State v. Martin

Citations

• 2018 Ohio 1061

Syllabus

IDENTIFICATION - ATTEMPTED MURDER - TAMPERING WITH EVIDENCE - EVIDENCE - CONSTITUTIONAL LAW/CRIMINAL - COUNSEL - PROSECUTOR - SENTENCING: Three witnesses' identifications of defendant during one-person arrest-scene show-ups were reliable under the totality of the circumstances where they had a good opportunity to view defendant during the commission of the crimes, they provided consistent and thorough descriptions of him to the police and to the 911 operator, they were certain of their identifications at the time, and they identified the defendant within 30 minutes after the crimes. R.C. 2933.83 is limited to live lineups. Defendant's convictions for attempted murder and tampering with the evidence were supported by sufficient evidence and were not contrary to the manifest weight of the evidence where the state presented testimony from three eyewitnesses who had seen defendant attack an unarmed man with a butcher knife cutting him on the head, face, and torso one of those eyewitnesses followed defendant, alerting police to his whereabouts, and watched as the police took him into custody and the police immediately recovered the knife used in the attack hidden underneath a vehicle near where defendant had been taken into custody. The trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant's motion for a mistrial based on prosecutorial misconduct during closing argument, because the prosecutor merely responded to defense counsel's arguments and did not improperly shift the burden of proof to defendant. Defendant's claims that his two trial attorneys had rendered ineffective assistance by failing to adequately prepare for trial and failing to seek a continuance to determine whether he wanted to testify were not supported by the record where defendant had indicated his confidence in his attorneys' representation, and the record shows that defendant's failure to testify was the result of his own knowing and intelligent decision. The trial court's imposition of conse