People v. Henderson
| Decision Date | 10 May 2016 |
| Docket Number | No. 58,58 |
| Citation | 2016 N.Y. Slip Op. 03649,27 N.Y.3d 509,35 N.Y.S.3d 274,54 N.E.3d 1145 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of New York, Appellant, v. Wayne HENDERSON, Respondent. |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
Richard A. Brown, District Attorney, Kew Gardens (Christopher J. Blira–Koessler, Robert J. Masters and John M. Castellano of counsel), for appellant.
Lynn W.L. Fahey, Appellate Advocates, New York City (Leila Hull of counsel), for respondent.
Defendant was convicted of attempted murder and two counts of assault in the first degree for repeatedly stabbing a 12–year–old victim. Defendant, who was 15 years old at the time, had known the victim for about a year and occasionally spent time with him in the company of defendant's 14–year–old girlfriend. One evening, defendant, the victim and defendant's girlfriend were smoking marijuana at a park when either the victim or defendant pulled a knife (the stories vary) and a struggle ensued. In the course of the struggle, defendant stabbed the victim 20 to 25 times, and either defendant or his girlfriend cut the victim's throat and carved an “X” into his cheek.1
The victim survived and testified against defendant at trial. He described the stabbing in great detail, explaining that defendant attacked him with a knife after defendant's girlfriend called the victim a “snitch” for telling his mother that the three had been using marijuana. Defendant raised a defense of justification and asserted that he lacked the requisite intent to kill or cause injury to the victim. Specifically, defendant maintained that he initially struggled with the victim in self-defense after the victim drew the knife, but that he eventually experienced a type of psychotic episode that caused him to black out. He claimed no memory of subsequent events.
Defense counsel called an expert in child and adolescent psychiatry to offer an opinion on defendant's mental condition. After interviewing defendant and his mother, administering a psychiatric evaluation to defendant, reading the testimony of the lead detective in the case and reviewing defendant's medical records, previous psychiatric evaluations and educational reports, the expert concluded that defendant suffered from schizophreniform disorder —“a very severe psychiatric disorder” that causes a person to deteriorate mentally but does not require hospitalization. He observed that defendant had a history of behavioral problems and violent outbursts, likely related to the fact that his father and uncle were both stabbed to death when defendant was quite young, and that defendant had previously been committed to a residential psychiatric facility. According to the expert, defendant's disorder, coupled with his use of drugs and alcohol, compromised defendant's mental state on the night of the crime and prevented him from forming the requisite intent. He testified that the large number of stab wounds defendant inflicted and the random and violent nature of the attack were consistent with someone who had experienced a psychotic episode brought on by schizophreniform disorder and with defendant's testimony that he “ blacked out.”
On cross-examination, the expert acknowledged that he had not seen photographs of the victim's stab wounds or his emergency room records, but that he had reviewed the lead investigator's statements about the wounds and that defense counsel had informed him they “were all over the place.” He also stated that he knew the victim had been stabbed multiple times in the interior and exterior jugular veins, chest, back and legs. When asked by the prosecutor whether he was aware that the People's theory of motive was that defendant stabbed the victim in retaliation for “snitching,” the expert indicated that he was not and that such information “could and ... could not necessarily change [his] opinion.”
In summation, defense counsel argued that the photographs of the victim's wounds were irrelevant to the expert's opinion of defendant's mental state and there was no need to share them with him; she “hired him as a psychiatrist to evaluate [defendant], not to evaluate photos of injuries of the complainant.” The prosecutor argued in summation that the expert's knowledge was incomplete and his diagnosis unsupportable, since he “didn't bother to look at the photos or was not given them.” The jury convicted defendant of all counts.
Defendant challenged the judgment of conviction on direct appeal, arguing, among other things, that he received ineffective assistance of counsel based on his attorney's failure to provide the expert with photographs or hospital records of the victim's stab wounds and to inform the expert that the victim had “snitched” on defendant. The Appellate Division agreed and reversed, concluding that counsel's “so-called strategic decision to withhold information from the expert allowed the prosecutor to demonstrate to the jury that the expert was ill-informed” and “that the failure to disclose was intentional, and possibly misleading” (118 A.D.3d 1020, 1023, 990 N.Y.S.2d 214 [2d Dept.2014] ). Even if counsel had made a strategic decision to withhold the information, the Court held, “it was not consistent with the actions of a reasonably competent attorney” and that counsel would have been better off not calling an expert at all (id. ). A Judge of this Court granted the People leave to appeal, and we now reverse.
The record as a whole reveals that defendant received meaningful representation (see People v. Baldi, 54 N.Y.2d 137, 147, 444 N.Y.S.2d 893, 429 N.E.2d 400 [1981] ). Defense counsel mounted a cogent, albeit unsuccessful, multipronged defense that highlighted defendant's psychological condition, drug and alcohol abuse and deeply troubled past. Counsel retained a reputable expert to evaluate defendant and provided that expert with a substantial amount of information, including defendant's medical and psychiatric records, educational reports and the testimony of the lead investigator in the case. Defense counsel's preparation of its expert was, in every respect, far superior to the witness preparation we deemed constitutionally deficient in People v. Bennett , 29 N.Y.2d 462, 329 N.Y.S.2d 801, 280 N.E.2d 637 (1972) and People v. Oliveras , 21 N.Y.3d 339, 971 N.Y.S.2d 221, 993 N.E.2d 1241 (2013), in which counsel either failed to familiarize himself with the relevant facts and law regarding an insanity defense and called two experts who “testified that the [defendant] was sane” (Bennett, 29 N.Y.2d at 466, 329 N.Y.S.2d 801, 280 N.E.2d 637 ), or else “chose to forgo any investigation of the critical documents concerning defendant's mental...
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