State v. Lemaine

Citations

• 2026 Ohio 1741

Syllabus

IMPROPER DISCHARGE — FELONIOUS ASSAULT — MANIFEST WEIGHT — SUFFICIENCY — INEFFECTIVE ASSISTANCE OF COUNSEL — NOTICE OF ALIBI — PROSECUTORIAL MISCONDUCT — CLOSING STATEMENTS — SENTENCING — FIREARM SPECIFICATIONS — MERGER — R.C. 2929.14 — CONSECUTIVE SENTENCES: Where the victim's testimony and reasonable inferences therefrom supported every element of the crimes, the State produced sufficient evidence to support those convictions. Where the victim's testimony clearly described defendant committing the offense, and where the trial court found the victim to be credible, and where defendant did not introduce the sort of truly compelling evidence necessary for the appellate court to disregard that credibility finding, defendant's convictions were not against the manifest weight of the evidence. Defendant was not entitled to reversal based on his claims of ineffective assistance of counsel because they relied upon the existence and weight of evidence not in the record. Although the prosecutor improperly relied upon statements outside the evidence during his closing statement, defendant failed to show that the prosecutor's comments had deprived him of a fair trial because (1) a trial court sitting without a jury is presumed to consider only appropriate evidence in making its findings of fact, and (2) defendant pointed to nothing to rebut that presumption. Defendant's firearm-specification sentences were not contrary to law (1) because R.C. 2929.14(B)(1)(g) and State v. Bollar, 2022-Ohio-4370, required the trial court to impose sentences for the two firearm-facilitations specifications, which were the two most serious specifications imposed under R.C. 2929.14(B)(1)(a), (2) because the trial court was required to merge and impose a sentence for one of the two vehicle-discharge specifications under R.C. 2929.14(B)(1)(c), as that specification was not subject to the merger rule articulated in R.C. 2929.14(B)(1)(g), and (3) because R.C. 2929.14(C)(1)(a) required that all of defe