State v. Wilson, 461 P.3d 1124

Wilson stabbed a friend six times with a serrated kitchen knife after the friend threatened to show the friend’s pregnant girlfriend photos of Wilson’s infidelity; the victim suffered serious injuries (collapsed lung, broken rib, severe facial wound).
Wilson fled with the girlfriend, later discarded the knife, was arrested after a multi-day search, and made recorded jailhouse phone calls admitting violent intent and boasting about killing or seriously injuring the victim.
The State introduced edited portions of those recorded calls (Audio Clips) at trial; defense counsel initially objected when he believed the State would not call the other party to the calls, but withdrew the objection after locating that witness and calling her for the defense.
Defense theory at trial was defense-of-others (protecting the pregnant girlfriend/unborn child); counsel obtained jury instructions for perfect and imperfect defense-of-others and a verdict form listing guilty, not guilty, aggravated assault, and attempted manslaughter.
The jury convicted Wilson of attempted murder (with a dangerous-weapon enhancement) and obstruction of justice; Wilson appealed only the attempted murder conviction, arguing ineffective assistance of counsel based on three specific trial decisions.

Issue	Wilson's Argument	State's Argument	Held
Failure to maintain a Rule 403 objection to the Audio Clips	Counsel should have objected to exclude the Audio Clips as unfairly prejudicial	A Rule 403 objection would have been futile because the calls were highly probative of Wilson’s state of mind and admissions; any unfair aspects were not substantially outweighing probative value	Counsel was not ineffective; a blanket objection would have been overruled and a limited exclusion would not likely have changed the outcome
Promissory opening statement re: debunking Audio Clips	Counsel ‘‘promised’’ to prove the Audio Clips false in opening and then failed to deliver, so performance was deficient	Opening comments were explanation/strategy (characterizing calls as jailhouse bravado), not a binding promise; the approach was reasonable trial strategy	Counsel’s opening was a reasonable strategic effort to contextualize the calls; no deficient performance shown
Failure to request a separate attempted-manslaughter jury instruction	Counsel should have separately requested an attempted-manslaughter instruction (jealous-lover theory)	Counsel reasonably chose defense-of-others and secured imperfect-defense options on the verdict form; alternate theories were weaker	Counsel’s choice of primary defense and instruction/ verdict form strategy was reasonable; no ineffective assistance found

Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (established the two-part deficient-performance and prejudice test for ineffective assistance)
Lee v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 1958 (reiterating the requirement that counsel’s actions be objectively unreasonable to show deficiency)
State v. Sessions, 342 P.3d 738 (discussing the objective-reasonableness standard for counsel performance)
State v. Kelley, 1 P.3d 546 (failure to raise futile objections does not constitute ineffective assistance)
State v. Maurer, 770 P.2d 981 (Rule 403 unfair-prejudice balancing; prejudice must be of the unfair sort to warrant exclusion)
State v. Garcia, 424 P.3d 171 (consider totality of evidence when assessing prejudice under Strickland)