Canady v. Commissioner of Correction

Citations

• 231 Conn. App. 603

Syllabus

The petitioner, who had been convicted of, inter alia, felony murder, appealed after the habeas court denied his petition for certification to appeal from its judgment denying in part his habeas corpus petition. The petitioner claimed, inter alia, that the court had improperly denied his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, in which he contended that his criminal trial counsel, C, failed to have the petitioner's mother, T, removed as his guardian ad litem because she was interfering with plea discussions. Held: The habeas court did not abuse its discretion in denying the petition for certification to appeal to this court, as the petitioner failed to demonstrate that his claims related to C's actions involving T as his guardian ad litem involved issues that were debatable among jurists of reason, were adequate to deserve encouragement to proceed further or could be resolved by a court in a different manner. The habeas court properly determined that the petitioner was not deprived of the effective assistance of his trial counsel stemming from C's failure to have T removed as the petitioner's guardian ad litem, as C did not perform deficiently but, instead, reasonably made a strategic decision not to seek the complete removal of T, taking into account the close relationship between the petitioner and T and that T's removal would have been counter- productive and could have further impeded C's discussions with the peti- tioner, and the failure to remove T did not prejudice the petitioner, there having been no reasonable probability that her removal would have resulted in a different outcome at trial. The petitioner's due process claim that the trial court failed to ensure that T was acting in his best interests as his guardian ad litem was procedurally defaulted, as that claim was not raised at the petitioner's criminal trial or on direct appeal from his conviction, the petitioner did not establish that the failure to do so was the result of ineffective assistance b