State v. JacksonState v. Jackson
Judgment Appealed From Is: Affirmed
Date of Judgment Entry on Appeal: May 17, 2024
Melissa A. Powers, Hamilton County Prosecuting Attorney, and Paula E. Adams, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for Plaintiff-Appellant,
Elizabeth Miller, Ohio Public Defender, and Peter Galyardt, Assistant State Public Defender, for Defendant-Appellee.
{¶1} Plaintiff-appellant state of Ohio appeals the common pleas court‘s judgment granting defendant-appellee Larry Jackson‘s
Background
{¶2} In 2021, following a bench trial, Jackson was convicted of four counts of rape of a child under the age of ten and sentenced to 15 years to life for each count, to be served concurrently. The victim was Jackson‘s younger cousin.
{¶3} Initially, when Jackson learned he was a suspect in these crimes, he voluntarily went to the police station to “clear his name.” He was interviewed by two police officers, including Detective Aaron Roach, for a little over an hour. Roach read the Miranda warnings to Jackson1 and asked him if he understood his rights. Jackson responded, “Well, it means I have the right to talk, but if I had a lawyer present, it‘d be I don‘t know. I really never –.” Detective Roach then said, “[I]f you want to talk to me, you can talk to me. If you want to stop talking to me – you can stop talking to me.” Jackson then signed the waiver-of-rights form and the interview proceeded. Jackson adamantly denied raping the victim during this interview. Believing Jackson was not being truthful, Roach suggested he take a polygraph test. Then, after the polygraph test and an hours-long interrogation by another officer, Detective Edwin Riveria, Jackson confessed to one act of oral sex, but maintained that he did not have vaginal intercourse with the victim.
{¶5} In finding Jackson guilty of the charged offenses, the trial court noted that the victim‘s testimony was credible (her trial testimony was consistent with statements she had made to the social worker during her Mayerson Center interview) and that Jackson‘s testimony at trial—denying raping the victim—was not credible given his confession.
{¶6} This court affirmed Jackson‘s convictions and sentence on direct appeal, holding that Jackson‘s confession had not been coerced and was voluntary and that Jackson‘s waiver of his Miranda rights was valid. State v. Jackson, 1st Dist. Hamilton No. C-210466, 2022-Ohio-2562.
Postconviction Proceedings
{¶7} In his timely-filed petition, Jackson set forth one ground for relief, arguing that his trial counsel was constitutionally ineffective with respect to presenting Jackson‘s motion to suppress his confession. Specifically, Jackson argues that trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance of counsel by failing to investigate and present evidence of Jackson‘s intellectual disabilities (either through a psychological assessment or school records), argue that his disabilities did not allow him to waive his Miranda rights knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily, and present evidence to
{¶8} In support of his claim, Jackson submitted the following evidence: his school records showing his intelligence quotient (“IQ“) and intellectual disabilities; the affidavit and report of Dr. Naeem Khan, a clinical psychologist who evaluated Jackson and opined that Jackson‘s low-to-borderline range of intellectual functioning prevented him from understanding his Miranda rights and the consequences of giving up those rights; and a law review article that analyzed research demonstrating the heightened risk for individuals with an intellectual disability to be wrongfully convicted, particularly due to the risk of false confessions.
{¶9} Dr. Khan‘s report indicated that at Jackson‘s then-current age of 31, his IQ was 77, only two points higher than his IQ in high school. In high school, Jackson had an Individualized Education Plan, which mandated that he be provided with “assistive tools” to help him succeed in school, including a study-skills class, an altered grading scale, and extended time to take tests. Dr. Khan‘s report also indicated that Jackson had scored in the “below average range” on the KBIT-2IQ, which tested Jackson‘s verbal and nonverbal abilities, and that he had scored “mild to borderline” in intellectual capacity on the sections of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Test evaluating Jackson‘s verbal-comprehension and perceptional-reasoning ability.
{¶10} The trial court held an evidentiary hearing on Jackson‘s petition, at which Detective Roach, Detective Riveria, and Dr. Khan testified. At the hearing, the state stipulated that Dr. Khan was an expert in the field of clinical psychology.
{¶11} Detective Roach testified that he had read the Miranda warnings to Jackson before his initial interview and asked Jackson if he had understood them. Roach interpreted Jackson‘s answer as just “processing out loud,” and determined that Jackson was not confused about his rights, and, in his opinion, understood his rights. Roach explained that he had suggested Jackson take a polygraph test because he had
{¶12} Detective Riveria testified that before he administered the polygraph test, he did not reread the Miranda rights to Jackson but confirmed with Jackson that Detective Roach had reviewed the Miranda rights with him and then informed Jackson that those rights were still in effect. Riveria testified that he had administered the polygraph test to Jackson and Jackson had failed. He explained that he would have stopped the polygraph test if he had thought Jackson did not understand his questions. After the test, he continued to question Jackson for two hours, testifying that he had heard of the “Reid Technique” of interrogation and had some prior training in it, but he does not use it when questioning suspects. Riveria testified that Jackson used complete sentences when confessing and explained that in his opinion, as an experienced police officer, Jackson‘s verbal comprehension was suitable.
{¶13} Dr. Khan testified that when he had written his report, opining that Jackson‘s low intellectual functioning prevented him from knowingly waiving his Miranda rights, he had not yet viewed the video recordings and transcripts of the polygraph test and Jackson‘s two interviews with police officers. But he testified that since then he has reviewed the video recordings and transcripts, and his opinion has not changed. He explained that he had evaluated Jackson, administering several tests measuring his intellectual capacity, and interacted with him for approximately five hours. He testified that these tests demonstrated that Jackson had a borderline intellectual disability with respect to verbal comprehension and perceptual reasoning.
{¶14} Dr. Khan also testified that Jackson had not voluntarily confessed to the crimes. Based on his low IQ, Dr. Khan explained that Detective Riveria‘s intense questioning, which included sitting very close to Jackson and occurred while Jackson was still connected to the polygraph instrument, overwhelmed Jackson, and Jackson, in Dr. Khan‘s opinion, was ultimately just “acquiescing” to Riveria in the interview.
{¶15} After the evidentiary hearing, a review of the petition, and the trial record, the common pleas court, which was the same court that had presided over Jackson‘s trial, granted Jackson‘s petition for postconviction relief, and ordered a new trial. In its decision, the common pleas court noted that trial counsel had unreasonably failed to raise the issue of Jackson‘s intellectual deficits and argue that it impacted Jackson‘s ability to competently waive his Miranda rights and give a voluntary confession, and the fact that this was not considered by the trial court when analyzing the motion to suppress the confession prejudiced Jackson.
{¶16} The state now appeals, contending in a single assignment of error that the common pleas court abused its discretion by finding that trial counsel was “ineffective by not specifically including ‘competency to waive Miranda’ in a motion to suppress.”
Analysis
{¶17} A trial court‘s decision granting or denying a
{¶19} The state does not challenge the trial court‘s finding that Jackson was prejudiced by his attorney‘s deficient performance, and we therefore do not address that prong of the Strickland standard. Instead, the state challenges only the deficient-performance prong of Strickland, maintaining that the common pleas court placed too much weight on Dr. Khan‘s report, where he had opined that Jackson‘s intellectual disabilities prevented him from understanding or comprehending the consequences of waiving his Miranda rights, to determine that trial counsel was deficient in failing to argue Jackson‘s competency to waive his Miranda rights in the motion to suppress. The state points out that when Dr. Khan first reached his conclusion as to Jackson‘s ability to understand his Miranda rights, Dr. Khan had not reviewed the video recordings or transcripts of Jackson‘s two police interviews. Therefore, the state contends that Dr. Khan‘s expert opinion, as set forth in his report, should not be given much weight as it relied primarily on “test scores” to determine whether Jackson understood his rights. We are unpersuaded.
{¶20} Dr. Khan spent more than five hours with Jackson, administering tests and interacting with him before he wrote his report. Further, at the evidentiary hearing on Jackson‘s petition, Dr. Khan testified that he had viewed the video recordings and transcripts of the police interviews before the hearing and that his
{¶21} Concluding that there was competent, credible evidence to support the trial court‘s determination that trial counsel‘s performance fell below an objective standard of reasonableness and considering that the state has raised no challenge to the court‘s finding that counsel‘s deficient performance prejudiced Jackson, we hold that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in granting Jackson‘s petition for postconviction relief and ordering a new trial. Accordingly, we overrule the single assignment of error and affirm the common pleas court‘s judgment.
Judgment affirmed.
KINSLEY, J., concurs.
WINKLER, J., concurs in part and dissents in part.
WINKLER, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part.
{¶22} To prove an ineffective-assistance claim, the defendant must demonstrate both that “counsel‘s performance was deficient,” and that “the deficient performance prejudiced the defense.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674. Because I agree with the majority that there was competent, credible evidence to support the lower court‘s finding of deficient performance, I concur in
{¶23} To prove prejudice in this case, Jackson had to “demonstrate a ‘reasonable probability’ that without the deficient performance, the trier of fact would have a reasonable doubt concerning [Jackson‘s] guilt [or, in other words, that the outcome of the trial would have been different]. Generally, there is no prejudice where ‘compelling evidence’ remains to support the conviction assuming the suppression motion would have been granted.” (Citations omitted.) State v. White, 1st Dist. Hamilton No. C-150250, 2016-Ohio-3329, ¶ 54.
{¶24} Here, under the prejudice prong of Strickland, the common pleas court had to consider whether, if Jackson‘s confession was suppressed, any compelling evidence remained to support Jackson‘s convictions. In this case, the remaining evidence is the victim‘s testimony that Jackson raped her four times. The common pleas court failed to consider this evidence or even discuss whether the outcome of the trial would have been different if the confession had been suppressed. Because the common pleas court failed to apply the correct test in considering the prejudice prong of Strickland, and because a lower court never has discretion to misapply the law or commit an error of law, see Johnson v. Abdullah, 166 Ohio St.3d 427, 2021-Ohio-3304, 187 N.E.3d 463, I would reverse the judgment of the lower court and remand the matter for the court to apply the proper analysis and determine whether, if Jackson‘s confession had been suppressed, there is a reasonable probability that the result of Jackson‘s trial would have been different; i.e., would there be reasonable doubt as to his guilt in light of the remaining evidence.
Please note:
The court has recorded its own entry on the date of the release of this opinion.