Warren v. State

Brandon Warren was convicted by a Houston County jury of killing Samuel Poss along with a co-defendant, Dakota White, and of hiding Poss's body. White testified that the two had discussed finding someone to kill and that they lured Poss to White's house, strangled him, and stabbed him. Warren gave a similar account but claimed White did the stabbing. After his conviction, Warren argued his trial lawyer was constitutionally ineffective for not objecting when the prosecutor described the burden of proof using percentages, and for not doing more to steer him away from testifying. The Supreme Court of Georgia rejected both claims. It found that even if the lawyer should have objected to the prosecutor's remark, the strong evidence against Warren meant the outcome would not have changed. It also found the lawyer's advice, explaining the pros and cons of testifying and leaving the choice to Warren, fell within the range of reasonable legal representation. The conviction and life sentence were affirmed.

Trial counsel's failure to object to the prosecutor's imprecise description of reasonable doubt did not prejudice Warren given the strong evidence against him, and counsel's advice to explain the pros and cons of testifying while leaving the final decision to Warren was within the range of reasonable professional conduct.

The ruling reinforces that Georgia defense lawyers are not required to tell clients whether to testify, only to explain the risks and leave the choice to them, and it shows courts will excuse imprecise prosecutor remarks about reasonable doubt when other evidence of guilt is strong.

Affirmed

1. To win an ineffective-assistance claim, a defendant must show both that his lawyer's performance was deficient (unreasonable under prevailing professional norms) and that this deficiency likely changed the trial's outcome, a two-part test from Strickland v. Washington.
2. The court compared the prosecutor's remark that reasonable doubt was not '95 percent, 85 percent' to a prior case where a similar remark was found harmful, but found this case closer to a case where the court excused a similar remark because the evidence of guilt was strong and the trial judge's instructions correctly explained the burden of proof.
3. Applying that comparison, the court found Warren's guilt was supported by his co-defendant's testimony, Warren's own largely matching testimony, and DNA evidence linking him to a knife used in the stabbing, so any error in not objecting to the prosecutor's remark was not likely to have changed the verdict.
4. On the testifying claim, the court applied its rule that a lawyer need only explain the pros and cons of testifying and confirm the decision belongs to the defendant, rather than tell the defendant what to do, because the choice to testify is a personal, tactical decision for the defendant himself.
5. Because trial counsel discussed the risks and benefits of testifying with Warren multiple times and left the final call to him, the court found this advice fell within the wide range of conduct considered reasonable for defense lawyers.

• murder conviction
• ineffective assistance of counsel
• right to testify
• reasonable doubt
• Houston County