665, Syl. ¶ 4. 304 P.3d 311 (2013).
Here, Slinkard didn't abandon Adams-he represented him before trial, throughout the trial, and during sentencing. Slinkard tested the prosecution's case throughout the trial. Adams' failure to prove prejudice separately precludes granting relief based on his claim of ineffective assistance of counsel.
We affirm the district court's judgment.