Waiters v. Lee ( 2017 )

15‐3487‐pr
Waiters v. Lee
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT
August Term 2016
(Argued: September 13, 2016  Decided: May 22, 2017)
No. 15‐3487‐pr
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
GENERAL WAITERS,
Petitioner‐Appellee,
‐v.‐
WILLIAM LEE,
Superintendent of Greene Haven Correctional Facility,
Respondent‐Appellant.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Before:    JACOBS, PARKER, LIVINGSTON, Circuit Judges.
Respondent‐Appellant  appeals  from  the  judgment  of  the  United  States
District  Court  for  the  Eastern  District  of  New  York  (Gleeson,  J.)  granting
Petitioner‐Appellee’s  petition  for  a  writ  of  habeas  corpus  on  the  basis  of
ineffective  assistance  of  counsel.    We  conclude,  in  light  of  the  deferential
standard  of  review,  that  the  state  trial  court’s  determination  that  trial  counsel’s
conduct did not prejudice the defense was not unreasonable.    Accordingly, we
VACATE  the  judgment  of  the  district  court  and  REMAND  the  case  for  further
proceedings consistent with this opinion.
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Judge JACOBS dissents in a separate opinion.
FOR PETITIONER‐APPELLEE:  MEGAN  WOLFE  BENETT  (Gary Farrell, on the
brief), New York, NY
FOR RESPONDENT‐APPELLANT:  RHEA  A.  GROB,  Assistant  District  Attorney
(Leonard  Joblove,  Jodi  L.  Mandel,  on  the
brief),  for  Kenneth  M.  Thompson,  District
Attorney of Kings County, Brooklyn, NY
DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON, Circuit Judge:
Petitioner‐Appellee  General  Waiters  (“Waiters”)  got  into  an  argument  at
the  home  of  his  then  girlfriend,  Jacqueline  Warren  (“Warren”),  one  Sunday
morning  in  May  2006  which  began,  as  Warren  testified,  when  she  told  Waiters
that  he’d  had  “too  much  to  drink.”    Trial  Tr.  at  399.    It  ended  when  Waiters
pulled  out  a  revolver  and  fired  repeatedly  at  Lorenzo,  Warren’s  adult  son  who
had  intervened  on  his  mother’s  behalf,  injuring  both  Lorenzo  and  Warren’s
14‐year  old  daughter,  and  killing  Warren’s  aunt  and  her  aunt’s  three‐year‐old
grandchild.    Following a jury trial, Waiters was convicted of murder, attempted
murder, and assault.
Waiters  does  not  deny  engaging  in  the  conduct  underlying  these  crimes.
Rather,  he  contends  that  his  trial  counsel  was  ineffective  for  failing  to  call  a
medical expert both to interpret—and thereby render admissible—the portion of
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his  medical  records  documenting  his  blood  alcohol  level  (“BAC”),  and  to
expound  upon  the  effects  of  that  level  of  intoxication.    With  that  evidence,
Waiters contends, it is reasonably likely that the jury would not have concluded
that he harbored the requisite intent to commit his crimes.    The state trial court
judge who presided over Waiters’s four‐day trial rejected this claim, concluding,
inter  alia,  that  Waiters  had  presented  nothing  “establishing  that  medical
testimony  regarding  the  defendant’s  level  of  intoxication  would  have  changed
the  jury’s  finding.”    Appellant’s  App’x  at  55.    The  district  court  (Gleeson,  J.),
however, disagreed and granted Waiters’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus on
this basis.
We  vacate  the  district  court’s  judgment  and  remand  for  further
proceedings  consistent  with  this  opinion.    To  establish  a  Strickland  claim,  the
likelihood  of  a  different  result  in  the  absence  of  the  alleged  deficiencies  in
representation “must be substantial, not just conceivable.”    Harrington v. Richter,
562  U.S.  86,  112  (2011);  see  also  Strickland  v.  Washington,  466  U.S.  688,  693  (1984)
(“It is not enough for the defendant to show that the errors had some conceivable
effect  on  the  outcome  of  the  proceeding.”).    Here,  we  cannot  say  with  any
assurance how the jury might have weighed the proffered expert evidence of the
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effects  of  intoxication  on  the  average  person’s  ability  to  form  intent  against
Waiters’s  own  specific  behavior  and  statements,  including  his  admission  to
Warren, about a year after the incident, that he was “aiming after” Lorenzo (and
thus  intending  to  shoot)  because  he  felt  that  Lorenzo  “was  trying  to  come
between” them.    Trial Tr. at 466 (emphasis added).    We are therefore guided by
the Supreme Court’s instruction that in cases like this one, governed by § 2254(d)
of  the  Antiterrorism  and  Effective  Death  Penalty  Act  of  1996  (“AEDPA”),  the
“state  court’s  determination  that  a  claim  lacks  merit  precludes  federal  habeas
relief so long as ‘fairminded jurists could disagree’ on the correctness of the state
court’s  decision.”    Harrington,  562  U.S.  at  101  (quoting  Yarborough  v.  Alvarado,
541 U.S. 652, 664 (2004)).    Here, the state trial court’s determination that Waiters
failed  to  establish  prejudice  was  not  unreasonable;  it  was  not  so  lacking  in
justification as to be “beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.”    Id.
at  103.    The  district  court  accordingly  erred  in  second‐guessing  that
determination and substituting its own judgment for that of the state court.
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BACKGROUND
I.    Factual Background1
A.    The Offense Conduct
On the afternoon of Saturday, May 6, 2006, Warren threw Waiters a party
at  her  apartment,  in  which  Waiters  also  resided,  to  celebrate  his  36th  birthday.2
The  party  was  attended  by  members  of  Warren’s  family,  including  her  teenage
children  Derrick  and  Shatashia,  who  lived  with  Warren;  her  sister  and  sister’s
husband; and her aunt Mary Lee Clark (“Clark”) and Clark’s five grandchildren,
who ranged in age from only a couple of months old to about ten.
Waiters had begun drinking earlier in the day, and had additional Bacardi
Light and soda with Warren and Clark during the party.    According to Warren,
she and Waiters drank every day; sometimes a fifth of rum managed to last them
two  days.    Waiters  regularly  became  verbally  abusive  when  he  drank,  though
he  did  not  so  behave  that  afternoon.    The  party  lasted  until  about  11:00  p.m.,
when  Warren’s  sister  and  brother‐in‐law  left.    Clark  and  her  grandchildren
stayed  the  night.    Warren’s  23‐year‐old  son,  Lorenzo,  a  letter  carrier  with  the
The  factual  background  presented  here  is  derived  from  uncontroverted  trial
1
testimony except where noted otherwise.
2  Waiters had lived in Warren’s apartment on an “[o]ff and on” basis for four to
five years at the time of the shooting.    Trial Tr. at 158–59.
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Postal Service who lived at the apartment but did not attend the birthday party,
returned home at about 2:00 a.m.
The next day, Waiters was up before 9:30 and went out to purchase cereal
and  milk  for  the  crowd.    Then,  before  11:00  a.m.,  he  resumed  drinking  with
Warren  and  Clark  for  about  half  an  hour.    Shortly  thereafter,  Warren  took  the
bottle from Waiters, telling him he’d had “too much to drink.”    Suppl. App’x at
43.    Waiters  resisted,  exclaiming  loudly,  “Fuck  you,  bitch,”  after  which  an
argument  ensued.    Id.  at  44.    According  to  Warren,  the  pair  feuded  for  a
period, until Waiters abruptly left the apartment, only to return about 10 minutes
later.3
Upon his return, Waiters proceeded directly to the couple’s bedroom.    He
remained there for 15 to 20 minutes before reappearing in the living room, now
wearing a jacket.    By this point, he was “screaming[,]. . . yelling[,] and . . . calling
[Warren] names.”    Id. at 46.    Clark implored him to calm down.    Waiters and
Warren exchanged curses before Warren demanded that he leave.
Lorenzo Warren testified that he heard the arguing and came out from his
bedroom to the living room to intervene, telling Waiters to “step away from [his]
Warren  testified  that  her  son,  Lorenzo,  joined  the  argument  shortly  before
3
Waiters  left,  but  Lorenzo  did  not,  in  his  testimony,  distinguish  between  the  periods
before and after Waiters’s absence from the apartment.
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mother” and to not “get in [her] face.”4    Id. at 19.    Waiters told Lorenzo that the
argument  did  not  “concern”  him.    Id.  at  20.    Lorenzo  then  moved  closer  to
Waiters, at which point Warren and Clark pushed the two men to opposite ends
of the room.
Derrick, then 17, and his younger sister Shatashia, 14, by this time drawn
to the living room by the commotion, heard, respectively, Waiters tell Lorenzo, “I
got something for you,” Trial Tr. at 483, and “you don’t want me to pull what I
got  out  of  my  jacket,”  id.  at  309.    Lorenzo  nonetheless  openly  doubted  that
Waiters  had  anything  in  his  jacket.    Waiters  then  pulled  out  a  revolver  and
pointed  it  at  Lorenzo,  who,  according  to  his  trial  testimony,  continued  to  taunt
Waiters,  saying,  “That  gun  isn’t  loaded.    You  don’t  have  any  bullets  in  that
gun.”    Suppl. App’x at 32.
Waiters thereafter rapidly fired multiple shots.    Derrick observed Waiters
aim “[s]traight” at his brother, Trial. Tr. at 504, from a distance of about seven or
eight  feet.    Warren  saw  Waiters  shoot  at  Lorenzo  as  “he  started  going  toward
where  Lorenzo  was  standing.”    Id.  at  414.    Waiters’s  first  shot  hit  Lorenzo  in
the  thigh,  and  the  remainder  hit  Shatashia  in  the  thigh;  Clark  in  the  head,
Lorenzo  testified  that  Derrick  likewise  walked  in  and  defended  Clark  from
4
Waiters’s  verbal  abuse,  telling  Waiters  “not  to  talk  to  [his]  aunt  like  that.”    Suppl.
App’x at 22.
7
abdomen,  and  leg;  and  three‐year‐old  Tajmere  Clark,  who  had  run  out  to  her
grandmother  during  the  tumult,  in  the  head  and  chest.    Clark  was  rendered
comatose and succumbed to her injuries after trial; Tajmere died at the scene.
Waiters  thereafter  attempted  to  leave.    According  to  Derrick,  who  stood
between  Waiters  and  the  front  door,  Waiters  pointed  the  gun,  a  .357  revolver,
point‐blank  at  Derrick’s  face.    Waiters  then  “pulled  the  trigger.”    Id.  at  508.
When  the  gun  “clicked,”  id.  at  508,  indicating  to  Derrick  that  it  was  out  of
ammunition,  Waiters  moved  toward  the  exit  but  Derrick  tackled  him  to  the
ground  and  began  punching.    Lorenzo,  though  injured,  then  got  on  top  of
Waiters  and  instructed  his  brother  to  leave,  all  while  Waiters  continued
squeezing  the  trigger  of  his  gun  and  “pointing  it  wildly.”    Id.  at  248.
Lorenzo  began  punching  Waiters,  but  Waiters  indicated  that  Lorenzo  “wasn’t
strong enough” and “wasn’t causing him any harm,” id. at 181, asking him, “Is
that  all  you  got?,”  id.  at  420.    Waiters  ultimately  sustained  a  concussion  after
Lorenzo  hit  him  with  a  fish  tank  and  Derrick  hit  him  with  a  vase  at  Lorenzo’s
instruction, around which time Waiters yelled to Warren for help.
Police  and  paramedics  responded  to  the  scene  and  transported  both
Waiters  and  his  victims  to  the  hospital.    Medical  records  introduced  at  trial
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noted  that  Waiters  was  intoxicated  when  he  arrived  at  Kings  County  Hospital
Center,  and  that  his  “CNS”  could  not  be  “assess[ed]  due  to  [his]  intoxicated
state.”5    Suppl.  App’x  at  94.    Records  not  before  the  trial  jury  but  part  of  the
record on appeal indicate that as of 12:33 p.m., approximately an hour after the
events  in  question,  Waiters  registered  an  ethyl  alcohol  level  of  386.24,  the
equivalent of a 0.39 BAC, which the hospital marked as “critical.”    Appellant’s
App’x at 76.    Waiters was alert on admission, but confused and unaware of the
time  or  where  he  was.    He  experienced  continued  disorientation  and  reported
hallucinations in the days thereafter; hospital staff documented his delirium and
history of “alcohol abuse and dependence.”    Suppl. App’x at 103.
B.    The Trial
Beginning  on  May  5,  2008,  General  Waiters  stood  trial  in  New  York
Supreme  Court,  Kings  County. 6     In  its  opening  statement,  the  prosecution
explained that it would prove that Waiters, in an alcohol‐fueled rage, attempted
to shoot and kill Lorenzo Warren, and that he was therefore responsible for all of
While  not  defined  in  the  hospital  records,  CNS  refers  to  Waiters’s  central
5
nervous system.
On  November  16,  2007,  prior  to  trial,  Waiters  sought  appointment  of  new
6
counsel,  citing,  inter  alia,  his  attorney’s  failure  to  negotiate  a  plea  deal  that  did  not
include the possibility of life imprisonment.    The state trial court denied the motion.
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the  resulting  injuries—and,  at  that  time,  the  single  fatality7—under  a  theory  of
transferred  intent.    Waiters’s  attorney,  Calvin  Simons  (“Simons”),  did  not
articulate  a  particular  defense  in  his  opening,  but  he  stressed  to  the  jury  that
Waiters  was  not  charged  with  intending  to  kill  or  injure  anyone  but  Lorenzo:
“The  issue  which  you  will  focus  on,  as  the  People  have  stated,  will  be  Lorenzo
Warren.”    Id. at 9.
During  the  prosecution’s  case  in  chief,  Lorenzo  testified  that  Waiters
appeared drunk during their altercation because his “speech . . . was a little bit
slurred.”    Id.  at  30.    Lorenzo  indicated,  however,  that  he  had  previously  seen
Waiters  intoxicated  “around  maybe  ten”  times,  id.  at  27,  and  that  he  had  been
“way worse” on those occasions, id. at 30.    Derrick testified that Waiters drank
during  the  party  the  previous  evening,  as  did  the  other  adults,  while  Shatashia
testified that she did not notice whether the adults were drinking, as she “was in
a room with the kids.”    Id. at 37.
For her part, Warren testified that Waiters drank on a daily basis, and that
it  caused  him  to  become  verbally  abusive.    She  did  not  recall,  however,  how
much Waiters had to drink on the day of his party or the next morning, although
As  noted  above,  Mary  Lee  Clark  died  of  her  injuries  after  the  trial  had
7
concluded.
10
she testified that she drank with him and with Clark for about half an hour that
morning before taking the bottle of Bacardi away.
Warren  further  testified  that  about  a  year  after  the  shootings,  in  Spring
2007,  Waiters  telephoned  her.    During the  conversation,  Warren asked  Waiters
why  he  had  done  what  he  did.    Waiters  explained  that  “he  was  aiming  after
[Lorenzo] . . . [b]ecause he was coming between [them].”    Trial Tr. at 421.
At  the  conclusion  of  the  prosecution’s  case,  Simons  indicated  that  the
defense would decide over the weekend whether to call Dr. Sanford Drob as part
of  the  defense  case.    Dr.  Drob  was  a  forensic  psychologist  engaged  by  the
defense  to  explore  a  possible  affirmative  defense  of  extreme  emotional
disturbance.    During  the  pretrial  period,  Waiters  was  evaluated  by  both  Dr.
Drob  and  Dr.  Alexander  Sasha  Bardey—a  prosecution  expert—in  connection
with  this  defense,  for  which  Simons  had  served  notice.    The  prosecution
responded  by  noting  that  Dr.  Drob’s  testimony  might  open  the  door  to  the
admission  of  a  statement  made  by  Waiters  to  police  in  the  aftermath  of  the
shootings.8    The trial court advised Simons to “make Doctor Drob aware of the
8   Simons  had  successfully  obtained  the  pretrial  suppression  of  this  statement,
which was taken at the Intensive Care Unit at Kings County Hospital on May 8, 2006, a
day after the shootings.    In the statement, according to police, Waiters indicated, inter
alia, that Warren’s oldest son “was giving him a hard time about how much he had been
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fact  that  certainly  if  he  opens  the  door,  and  maybe  opening  a  door  to  a  can  of
worms,  that  would not  be  helpful  to  your  client.”    Id.  at  524.    It  then  recessed
for the weekend.
The  following  Monday,  Simons  informed  the  trial  court  that  Waiters  did
not  want  Dr.  Drob  to  testify.    Waiters  confirmed  that  proposition,  and  further
indicated  that  he  did  not  wish  to  testify  on  his  own  behalf.    Simons  thereafter
sought  to  introduce  certified  medical  records  of  Waiters’s  hospital  visit  in
support of the argument that Waiters was intoxicated and unable to form intent.
The prosecution objected, arguing primarily that the evidence already indicated
that  Waiters  was  drinking,  intoxicated,  and  suffered  a  head  injury;  that  the
hospital  records  would  invite  speculation  absent  an  explanation  of  the  terms
contained  therein;  and  that  introducing  them  might  open  the  door  to  evidence
that General Waiters, “in talking to both Doctor Drob[] and Doctor Bardey, said
that he hadn’t been drinking that morning, was not intoxicated, and was able to
drinking,”  after which Waiters went into the bedroom  and retrieved  a gun.    Nov.  17,
2011  Tr.  at  17.    He  began  to  fire,  according  to  his  account  of  the  incident,  when
“Jackie’s son started to come at him down the hallway,” after which Lorenzo, assisted
by Derrick, ”got on top of him [and] started stomping” until he passed out.    Id. at 17–
18.
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give  a  coherent  version,  his  coherent  version  about  what  had  happened.” 9
Suppl.  App’x  at  66.    The  trial  court  ultimately  admitted  two  redacted  pages  of
the medical records which together indicated, as previously stated, that Waiters
arrived  at  the  hospital  in  an  intoxicated  state  and  that  hospital  staff  could  not
evaluate his “CNS” as a result.    The trial court found that all other parts of the
medical  record  “would  not  be  [relevant]  without  an  explanation  by  medical
personnel.”10    Id. at 73.    Simons took exception to the redaction, but rather than
seek  an  adjournment  to  obtain  a  medical  expert,  he  indicated  that  the  defense
9   Dr. Drob’s report indicates that Waiters claimed that Lorenzo threatened to kill
him on the morning of the shootings, causing Waiters to fear for his life and to go “to
the bedroom and [get] his gun.”    Sanford L. Drob, Preliminary Forensic Psychological
Evaluation 4–5 (Sept. 24, 2007), ECF No. 37.    Waiters shot at Lorenzo, he told Dr. Drob,
to  scare  him,  after  Lorenzo  allegedly  said,  “I’ll  kill  you  now.”    Id.  at  5.    Waiters
indicated that he shot Tajmere Clark accidentally, after which he “fired another shot at
Lorenzo and hit him in the leg.”    Id. at 4–5.    Waiters indicated that he was not drunk
that  morning,  but  that  he  was  hung  over.    Id.  at  6.    Dr.  Drob  concluded  that  “there
[was]  little  to  suggest  that  Mr.  Waiters  was  either  unaware  of  the  nature  of  his  act  or
unable to appreciate its wrongfulness.”    Id. at 23.    Waiters’s statements to Dr. Bardey
similarly  suggested  that  Waiters  was  aware  of  his  actions  that  day,  and  picked  up,
pointed, and shot a gun at Lorenzo Warren to scare him.    See Alexander Sasha Bardey,
Forensic‐Psychiatric Evaluation 7, 15 (Oct. 9, 2007), ECF No. 37.
10  The dissent contends that the state trial judge “urged defense counsel to call an
expert”  and  “went  as  far  as  she  could  go  without  committing  advocacy.”    Yet  the
record  indicates  that  the  trial  judge,  the  very  judge  who  later  found  that  Simons’s
performance did not prejudice Waiters’s defense, was not commenting on the probative
value of the hospital records, but rather was suggesting that the best way to render them
admissible was to call an expert to interpret them.    See, e.g., Suppl. App’x at 68 (“[T]he
best  way  would  have  been  to  get  someone  from  the hospital  to  certainly  interpret  the
records . . . .”).
13
was “prepared to go forward” without the full medical records being admitted.11
Id. at 73.
In his summation, Simons argued that Waiters was so intoxicated that he
did not intend to kill Lorenzo, but rather was merely reckless.    He attempted to
cast doubt on the testimony of Warren and her family suggesting the contrary by
emphasizing  discrepancies  and  omissions  in  the  various  witness  accounts.    He
noted,  among  other  things,  that  Waiters  started  drinking  again  that  morning;
that  the  medical  records  indicated  that  he  was  intoxicated;  that  multiple
witnesses  testified  that  Waiters  changed  when  he  drank;  and  that  Waiters
continued to pull the trigger on his revolver even after he had discharged all of
its  bullets.    Simons  also  attacked  the  credibility  of  Warren’s  testimony  about
Waiters’s phone call in Spring 2007, noting that she did not immediately mention
the  call  to  the  prosecutor,  even  though  she  had  “already  talked  to  the  District
Attorney in the case.”    Trial Tr. at 607–08.
11  The prosecution thereafter suggested that the state trial court’s determination
to  admit  even  the  redacted  pages  rendered  it  “relevant  and  admissible  to  call  either
Doctor Drob or Doctor Bardey,” Suppl. App’x at 73, given that Waiters “gave accounts
to  both  [doctors]  in  which  he  talk[ed]  about  [the  fact]  that  he  clearly  knew  what  was
going on and that he had a specific intent,” Trial Tr. at 555.    The defense objected, and
the  trial  court,  without  explicitly  addressing  whether  Waiters  had  opened  the  door,
determined that it would admit the redacted records over the prosecution’s objection.
14
In  response,  the  prosecution  also  focused  on  Waiters’s  intent,  noting  that
Waiters  was  able  to  perform  the  physical  acts  necessary  to  commit  his  crimes,
and  that  his  use  of  the  gun—and  specifically  the  fact  that  he  targeted  and
successfully  shot  Lorenzo,  “track[ing]  over  to”  follow  him  as  Lorenzo  moved
across  the  apartment—suggested  that  he  was  able  to  intend,  and  did  intend,  to
kill.    Id. at 629.
The  prosecution  likewise  argued  that,  while  Waiters  “drank  seriously
every day,” id. at 633, and was voluntarily intoxicated that morning, the witness
testimony  suggested  he  was  not  so  severely  intoxicated  that  he  was  unable  to
form intent.    Indeed, the prosecution explained that Waiters bought cereal and
milk that morning; argued with Warren about his drinking; obtained a revolver
and hid it in his jacket; argued with and ultimately shot Lorenzo; and attempted
to escape the apartment after exhausting his ammunition.    Moreover, Waiters’s
phone  call  to  Warren,  the  prosecution  contended,  clearly  demonstrated  that  he
formed the requisite intent to commit his crimes: “[I]f he’s so blown out, if he is
so, so soused that he can’t form intent . . . when Jackie asked him ‘Why did you
do it?’ he would have said, ‘Honey, I don’t know.’    But he doesn’t.”    Id. at 642.
Instead,  the  prosecution  maintained,  General  Waiters  admitted  that  he  intended
15
to  shoot  Lorenzo  “to  eliminate  him  for  coming  between”  Waiters  and  Warren.
Id. at 642.
Thereafter, at Simons’s request, the state trial court: (a) instructed the jury
on the relevance of intoxication evidence, describing how it can serve to negate
the  intent  element  of  the  crimes  with  which  Waiters  was  charged,  and  (b)
instructed  the  jury  on  manslaughter  in  the  first  degree,  as  a  lesser–included
charge of second degree murder.    Thereafter, on May 13, 2008—the same day on
which  deliberations  began—the  jury  found  Waiters  guilty  of  one  count  of
murder  in  the  second  degree,  in  violation  of  New  York  Penal  Law  § 125.25(1);
one count of attempted murder in the second degree, in violation of  New York
Penal Law §§ 110.00 and 125.25(1); and two counts of assault in the first degree,
in  violation  of  New  York  Penal  Law  § 120.10(1).    The  trial  court  ultimately
sentenced Waiters to consecutive sentences of 25 years to life for second‐degree
murder,  10  years  for  second‐degree  attempted  murder,  25  years  and  five  years
for  each  of  the  assault  counts,  respectively,  and  five  years  of  post‐release
supervision.
16
II. Post‐Trial Proceedings
Waiters filed both a pro se motion to vacate his conviction under New York
Criminal  Procedure  Law  § 440.10(1)(h)  (the  “440.10  motion”)  and,  with  the
assistance of counsel, a direct appeal.    In his 440.10 motion, Waiters maintained
that Simons was constitutionally ineffective for failing to call an expert witness to
interpret  his  hospital  records  and  testify  about  his  intoxication,  and  for  not
requesting that the trial court charge the jury on second‐degree manslaughter.12
On  January  26,  2011,  the  state  trial  court  denied  Waiters’s  440.10  motion  as
procedurally barred, concluding that sufficient facts appeared on the face of the
record to permit review of his claims on direct appeal.    The New York Supreme
Court  Appellate  Division  –  Second  Judicial  Department  (“Appellate  Division”)
denied leave to appeal.
Waiters  thereafter  filed  a  pro  se  supplemental  brief  in  his  direct  appeal,
dated  February  4,  2011,  alleging  ineffective  assistance  of  counsel  for  the  same
reasons as those identified in his 440.10 motion.    On May 8, 2012, the Appellate
Division  modified  Waiters’s  sentence  by  directing  that  portions  of  it  run
concurrently,  but  otherwise  rejected  Waiters’s  appeal.    See  People  v.  Waiters,  95
12  Unlike  first  degree  manslaughter,  which  requires  a  specific  intent  “to  cause
serious  physical  injury  to  another  person,”  N.Y.  Penal  Law  § 125.20(1),  second  degree
manslaughter entails a mens rea of only recklessness, see N.Y. Penal Law § 125.15.
17
A.D.3d 1043, 1044–45 (2d Dep’t 2012).    The Appellate Division determined that
Waiters’s ineffective assistance of counsel claim could not be resolved “without
reference  to  matter  outside  the  record,”  such  that  it  was,  in  fact,  appropriately
raised  in  a  440.10  motion.    Id.  at  1044–45.    The  New  York  Court  of  Appeals
denied leave to appeal.    People v. Waiters, 19 N.Y.3d 1002 (2012).
A year later, on June 26, 2013, Waiters filed a pro se habeas petition in the
United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York under 28 U.S.C.
§  2254(d),  alleging,  once  again,  that  Simons  was  constitutionally  ineffective  for
the  same  reasons  as  those  identified  in  his  440.10  motion.    On  November  5,
2013,  the  district  court  (Gleeson,  J.)  appointed  counsel  and  stayed  the  case  to
permit  Waiters  to  exhaust  his  claims  through  a  renewed  440.10  motion.    The
state  trial  court  thereafter  held  an  evidentiary  hearing  on  Waiters’s  renewed
440.10 motion on May 28 and 29, 2014—six years after Waiters’s trial—at which
Waiters  called  Dr.  Richard  Stripp,  a  forensic  toxicologist,  and  Simons,  his  trial
attorney.13
Dr. Stripp testified that Waiters’s BAC of 0.39 was “significantly elevated,”
Appellant’s  App’x  at  75,  and  that  it  meant  that  Waiters  had  consumed  sixteen
13   Waiters’s  renewed  440.10  motion  included  an  additional  theory  of
ineffectiveness,  namely  Simons’s  failure  to  impeach  Warren  with  prior  inconsistent
statements.
18
alcoholic  drinks  that  morning,  or  even  more  if  his  drinking  was  spread  over  a
longer period of time.14    Dr. Stripp further opined that an average person with
such  a  high  BAC  would  suffer  “motor  impairment”  and  “significant  cognitive
impairment,”  id.  at  81,  including  compromised  judgment  and  emotional
instability, blackouts, and amnesia.
Dr.  Stripp  also  recognized,  however,  that  there  is  “very  significant
individual[]  variation”  in  how  individuals  are  affected  by  alcohol,  such  that
tolerance is “one of the most important considerations when interpreting a blood
alcohol  concentration.”    Id.  at  68.    Accordingly,  he  explained  that  a  “very
tolerant drinker [can] have some level of functioning” when intoxicated, id. at 82,
such that the effects of intoxication—be they physical or mental, which Dr. Stripp
explained  do  not  always  manifest  in  tandem—may  be  reduced  by  as  much  as
half.    In  fact,  Dr.  Stripp  indicated  that  he  had  seen  individuals  with  very  high
BACs who were, despite exhibiting poor judgment, still able to form intent.
Based on the medical records, Dr. Stripp noted that while hospitalized in
the  aftermath  of  the  shootings,  Waiters  suffered  from  delirium  and
hallucinations  caused  by  alcohol  withdrawal  which,  together  with  abnormal
14  Dr.  Stripp  also  indicated  that  Waiters’s  BAC  “could  have  been
slightly higher, .  .  .  at  that  level[,]  or  even  slightly  lower”  at  the  time  of  the  incident.
Appellant’s App’x at 76.
19
liver  function,  suggested  that  Waiters  had  a  long‐term  alcohol  problem  and
consumed  large  quantities  on  a  daily  basis.    Therefore,  and  given  the
aforementioned “significant variation” in individuals’ alcohol tolerance, id. at 89,
Dr. Stripp concluded that while Waiters’s “[d]efinite[]” drunkenness affected his
“functioning  and  judgment,”  id.  at  95,  102,  Dr.  Stripp  could  not  opine  on  how
tolerant  Waiters  was,  or  on  what  effect  his  intoxication  may  have  had  on  his
ability to form intent.15
Simons,  in  his  testimony,  explained  that  he  sought  and  obtained  a
subpoena for Waiters’s hospital records within two weeks of his first appearance
in  the  case.16    Simons  and  his  client  initially  planned  on  pursuing  an  extreme
emotional disturbance defense and calling both Dr. Drob and Waiters to support
it, but Simons became concerned about the defense’s viability before trial, and it
was ultimately not pursued.17    Simons further represented that Waiters, on the
Dr.  Stripp  also  confirmed  that  some  of  the  symptoms  that  Waiters  exhibited
15
upon admission to the hospital may have been attributable to his head injury.
In  reviewing  the  records,  Simons  had  the  assistance  of  family  members—an
16
internist, a trauma surgeon, and a registered nurse—and, to the best of his recollection,
a defense investigator with medical training.
In  a  letter  to  his  client  written  in  October  2007,  over  six  months  before  trial,
17
Simons  indicated  that  the  defense,  which  was  apparently  predicated  on  Waiters’s
supposed  reaction  to  Lorenzo  Warren’s  allegedly  threatening  conduct,  would  be
difficult  given that none of  the  witnesses stated that  Lorenzo  threatened Waiters.    As
Simons  put  it  to  Waiters  in  the  pretrial  period,  Waiters’s  testimony  might  constitute
20
day  of  his  scheduled  testimony,  decided  not  to  take  the  stand,  despite  Simons
advising him to do so.
Sometime  after  the  close  of  the  prosecution’s  case,  the  defense  settled  on
an  intoxication‐based  theory  and,  to  that  end,  Simons  sought  to  introduce
Waiters’s  full  hospital  records.    Simons  indicated  that  he  discussed  the
significance  of  Waiters’s  blood  alcohol  level  with  his  client  “a  lot,”  but  that  the
“problem”  was  that  when  he  asked  Waiters  about  his  0.39  BAC,  Waiters  told
him—consistent  with  his  statements  to  Dr.  Drob  and  Dr.  Bardey—that  he  was
not  drunk,  and  that  while  he  “drank  the  night  before,”  on  the  morning  of  the
shootings  he  “did  not  feel  drunk  at  all.”    Id.  at  132.    Further,  according  to
Simons, Waiters consistently represented that he fired at Lorenzo to “scare him
or . . . hit him in the leg,” id. at 182, the same explanation he had provided to the
experts.    Simons  ultimately  did  not  offer  a  strategic  reason  for  not  calling  a
medical  expert,  claiming  he  could  no  longer  remember  what  he  was  thinking,
though he affirmed he was pursuing a strategy in Waiters’s best interest.
Following  the  hearing,  on  October  14,  2014,  the  state  trial  court  denied
Waiters’s renewed 440.10 motion, finding that Simons’s failure to call a medical
“the  only  evidence  of  a  [threat]  and  if  a  jury  does  not  believe  you  then  you  will
probably  be  convicted.”    Letter  from  Calvin  J.  Simons  to  General  Waiters  (Oct.  25,
2007), ECF. No. 37.
21
expert to explain Waiters’s medical records and BAC amounted to a permissible
“mere  tactical  decision”  under  Strickland.    Id.  at  55.    The  trial  court  explained
that “[t]he defendant’s intoxicated state was explored before the jury,” and that,
more  generally,  “the  defendant’s  expert,  Dr.  Stripp  .  .  .  could  not  establish  that
the defendant’s blood alcohol level was such that his intent to commit the crime
was  negated.”    Id.  at  55.    The  trial  court  accordingly  determined  that  while
Simons  could  have  called  an  expert  to  explain  the  medical  records,
“[p]articularly in light of the defendant’s claims that he was not intoxicated at the
time  of  this  incident,”  the  failure  to  do  so  “under  the  particular  facts  and
circumstances  of  [the]  case”  did  not  constitute  ineffective  assistance.    Id.  at  55.
Simons,  the  trial  court  also  noted,  was  placed  “in  the  untenable  position  of
setting  forth  a  theory  which  was  not  consistent  with  the  defendant’s  own
position,”  namely  that  he  was  not  intoxicated.    Id.  at  55.    Thus,  for  each
ineffectiveness contention “there [were] equally plausible explanations why trial
counsel proceeded in the manner which he did at the time of the trial.”    Id. at 55.
As  to  prejudice,  the  state  trial  court  first  observed  that  Waiters’s
intoxicated  state  and  its  impact  on  the  defendant’s  capacity  to  form  intent  had
been  considered  and  rejected  by  the  jury,  and  that  expert  evidence  would  not
22
likely  have  influenced  this  result  given  that  “Dr.  Stripp  established  [that  while]
the defendant had a particularly high blood alcohol level . . . the effects of [that
level]  could  vary  greatly  depending  on  the  defendant’s  tolerance.”    Id.  at  55.
There  was  otherwise  “no  testimony  presented  which  established  that  medical
testimony  regarding  the  defendant’s  level  of  intoxication  would  have  changed
the jury’s finding.”    Id. at 55.    Accordingly, the trial court concluded that while
Simons could have called an expert, “his failure to do so [did] not rise to the level
of  a  course  of  conduct  which  was  inexplicably  prejudicial.”18    Id.  at  55.    The
Appellate Division again denied leave to appeal.
Waiters  thereafter  returned  to  district  court.    The  district  court  lifted  the
stay,  ordered  additional  briefing,  and  held  oral  argument  on  Waiters’s  habeas
petition  on  July  24,  2015.    On  September  25,  2015,  the  district  court  granted
Waiters’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus, finding the state court’s rejection of
his 440.10 motion to be “an unreasonable application of the Strickland standard,”
id. at 24, and ordering Waiters’s release within 45 days.    The district court also
denied  the  State’s  application  for  a  stay  pending  the  appeal.    The  State
thereafter filed  an  application  for  a  stay  in  this  Court,  and on  April  5,  2016,  we
The  state  trial  court  also  rejected  Waiters’s  other  ineffective  assistance  claims
18
stemming  from  Simons’s  decision  not  to  impeach  Warren  with  prior  inconsistent
statements, and not to seek a charge of second‐degree manslaughter.
23
granted  the  application  and  stayed  Waiters’s  release  indefinitely  pending  this
panel’s resolution of the appeal.
DISCUSSION
I
The  Supreme  Court  in  Strickland  set  forth  a  two‐part  test  for  evaluating
claims of ineffective assistance of counsel.    To warrant relief, a defendant must
demonstrate  both  “that  counsel’s  performance  was  deficient”  and  “that  the
deficient  performance  prejudiced  the  defense.” 19     Strickland,  466  U.S.  at  687;
accord Fischer v. Smith, 780 F.3d 556, 559 (2d Cir. 2015).    “Without proof of both
deficient performance and prejudice to the defense,” the Supreme Court has said,
it  cannot  be  shown  that  the  conviction  “‘resulted  from  a  breakdown  in  the
adversary process that rendered the result of the proceeding unreliable,’” and the
conviction  “should  [therefore]  stand.”    Bell  v.  Cone,  535  U.S.  685,  695  (2002)
(quoting  Strickland,  466  U.S.  at  687).    We  review  the  district  court’s  grant  of  a
19   The  habeas  petitioner  must  satisfy  both  prongs,  and  at  all  times  “bears  the
ultimate burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that his constitutional
rights [were] violated.”    Cardoza v. Rock, 731 F.3d 169, 178 (2d Cir. 2013) (quoting Epps
v. Poole, 687 F.3d 46, 50 (2d Cir. 2012)); see also Carrion v. Smith, 549 F.3d 583, 588 (2d Cir.
2008)  (“[T]he  burden  rests  on  the  accused  to  demonstrate  a  constitutional  violation.”
(alteration in original) (quoting United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 658 (1984))).
24
petition  for  habeas  corpus  de  novo,  and  its  underlying  findings  of  fact  for  clear
error.    Ramchair v. Conway, 601 F.3d 66, 72 (2d Cir. 2010).
Under AEDPA, when a state court adjudicates a petitioner’s habeas claim
on  the  merits,  a  district  court  may  only  grant  relief  where  the  state  court’s
decision  was  “contrary  to,  or  involved  an  unreasonable  application  of,  clearly
established Federal law,” or was “based on an unreasonable determination of the
facts  in  light  of  the  evidence  presented.”    28  U.S.C.  § 2254(d).    AEDPA  by  its
terms  requires  substantial  deference  to  the  state  court’s  decision  in  all  cases
governed,  as  here,  by  § 2254(d).20    See  Cavazos  v.  Smith,  565 U.S. 1,  9  (2011)  (per
Indeed,  the  Supreme  Court  has  indicated  that  double  deference  is  appropriate
20
when  evaluating  Strickland  claims  governed  by  §  2254(d).    See,  e.g.,  Knowles  v.
Mizrayance,  556  U.S.  111,  123  (2009).    Whether  such  heightened  deference  applies  to
both prongs of a Strickland claim, or only to the ineffective assistance prong, remains an
open question in this Circuit.    The Supreme Court has suggested that double deference
is  appropriate  as  to  both  prongs,  see  Cullen  v.  Pinholster,  563  U.S.  170,  202  (2011)
(distinguishing  two  Supreme  Court  cases  because  the  “Court  did  not  apply  AEDPA
deference  to  the  question  of  prejudice  in  those  cases;  each  of  them  lack  the  important
‘doubly  deferential’  standard  of  Strickland  and  AEDPA”),  but  the  Circuits  that  have
ruled  on  the  issue  are  split,  compare  Hardy  v.  Chappell,  849  F.3d  803,  825  n.10  (9th  Cir.
2016)  (explaining  that  “a  case  considering  only  [the  prejudice]  prong  is  not  subject  to
double  deference”);  Evans  v.  Sec’y,  Dep’t  of  Corr.,  703  F.3d  1316,  1333  (11th  Cir.  2013)
(“[D]ouble deference does not apply to the prejudice inquiry.”) with Foust v. Houk, 655
F.3d 524, 534 (6th Cir. 2011) (“We therefore afford double deference . . . on both prongs
of the Strickland test.”); Elmore v. Ozmint, 661 F.3d 783, 876 (4th Cir. 2011) (Wilkinson, J.,
dissenting) (observing that “courts regularly apply the ‘doubly deferential’ standard of
Strickland and AEDPA to both the performance and prejudice prongs,” and describing
that  practice  as  “mak[ing]  good  sense”).    We  need  not  resolve  the  question  here
25
curiam)  (noting  “the  necessity  of  deference  to  state  courts  in  § 2254(d)  habeas
cases”).
The operative question in reviewing a state court’s Strickland ruling is thus
“not  whether  a  federal  court  believes  the  state  court’s  determination  was
incorrect[,]  but  [rather]  whether  that  determination  was  [objectively]
unreasonable—a  substantially  higher  threshold.”    Schriro  v.  Landrigan,  550  U.S.
465,  473  (2006);  accord  Yarborough  v.  Alvarado,  541  U.S.  652,  665  (2004);  see  also
Jones v. Stinson, 229 F.3d 112, 119 (2d Cir. 2000) (explaining that, for application of
a  clearly  established  federal  law  to  be  unreasonable,  the  state  court  must  not
merely  have  erred,  but  rather  its  actions  must  be  “somewhere  between  ‘merely
erroneous and unreasonable to all reasonable jurists’” (quoting Francis S. v. Stone,
221  F.3d  100,  109  (2d  Cir.  2000))).    Accordingly,  to  justify  relief,  Waiters  was
required  to  establish  “that  the  state  court’s  ruling .  .  .  was  so  lacking  in
justification  that  there  was  an  error  well  understood  and  comprehended  in
existing law beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.”    Richter, 562
U.S. at 103; accord Vega v. Walsh, 669 F.3d 123, 126 (2d Cir. 2012).
because the application of AEDPA deference alone is sufficient to conclude that vacatur
is the proper course.
26
Because this appeal can be resolved with reference to Strickland’s prejudice
prong alone, we assume, without deciding, that there was no strategic rationale
for Simons’s decision not to call a medical expert.    To be clear, however, the fact
that Simons no longer remembers his reason for this decision does not preclude a
determination  that  Waiters  failed  to  establish  constitutionally  defective
representation.    The  state  trial  judge  noted  that  for  each  argument  raised  by
Waiters  supposedly  demonstrating  his  counsel’s  ineffectiveness,  “there  [were]
equally plausible explanations why trial counsel proceeded in the manner which
he did at the time of the trial.”    Appellant’s App’x at 55.    We see no reason to
disagree.21    But, as the Supreme Court explained in Strickland itself, “[t]he object
21  As  the  state  court  noted,  while  Waiters’s  repeated  insistence  to  Simons,  Dr.
Drob, and Dr. Bardey that he was aware of his actions and intended to shoot at Lorenzo
did not preclude his attorney from calling a medical expert, Waiters’s statements were
nonetheless  relevant  to  the  question  whether  Simons  provided  constitutionally
ineffective assistance in electing not to call one.    See Nix v. Whiteside, 475 U.S. 157, 165
(1986)  (stressing  courts  “must  be  careful  not  to  narrow  the  wide  range  of  conduct
acceptable under the Sixth Amendment so restrictively as to constitutionalize particular
standards  of  professional  conduct,”  and  noting  that  “the  Sixth  Amendment  inquiry  is
into  whether  the  attorney’s  conduct  was  ‘reasonably  effective’”).    Indeed,  the
prosecution  suggested  at  trial  that  introducing  medical  evidence  of  Waiters’s  level  of
intoxication  would  open  the  door  to  the  admission  of  Waiters’s  statements  to  the
doctors—evidence  that  would  have  been  devastating  to  the  defense.    See  People  v.
Rodriguez, 134 A.D.3d 512, 513 (1st Dep’t 2015) (concluding that the defendant “was not
deprived of effective assistance by counsel’s decision” not to put on evidence that might
have  opened  the  door  to  the  defendant’s  incriminating  admissions);  see  also  People  v.
Fardan, 82 N.Y.2d 638, 646 (1993) (explaining that “when the defendant or a witness for
the  defense  testifies  to  facts  that  are  in  conflict  with  .  .  .  precluded  evidence,”  the
27
of an ineffectiveness claim is not to grade counsel’s performance” so that “[i]f it is
easier  to  dispose  of  an  ineffectiveness  claim  on  the  ground  of  lack  of  sufficient
prejudice . . . that course should be followed.”    466 U.S. at 697; accord Strouse v.
Leonardo, 928 F.2d 548, 556 (2d Cir. 1991).    We conclude that the state court did
not unreasonably apply Strickland in determining that Simons’s conduct was not
prejudicial,  i.e.,  in  finding  that  Waiters  failed  to  demonstrate  that  it  was
reasonably likely that calling a medical expert would have changed the outcome
of  his  trial. 22     See  Carrion,  549  F.3d  at  588  (noting  that  a  petitioner  must
defense  “’opens  the  door’  on  the  issue  in  question”).    Moreover,  seeking  an
adjournment  to  obtain  a  medical  expert  would  have  afforded  the  prosecution  time  to
seek  additional  evidence  concerning  Waiters’s  capacity  to  form  intent.    The  record
does not permit a conclusion regarding why exactly Simons chose not to call an expert.
The existence of plausible explanations, however, bears on the question (which we need
not  resolve)  whether  Waiters  satisfied  his  burden  of  establishing  Strickland’s  first
prong—that Simons’s performance was deficient.    See Cardoza, 731 F.3d at 178 (noting
petitioner’s “ultimate burden” of establishing that his rights were violated).
22   The  dissent  maintains  that  the  state  trial  court’s  ruling  on  prejudice  is
ambiguous and therefore unworthy of deference.    We disagree.    The dissent relies on
a single sentence at the conclusion of the trial court’s decision, which states that “having
viewed the evidence first hand, there is a little doubt the claims raised by the defendant
would  have  served  to  change  the  jury’s  verdict.”    Appellant’s  App’x  at  56.    Read  in
context,  however,  the  trial  court  plainly  did  not  intend  to  suggest  the  existence  of
prejudice,  but  rather  inadvertently  added  an  “a”  and  omitted  a  “not”  (emblematic  of
several other typos in its opinion).    Thus, earlier in the decision, the trial court clearly
affirmed that “Dr. Stripp, called for the purpose of this hearing, could not establish that
the  defendant’s  blood  alcohol  level  was  such  that  his  intent  to  commit  the  crime  was
negated.”    Id.    Further,  in  the  sentences  that  immediately  precede  the  offending
clause,  the  district  court  made  clear  that  “[t]rial  counsel’s  conduct  did  not  constitute
egregious  or  prejudicial  conduct.  .  .  .    The  evidence  presented  establish[ed]  the
28
“‘affirmatively  prove  prejudice  arising  from  counsel’s  allegedly  deficient
representation’” (quoting United States v. Cohen, 427 F.3d 164, 167 (2d Cir. 2005))).
Accordingly, the district court erred in holding otherwise and in granting habeas
relief.
II
A. Waiters’s Burden
To  establish  prejudice  under  Strickland,  a  habeas  petitioner  must
demonstrate  “a  reasonable  probability  that,  but  for  counsel’s  unprofessional
errors,  the  result  of  the  proceeding  would  have  been  different.”23    Greiner  v.
defendant  received  a  fair  trial  with  the  benefit  of  effective  representation.”    Id.Indeed,  even  the  district  court  recognized  that  the  trial  court  “found  there  was  no
testimony  establishing  that  medical  testimony  about  Waiters’s  level  of  intoxication
would  have  changed  the  jury’s  finding.”    Id.  at  15.    With  respect,  the  dissent
obfuscates the record.
23  Puzzlingly, the dissent relies on Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), and not
on  Strickland,  to  argue  its  case,  apparently  on  the  theory  that  if  the  prosecution  had
suppressed  the  medical  evidence,  we  would  surely  agree  that  prejudice  had  been
established.    But  the  prosecution  did  not  suppress  the  evidence,  and  so  this  is  not  a
counterfactual  we  need  (or  should)  address.    The  Strickland  prejudice  inquiry  partly
“finds its roots in the test for materiality of exculpatory information not disclosed to the
defense  by  the  prosecution.”    Strickland,  466  U.S.  at  694.    But  the  dissent  errs  in
concluding  that  Brady  and  Strickland  prejudice  are,  as  a  result,  necessarily  identical  in
their  application.    As  our  learned  predecessor  astutely  observed,  “words  are
chameleons, which reflect the color of their environment,” Commissioner v. Nat’l Carbide
Corp., 167 F.2d 304, 306 (2d Cir. 1948) (L. Hand, J.), such that “identical language may
convey  varying  content,”  Yates  v.  United  States,  135  S.  Ct.  1074,  1082  (2015).    Thus,
rather  than  look  to  a  body  of  case  law  separate  from  that  which  governs  the  claim  at
issue  here,  we  conclude  that  under  well‐established  precedent  specific  to
29
Wells, 417 F.3d 305, 319 (2d Cir. 2005) (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694); see also
Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687 (explaining that the deficient performance must be “so
serious as to deprive the defendant of a fair trial, a trial whose result is reliable”).
“A reasonable probability is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in
the  outcome,”  Strickland,  466  U.S.  at  694,  and  thus  the  chance  of  an  alternate
result must be “’substantial,’ not just ‘conceivable,’” Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S.
170, 189 (2011) (quoting Richter, 562 U.S. at 112); see also Strickland, 466 U.S. at 693(explaining  that  the  required  level  of  prejudice  falls  between  the  deficiencies
having  “some  conceivable  effect”  and  “more  likely  than  not  alter[ing]  the
outcome  in  the  case”).    Moreover,  we  have  said  that  where  a  conviction  is
“supported by overwhelming evidence of guilt,” habeas relief on the ground of
ineffective  assistance  is  generally  not  warranted.    Lindstadt  v.  Keane,  239  F.3d
191,  204  (2d  Cir.  2001);  see  also  United  States  v.  Hasan,  586  F.3d  161,  170  (2d  Cir.
2009)  (denying  habeas  relief  on  this  basis).    This  is  because  a  verdict  or
conclusion with ample record support is less likely to have been affected by the
errors  of  counsel  than  “a  verdict  or  conclusion  only  weakly  supported  by  the
record.”    Strickland, 466 U.S. at 696.
Strickland—and  particularly  to  claims  raised  in  a  § 2254(d)  petition—the  state  trial
court’s  determination  that  Simons’s  conduct  did  not  prejudice  Waiters’s  defense  was
not objectively unreasonable.
30
Waiters’s  theory  of  prejudice  hinges  on  New  York  Penal  Law  § 15.25,
which  provides  that  “evidence  of  intoxication  of  the  defendant  may  be  offered
whenever  it  is  relevant  to  negative  an  element  of  the  crime  charged.”
Intoxication, however, “is not, as such, a defense to a criminal charge,” People v.
Sirico,  17  N.Y.3d  744,  745  (2011)  (quoting  N.Y.  Penal  Law  §  15.25),  and  “the
general rule is that an intoxicated person can form the requisite intent to commit
a  crime,”  People  v.  Alston,  42  A.D.3d  468,  469  (2d  Dep’t  2007)  (quoting  People  v.
LaGuerre, 29 A.D.3d 820, 822 (2d Dep’t 2006)).24    Under New York law, “it is for
the  trier  of  fact  to  decide  if  the  extent  of  the  intoxication  acted  to  negate  the
element  of  intent.”    Id.  (quoting  LaGuerre,  29  A.D.3d  at  822).    And  while  a
“relatively  low  threshold”  exists  to  demonstrate  entitlement  to  an  intoxication
charge, even a charge may not be warranted, despite the defendant’s substantial
use  of  intoxicants  at  the  time  of  an  alleged  crime,  where  “the  uncontradicted
record evidence . . . supports the conclusion that his overall behavior on the day
of the incident was purposeful.”    Sirico, 17 N.Y.3d at 746; see also People v. Beaty,
22  N.Y.3d  918,  921  (2013)  (noting  no  intoxication  charge  was  warranted,  even
24   The  question  is  thus  not,  as  the  dissent  suggests,  whether  Waiters  was
extremely intoxicated, whether his intoxication affected his aim, or even whether he had
a diminished ability to form the requisite intent.    Rather, it is whether, with the benefit
of  the  disputed  evidence,  there  is  a  reasonable  probability  that  the  jury  would  have
found that Waiters’s intoxication rendered his actions unintended.
31
though  the  defendant  might  have  consumed  alcohol  before  committing  the
crimes  alleged,  where  “the  evidence  established  that  [the]  defendant’s  conduct
was purposeful”).
All the charges of which Waiters was found guilty required specific intent.
See N.Y. Penal Law §§ 125.25(1) (requiring “intent to cause the death of another
person”),  110.00  (requiring  “intent  to  commit  a  crime”),  120.10(1)  (requiring
“intent  to  cause  serious  physical  injury  to  another  person”).25    Waiters  thus
contends  that  there  is  a  reasonable  probability  that,  but  for  his  attorney’s
allegedly  deficient  performance—as  is  relevant  here,  Simons’s  failure  to  call  a
medical  expert—the  jury  would  not  have  found  that  Waiters  harbored  the
requisite intent to commit his crimes.    He further contends, as he must, that the
state  court’s  conclusion  to  the  contrary  was  sufficiently  unreasonable  such  that
“there is no possibility fairminded jurists could disagree.”    See Richter, 562 U.S.
at 102.    For the following reasons, Waiters is incorrect.
25  The charge of criminal possession of a weapon in the fourth degree, which the
jury  did  not  reach,  did  not  require  specific  intent.    See  N.Y.  Penal  Law  § 265.01(1);
People  v.  Parrilla,  27  N.Y.3d  400,  405  (2016)  (indicating  that  a  defendant  “need  only
knowingly possess a firearm” to violate the statute).
32
B. Application
At  the  close  of  Waiters’s  trial,  based  on  both  witness  testimony  and  the
two  redacted  pages of  medical  records  that  the district  court  admitted,  the  jury
was  well  aware  that  Waiters  had  been  drinking  both  during  his  birthday  party
and  the  following  morning,  and  that  he  was  intoxicated  when  he  emptied  his
revolver  in  the  direction  of  Warren’s  family.    The  jury  was  also  privy  to
evidence  indicating  that  Waiters’s  intoxication  had  not  rendered  him  incapable
of  purposeful  action,  including  testimony  documenting  his  actions  and
conversations  on  the  morning  of  the  incident,  and  his  subsequent  admission  to
Warren  that  he  had  targeted  Lorenzo  because  Lorenzo  was  “coming  between”
them.    Trial  Tr.  at  421.    On  the  basis  of  this  evidence,  while  the  jury  was
instructed on intoxication, it found Waiters guilty of murder, attempted murder,
and assault.
We are not persuaded that, had the jury also heard from a medical expert
and  reviewed  the  full  set  of  medical  records,  there  is  a  sufficiently  strong
probability  that  it  would  have  found  differently  such  that  the  state  trial  court’s
determination  to  the  contrary  was  unreasonable.    While  such  evidence  could
have  been  proffered,  it  would  not  likely  have  made  a  difference  in  light  of  the
33
strong, specific testimonial evidence indicating that Waiters formed the requisite
intent to commit his crimes.    See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 696; Lindstadt, 239 F.3d at
204.
Dr.  Stripp’s  testimony  and  the  medical  records  offer  support  for  two
propositions.    First,  they  demonstrate  that  Waiters  was  intoxicated  and  had  a
BAC of 0.39, which the hospital deemed “critical,” Appellant’s App’x at 76—and
which was potentially life threatening—approximately an hour after the incident.
Second,  Dr.  Stripp’s  testimony  establishes  that  a  0.39  BAC  causes  significant
physical  and  mental  impairment  in  the  average  person,  and  of  a  sort  associated
with  the  incapacity  for  purposeful  conduct  (encompassing,  for  instance,
blackouts and amnesia).
However,  the  critical  deficiency  of  this  evidence—a  deficiency  which  the
dissent notably omits to discuss—is that it does not establish how the 0.39 BAC
affected Waiters and, more specifically, whether it undermined his ability to form
intent.    As Dr. Stripp testified, there is “very significant individual[] variation”
among individual responses to alcohol because of variances in tolerance, which
is  “one  of  the  most  important  considerations  when  interpreting  [BAC].”    Id.  at
68.    For this reason, Dr. Stripp made clear that he had no opinion as to whether
34
Waiters could have formed intent and that he could not say “when an individual
along the continuum of blood alcohol content los[es] the ability to form intent.”
Id. at 89.    Indeed, a “very tolerant drinker [can] have some level of functioning”
when intoxicated, id. at 82, to the extent that an individual with a very high BAC
can, despite bad judgment, still form specific intent.
The  evidence  here  suggests  that  Waiters  possessed  such  tolerance.
Warren  testified  that  Waiters  drank  every  day—behavior  that  Dr.  Stripp
explained results in alcohol tolerance—and Lorenzo maintained that he had seen
Waiters  intoxicated  “maybe  ten”  times,  Trial  Tr.  at  208,  and  that  Waiters  was
much more intoxicated on those days than he was during the incident.    The full
medical  records  likewise  indicate  that  Waiters  had  a  history  of  “alcohol  abuse
and  dependence,”  Suppl.  App’x  at  103,  consistent  with  Dr.  Stripp’s  testimony
regarding Waiters’s delirium, hallucinations, and abnormal liver function.
Further, to the extent that Waiters’s BAC has remaining significance, even
given that Waiters habitually abused alcohol and that Dr. Stripp could not opine
on the question whether Waiters’s intoxication negated his ability for purposeful
conduct, it is still overshadowed, in this case, by the specific testimonial evidence
of Waiters’s ability to carry out purposeful acts prior to, and during, the incident.
35
That  morning,  Waiters  (a)  purchased  cereal  and  milk  for  Warren’s  family,  an
errand  which  necessarily  involved  purposeful  travel  and  conducting  a
transaction; (b) argued with Warren when she took a bottle of alcohol from him;
(c) obtained a revolver and had the presence of mind to hide it under a jacket; (d)
argued with, and taunted, Lorenzo while making oblique references to his gun;
(e) aimed and fired his revolver at Lorenzo, striking him in the thigh; (f) put his
gun to Derrick’s head and pulled the trigger;  (g) attempted to flee the scene; (h)
continued  taunting  Lorenzo  while  he  struggled  with  him  on  the  floor;  and  (i)
asked  Warren  for  help  during  that  struggle.    Collectively,  these  actions  tend
strongly to demonstrate that Waiters retained the ability to identify a conscious
purpose  and  to  act  on  that  purpose,  the  intent  necessary  for  conviction.    Cf.
Beaty,  22  N.Y.3d  at  921  (finding  that  an  intoxication  charge  was  not  warranted
because evidence that the defendant “cut a hole in a screen to gain entry [into a
house], instructed the victim to be quiet, threw a blanket over her head, and stole
her  cell  phone  so  she  could  not  call  the  police”  had  “established  that  [the]
defendant’s conduct was purposeful”); People v. Saavedra, 39 A.D.3d 316, 317 (1st
Dep’t  2007)  (concluding  that  the  “[d]efendant’s  intent  to  cause  serious  physical
injury could be readily inferred from his actions, and there was no evidence that
36
he  was  so  intoxicated  as  to  be  unable  to  form  the  requisite  intent”  where  the
defendant  “observed  his  friend  fighting  with  [an]  unarmed  victim,  [and
thereafter] went to his car and obtained a knife with which he repeatedly stabbed
the victim in the back” (citation omitted)).
Waiters’s own description of the events of that morning corroborates this
understanding of his mental state.    According to Warren, Waiters admitted in a
Spring 2007 phone call that he was “aiming after” Lorenzo because Lorenzo was
“coming between” them.    Trial Tr. at 421.    Waiters appears, moreover, to have
reported  to  Dr.  Drob  and  to  Dr.  Bardey  both  that  he  retrieved  his  weapon  and
shot  it  intending  to  scare  Lorenzo  Warren  because  Waiters  felt  threatened,  and
that he did not feel intoxicated that morning at all.26    The evidence thus strongly
suggests  that  Waiters  had  the  ability  to  form  the  requisite  intent  to  commit  his
crimes.    Cf. People v. Natal, 100 A.D. 3d 509, 509 (1st Dep’t 2012) (finding that the
defendant’s  “oral  and  videotaped  post[‐]arrest  statements,  as  well  as  the
observations  of  the  responding  police  officers,”  “supported  the  trier  of  fact’s
As  noted  above,  while  Dr.  Drob  and  Dr.  Bardey  were  not  called  at  trial,  the
26
record suggests that, were the full medical records admitted through the testimony of a
medical expert, the prosecution would have sought to introduce evidence of Waiters’s
statements to the doctors.
37
determination that although intoxicated, [the] defendant had the intent to cause
serious physical injury when he stabbed the victim in the chest”).
In  reaching  a  different  conclusion,  the  district  court  relied  heavily  (as  the
dissent  does)  on  the  theory  that  evidence  of  Waiters’s  BAC  and  its  possible
effects  would  have  enabled  Simons  to  “fend  off”  the  prosecution’s  summation
argument that there was no evidence indicating that Waiters was so intoxicated
that he could not form the requisite intent.    Appellant’s App’x at 23.    While the
evidence  in  question  would  certainly  have  supported  a  response  to  this
prosecution argument, however, it does nothing to reduce the persuasiveness of
other central elements in the prosecutor’s closing, including Warren’s testimony
that  Waiters  admitted  to  her  that  he  purposefully  shot  at  Lorenzo.    As
recounted  by  the  prosecution  in  summation,  Waiters  admitted  to  Warren,  in
“‘black and white,” that he “wanted to eliminate [Lorenzo] for coming between
[them].”    Trial  Tr.  at  642.    Moreover,  we  also  do  not  presume  that  the
prosecution’s summation would have been identical had Simons introduced the
medical  evidence  on  which  Waiters  relies.    Rather,  the  prosecution  would,  in
that scenario, have emphasized the remaining evidence in the record—evidence
that, in any event, the prosecution did reference in its summation—which offered
38
substantial and unrebutted support for the proposition that Waiters did intend to
shoot Lorenzo Warren, regardless of his BAC.
In  this  vein,  the  central  intoxication  case  the  district  court  cites,  Miller  v.
Terhune,  510  F.  Supp.  2d  486  (E.D.  Cal.  2007),  is  unavailing. 27     First,  the
ineffectiveness of the defendant’s attorney in Terhune was not limited to a failure
to investigate—or to call an expert to testify about—the effect of the defendant’s
intoxication, but rather included a failure even to seek an intoxication instruction
or  pursue  an  intoxication‐based  defense  in  the  first  place.    See  id.  at  491,  502.
Here, the jury was instructed on intoxication and Simons argued the point in his
summation, yet the jury still voted to convict.    Second, in Miller, the expert that
defense  counsel  could  have  called  clearly  opined  that  the  defendant’s  cognitive
27 The  remaining  cases  Waiters  cites  in  his  appellate  brief  on  this  issue  are  also
unpersuasive because the circumstances at issue in those cases bear little resemblance to
those at issue here.    See Cox v. Donnelly, 387 F.3d 193, 197–99 (2d Cir. 2004) (ineffective
assistance for failure to object to unconstitutional intent instruction); Davis v. Strack, 270
F.3d  111,  131–32  (2d  Cir.  2001)  (violation  of  due  process  stemming  from  failure  to
provide  justification  charge);  Lindstadt,  239  F.3d  at  194,  199–205  (finding,  in  a  case  of
“underwhelming  evidence,”  that  defense  counsel’s  “ineffectiveness”—(a)  failure  to
identify  a  clear  factual  discrepancy  that  would  have  provided  “something  akin  to  an
alibi”; (b) failure to effectively challenge “the only physical evidence” of the defendant’s
crimes; (c) an opening statement which “assured that, before [the defendant] opened his
mouth to testify, he admitted that the prosecution has made its case”; and (d) failure to
make  an  “obvious  point”  that  demonstrated  the  relevance  of  the  testimony  of  two
probation  officers,  the  only  witnesses  who  could  corroborate  the  defense—was
prejudicial).
39
abilities were sufficiently impaired to negate his intent to kill, id. at 491, 504–05,
whereas here Dr. Stripp refused to draw any such conclusion.
In  short,  we  cannot  say  that  the  state  trial  court’s  ruling—that  Waiters’s
defense was not prejudiced by Simons’s conduct—was objectively unreasonable.
This  is  not  a  case  where  Dr.  Stripp’s  testimony  and  the  full  medical  records
would  have  so  clearly  “alter[ed]  the  entire  evidentiary  picture”  that  the  trial
court’s  decision  is  indefensible.    Strickland,  466  U.S.  at  696.    Rather,  the  strong
evidence of intent here places the trial court’s ruling firmly within the bounds of
“fairminded disagreement.”    Richter, 562 U.S. at 103.    Therefore, in light of the
deferential  standard  of  review,  we  conclude  that  the  district  court  erred  in
granting Waiters’s petition.
*  *  *
With respect to the other grounds for habeas relief that Waiters identifies,
namely  Simons’s  alleged  failure  to  (a)  ask  that  the  jury  be  charged  on
second‐degree  manslaughter,  and  (b)  impeach  Warren  with  prior  inconsistent
statements,  we  do  not  address  them  here  because  the  district  court  did  not
consider  them  below.    Cf.  DiSimone  v.  Phillips,  461  F.3d  181,  198  (2d  Cir.  2006)
(remanding  habeas  case  for  consideration  of  a  question  that  had  “not  to  date
40
been  the  focus  of  attention  in  the  courts  that .  .  .  reviewed  [the  defendant’s]
case”);  United  States  v.  Tarricone,  21  F.3d  474,  476  (2d  Cir.  1993)  (refusing  to
consider  ineffective  assistance  claim  because  the  government  introduced
additional  facts  that  the  Court  determined  “should  be  evaluated  by  the  district
court  in  the  first  instance”).    We  instead  remand  so  that  the  district  court  may
consider  the  remaining  aspects  of  Waiters’s  ineffective  assistance  allegations  in
the first instance, consistent with the analysis herein.
CONCLUSION
For  the  foregoing  reasons,  we  VACATE  the  district  court’s  grant  of
Waiters’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus and REMAND the case for further
proceedings consistent with this opinion.
41
DENNIS JACOBS, Circuit Judge, dissenting:
I respectfully dissent.
At a family gathering the morning after his birthday party, defendant
General Waiters shot at the son of his girlfriend; but, shooting wildly, he
wounded his target, hit three others, and killed two, including a toddler. He did
this in a drunken rage. He is not entitled to much indulgence; but he was entitled
to a fair trial. He did not get one because his counsel failed to arrange entry into
evidence of a hospital record showing his blood alcohol at a potentially lethal
level.
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York
(Gleeson, J.) granted a writ of habeas corpus on the ground that defense counsel
was constitutionally ineffective, that prejudice was established, and that the
constitutional violation survives such deference as is owed to the rulings of the
state court.
The two elements of ineffectiveness under the federal Constitution are
deficient performance by counsel below and prejudice. The majority opinion
goes on the assumption that “counsel made errors so serious that counsel was
not functioning as the ‘counsel’ guaranteed the defendant by the Sixth
1
Amendment,” Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984), but reverses
anyway on the ground that the showing of prejudice is insufficient to withstand
the deference we owe to state courts in habeas cases. Because I vote to affirm, I
need to consider counsel’s performance as well as prejudicial impact.
I
Defense counsel failed to adduce the only effective evidence in support of
the only defense that was pressed on summation. Waiters’s only conceivable
defense was lack of intent, and the only conceivable way he could show lack of
intent was by alcohol impairment. The jury charge allowed the jury to consider
the impact of alcohol on the question of intent; defense counsel on summation
argued alcoholic impairment of intent; and the prosecution joined issue on that
point at closing.
On the issue of intoxication, defense counsel held a largely bad hand. The
impairment defense was undercut at trial by the defendant’s girlfriend, whose
family members were decimated by the gunfire. She testified that, on the
morning of the shooting, she was drinking with him for half an hour but she
could not say he had imbibed more than a single drink. Her son, whom Waiters
2
shot, testified that Waiters’s words were “a little bit slurred,” but also testified
that he had seen Waiters “way worse” at least ten other times. This was the only
testimony bearing on intoxication as the case went to the jury.
The only hope of the defense (and a potent one) was a hospital record
showing that Waiters’s blood alcohol content (“BAC”) was .39--five times the
legal limit for driving; indicative (for a person of defendant’s 130 pounds) of
sixteen drinks the morning of the shooting; and typically enough to cause
“significant cognitive impairment” including “impairment on judgment,”
“blackouts,” “amnestic effects” and “potentially even unconsciousness.” App’x
at 81. And death. This was no mere incremental detail; it was powerful evidence
of an otherwise forlorn defense.
But defense counsel inexplicably never played that trump card. He did
attempt to enter into evidence the defendant’s post-shooting hospital records, but
the state trial court allowed in just two lines of them, and excluded the BAC
number on the (valid) ground that expert testimony was needed to explain what
it meant. The court was more than happy to give defense counsel time to find an
expert to introduce and explain the BAC record, and everyone in the courtroom
(except defense counsel) seemed to appreciate the import of that evidence: the
3
state trial judge repeatedly urged defense counsel to call an expert to introduce it,
and the prosecution was willing to adjourn to allow the defense to find an expert.
See infra at 14-15. Defense counsel dug in. When the court informed him that it
would not allow the BAC information in unless he called an expert, defense
counsel told the court he would not call any more witnesses.
Thus the state trial court allowed into evidence just two lines of the
medical records, both of which blandly observed that Waiters was “intoxicated.”
Neither line included the BAC level, and neither line could answer the crucial
question of whether Waiters’s intoxication was sufficient to impair intent.
Defense counsel seemed not to understand how much more significant the .39
BAC was than the reference to his client as “intoxicated”: in the evidentiary
colloquy with the state trial judge, he failed to zero in on that number; and at the
post-conviction hearing, he would not agree that it signified that Waiters had
been “very drunk.” App’x at 129.
Unsurprisingly, the prosecutor’s closing statement on the intoxication
defense focused on problems that would have been resolved by the BAC record.
See infra at 9-10.
4
The refusal by defense counsel to introduce his only powerful piece of
evidence is simply unaccountable. At trial, he offered no explanation. He seems
not to have discussed the issue with his client before or during the evidentiary
colloquy. At the hearing to vacate Waiters’s conviction under New York
Criminal Procedure Law § 440.10, conducted by the same state trial judge,
defense counsel could not recall why he let pass the offered opportunity to call an
expert. A pity: I would be deeply curious to know.
Without deciding the adequacy of counsel’s representation, the majority
nevertheless posits several reasons why a lawyer might do what defense counsel
did here. None of it washes. It is true that cross-examination of the expert would
elicit the concession that Waiters probably built up resistance by long-term
alcohol abuse. But every piece of evidence is subject to cross-examination and
attack. As Judge Gleeson observed:
No reasonable defense attorney would opt to keep the jury ignorant of
Waiters’s astronomically high BAC on the off chance that it might not be
astronomical enough . . . Trial counsel’s decision simply was not a tactical
choice; it was incompetence.
App’x at 20, 22.
The majority also speculates that defense counsel may have been afraid to
ask for an adjournment because that would have given the prosecution time to
5
seek additional evidence of Waiters’s intent. But the majority does not extend
that speculation to come up with any particular piece of evidence the prosecution
might have sought out. I can’t come up with one either.
The majority opinion further posits that the expert testimony might open
the door to statements Waiters made to psychological evaluators, in which he
denied that he had been drunk at the time of the shooting (and the state trial
judge made a similar point).1 But the effect of the admissions is easy to discount.
Many drunks profess perfect sobriety, and no rational juror would credit an
individual’s statement that he was sober over scientific evidence that he had
sixteen drinks in the prior hour.
II
The majority opinion relies solely on its conclusion that the showing of
prejudice was insufficient even to establish a “reasonable probability” that the
1
After the post-trial hearing, the state trial court noted that introducing the
.39 BAC into evidence would be inconsistent with Waiters’s own protestations
that he was sober the morning of the shooting. It may be that a defense lawyer is
not obligated to argue an intoxication defense when his client denies being
drunk; but once defense counsel chooses to argue a defense (and intoxication was
the only defense he argued on summation), he has an obligation to do so
effectively.
6
outcome would have been different--i.e., that the jury might have acquitted, or
hung, or convicted on a lesser charge, Strickland, 466 U.S. at 695--and that in any
event we owe deference to the state trial court’s ruling after the post-trial hearing.
Consider how the prosecution would fare in this case if it had withheld
from the defense a document showing that, one hour after the shooting, the
defendant had enough alcohol in his blood to kill a normal person. The prejudice
would be seen as obvious and the effect palpable.
As a matter of law, the result here can be no different. The standard for
gauging prejudice in a case of ineffectiveness is derived from Brady, 373 U.S. 83(1963); and the Supreme Court has told us that the standard for assessing
prejudice is the same in Brady claims as in claims for ineffectiveness.2 Tellingly,
the majority opinion does not assert that it would reach the same finding on
prejudice if the Strickland and Brady standards were the same. Instead
2
Compare Strickler v. Greene, 527 U.S. 263, 289 (1999) (holding that
prejudice under Brady requires a “‘reasonable probability’ that the result of the
trial would have been different”) with Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668,
694 (1984) (explaining that the test for prejudice in ineffective assistance claims is
a “reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result
of the proceeding would have been different,” and that the prejudice test in
ineffectiveness cases “finds its roots in the test for materiality of exculpatory
information not disclosed to the defense by the prosecution”).
7
(proceeding by footnote), the majority opinion agrees that the Strickland
standard derives from the Brady standard and uses the same words, but holds
that the two standards are somehow different. In doing so, it cites no relevant
law, and splits from published decisions by every other circuit in the country.3
3
See Ruiz v. United States, 339 F.3d 39, 43 (1st Cir. 2003) (“Brady claims
are subject to the same prejudice requirement as ineffective-assistance claims”);
Marshall v. Hendricks, 307 F.3d 36, 85 n.37 (3d Cir. 2002) (“the Strickland
prejudice standard is the same as the Brady materiality standard”); United States
v. Higgs, 663 F.3d 726, 735 (4th Cir. 2011) (“[t]he standard for Strickland
prejudice is the same as for Brady materiality”); Felder v. Johnson, 180 F.3d 206,
214 (5th Cir. 1999) (“the standard for prejudice under Strickland is identical to
the standard for materiality under Brady” (internal quotation marks omitted));
Moreland v. Robinson, 813 F.3d 315, 330 (6th Cir. 2016) (“Strickland and Brady
claims use the same ‘reasonable probability’ standard to assess prejudice”);
Harris v. Thompson, 698 F.3d 609, 645 (7th Cir. 2012) (“[w]hen a defendant is
deprived of favorable evidence, the same ‘reasonable probability’ standard
applies to determining materiality under Brady and . . . to determining whether
the accused was prejudiced for the purposes of Strickland”); Clay v. Bowersox,
367 F.3d 993, 1000 (8th Cir. 2004) (“[t]he materiality standard under Brady is the
same as the prejudice standard under Strickland”); United States v. Olsen, 704
F.3d 1172, 1187 (9th Cir. 2013) (“Brady materiality and Strickland prejudice are
the same”); Romano v. Gibson, 239 F.3d 1156, 1172 (10th Cir. 2001) (“Brady's
prejudice inquiry is equivalent to the prejudice analysis that applies to an
ineffective assistance of counsel claim under Strickland”); Jennings v.
McDonough, 490 F.3d 1230, 1243 (11th Cir. 2007) (“[t]he prejudice prong of
Strickland incorporates the same standard used for assessing the materiality of
evidence under Brady”); United States v. Baxter, 761 F.3d 17, 24 n.4 (D.C. Cir.
2014) (citing Montgomery v. Bobby, 654 F.3d 668, 679 n. 4 (6th Cir.2011) for the
proposition that “[i]t is well settled that the test for prejudice under Brady and
Strickland is the same.”).
8
Applying the Strickland standard (as derived from Brady), prejudice is
clear because the evidence that Waiters had absorbed a potentially lethal intake
of sixteen drinks was the vital corrective to Warren’s testimony that she had seen
him have only one drink that morning in about half an hour. It is easy to
conclude here, as we would in a Brady case, that the evidence the jury never got
to see would have “alter[ed] the entire evidentiary picture,” such that acquittal
was at least reasonably probable. Strickland 466 U.S. at 696.4
This was not lost on the prosecutor. In summation, the prosecution
recalled testimony that one victim smashed an aquarium over Waiters’s head,
and discounted the hospital note that Waiters was “intoxicated” with the
rhetorical question:
How are you able to tell intoxication from the effects of getting hit over the
head with a fish aquarium? Who knows?
4
Waiters argues that his counsel was also ineffective for failing to impeach
Warren on a crucial point. Her testimony that Waiters had had only one drink
could have been impeached with her prior statement to the defendant’s
investigator that Waiters drank a pint of liquor by himself that morning. “In
evaluating prejudice, we look to the cumulative effect of all of counsel’s
unprofessional errors,” and that error can only exacerbate the existing prejudice.
Gersten v. Senkowski, 426 F.3d 588, 611 (2d Cir. 2005). The mandate in this case,
which vacates and remands for consideration of this claim of ineffectiveness (and
another), therefore leaves open the way to an ultimate ruling on remand that
Waiters’s counsel was ineffective and that prejudice resulted.
9
Supp. App’x at 86-87. “Who knows?” The prosecutor knows. He knew that the
excluded BAC information would establish not only that the impairment was
due to alcohol, but that Waiters was so intoxicated he could have fallen over
dead.
The majority opinion advances two arguments to discount the possibility
of an acquittal even if the BAC record had been allowed into evidence with an
expert explanation. First, the majority opinion claims that the jury was “well
aware . . . that [Waiters] was intoxicated when he emptied his revolver in the
direction of Warren’s family.” Maj. Op. at 33. A review of the record shows that
there was actually very little evidence of Waiters’s intoxication before the jury
when it went to deliberate. His girlfriend testified that her fight with Waiters
began when she told him he had too much to drink, but (as set forth above) she
also testified that she did not know whether he had more than one drink that
morning, and her son testified that, though Waiters’s words were “a little bit
slurred,” he had seen Waiters “way worse” at least ten other times. The only
other evidence of intoxication was the two lines in the medical records saying
that Waiters was “intoxicated.” But the prosecutor effectively attacked that
10
medical evidence as unreliable and imprecise in his closing statement. See supra
at 9-10.
None of that evidence would persuade a jury that Waiters was extremely
intoxicated, as required for an intoxication defense. None of it has anything like
the force of the BAC record, which (with an expert explanation) would prove that
the 130-pound defendant must have had sixteen alcoholic drinks that morning
before the shooting started.
The majority opinion also considers that there was scant hope for an intent
defense because Waiters did a number of voluntary acts that show self-
possession: he bought milk and cereal; he got the gun; he concealed it on his
person; he taunted his target with having it. But when he then shot, he barely
wounded the target with whom he stood face to face, and he accidentally shot
three others, two of them fatally. In other words, the evidence that Waiters was
sober enough to act with intent was vulnerable.
The evidence of intoxication that the jury saw did not approach the level
deemed necessary in the jury charge (as set out in the margin).5 A jury that had
5
Supp. App’x at 88:
11
the most powerful evidence in Waiters’s favor--a jury that knew he had a .39
BAC and that was told what that meant--could easily conclude that he was
profoundly under the influence, and had a diminished ability to form the
requisite intent.6
III
The majority opinion is understandably reluctant to hold on the merits that
it was not at least “reasonably probable” that evidence of the defendant’s
“Now, jurors, under our law, intoxication is not as such a defense to a
criminal charge. But evidence of the defendant’s intoxication may be
considered by you whenever it is relevant to negative an element of the
crime charged.
“So, in determining whether the defendant had the intent necessary to
commit a crime, you may consider whether the defendant’s mind was
affected by intoxicants to such a degree that he was incapable of forming
the intent necessary for the commission of any of the crimes charged that I
just submitted to you.”
6
The majority opinion also cites several New York state cases on the
intoxication defense. None of them is relevant. The question here is not
sufficiency of the evidence or entitlement to an intoxication charge; it is whether
there is a “reasonable probability” that--if an expert had explained to the jury
what a .39 BAC meant--the jurors would have convicted on the lesser charge, or
acquitted, or hung. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694.
12
prodigious intake might have changed the guilty verdict. Instead, the majority
opinion leans on the concept of deference.
First, it is of course true that ineffectiveness claims generally involve
deference. But the deference due under Strickland is deference to the tactical
choices made by defense counsel--the “strong presumption that counsel’s
conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance.”
Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689. That goes to the “ineffectiveness” prong of
Strickland, not to prejudice. Since the majority opinion punts on ineffectiveness
and relies solely on prejudice, Strickland deference thus does no work for it. See
Hardy v. Chappell, 849 F.3d 803, 825 n.10 (9th Cir. 2016); Evans v. Sec’y, Dep’t of
Corr., 703 F.3d 1316, 1334 (11th Cir. 2013) (Jordan, J., concurring) (“[it] makes no
sense to say that initial judicial review as to whether prejudice resulted from
counsel's deficient performance--on its own, before adding AEDPA deference--
involves any deference”).7
7
The majority goes as far as is prudent in suggesting (without holding)
that “double deference” may be owed as to prejudice, i.e., deference
(uncontroversially) to the trial court as well as deference (oddly) to the defense
counsel. But I concede there is a circuit split on this, and that some other courts
have made the same error.
13
Nor can the majority rely on deference to the state trial judge under
AEDPA. The views of the trial judge are best manifested by her several efforts to
focus defense counsel on the need to get an expert to give the testimony that
would make admissible medical records containing the crucial .39 BAC. The
judge went as far as she could go without committing advocacy:
THE COURT: I would agree with [the prosecutor] that the best way would
have been to get someone from the hospital to certainly interpret the
records as to those limited issues. Quite frankly, I don’t know why, you
know, someone wasn’t called or at the very least to get an assessment by
the doctor who appeared, even if it was by the people, something that
would assist.
THE PROSECUTOR: Well, I’m not in a position of assisting [the defendant]
your Honor.
THE COURT: I understand that. Nor should you be. But I’m saying that
[expert testimony] is possibly one way that it could have been rectified.
THE PROSECUTOR: My position is it’s the only way, your Honor.
What is [defense counsel] going to get up there and say? That this level
means something? That this person’s observation is any better than any
other person’s observation? That one person’s intox, what does it mean in
a medical standpoint? Does it mean that he can’t form intent? I mean, this
is all going to be speculation. What’s he going to do, testify? Then it
becomes impossible for me to rebut. Nor should I have to.
Again, you say it might be the better course. We’re still not under a time
crunch here, Judge. It can be done.
[]
14
THE COURT: So, if you’re seeking to have blood levels, the amount of
ethanol alcohol in Mr. Waiters’s blood stream, then clearly there should be
someone to explain it for the edification of the jury as to what, in fact, that
would mean. Otherwise, there’s no point to seek to introduce those levels
of ethanol alcohol in his blood stream.
DEFENSE COUNSEL: Your Honor, the defense at this point is not
introducing any additional witnesses at this point.
We would request that the Court permit all the information in, and we’re
prepared for the Court to make its ruling based on the defense not
presenting any additional witnesses at this time.
THE COURT: May I see counsel at sidebar. (Off-the-record discussion held
at the bench.)
It’s the Court’s understanding that the defense is not going to be calling
any medical witness in order to certainly enlighten the jury as to what the
numbers mean contained in the medical records.
Supp. App’x 68-69, 71-72.
The majority opinion relies on the post-hearing conclusion of the state trial
judge. She expressed her conclusion in a single clause, which does not help the
majority at all:
[T]here is a little doubt the claims raised by the defendant would have
served to change the jury’s verdict.
App’x at 56. That sentence is best read to reflect that the trial judge declined to
rule on prejudice; after all, given her holding that defense counsel was effective,
15
she did not need to decide prejudice. The majority opinion, however, urges that
this sentence is afflicted by a pair of typographical errors: if the indefinite article
“a” is removed and the little word “not” is inserted at a likely spot, the finding
would coincide with the view of the majority opinion. (The majority opinion
justifies its rewrite on the ground that the state habeas opinion--to which it urges
deference--is full of typos.) I think it is possible that the state trial judge did
intend to say the opposite of what she wrote. The context is ambiguous. But
surely it is odd to rewrite a sentence that is grammatically sound in order to
make it say something else for the purpose of giving it deference.
Finally, AEDPA deference does not mean that we use the rubber stamp.
When a state court decision is unreasonable, we may grant habeas relief.
Rompilla v. Beard, 545 U.S. 374, 380 (2005). So even if the state court had held
that there was no sufficient prejudice in this case, that decision would have been
unreasonable for reasons I need not repeat.
***
Defense counsel pursued an intoxication defense, but failed to introduce
and explain evidence that his 130-pound client had sixteen alcoholic drinks
16
before committing the crime. He never provided a reason for his omission, and
none is conceivable. It is at least reasonably probable that a jury, hearing such
potent evidence, would develop reasonable doubt as to the element of intent.
17