People v Andre Lamont Jackson

MURDER -- Sufficiency of Evidence
DISCOVERY -- Statement of Witness
JURY -- Prejudice of Individual Jurors
EVIDENCE -- Hearsay
JUDGE -- Disqualification
COUNSEL -- Ineffectiveness Of -- Failure to Object
 
People v Andre Lamont Jackson
___ Mich App ___ (#285532, 05-17-11)
Whitbeck, O’Connell, WILDER
MALITA BARRETT
 
Affirmed convictions of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, assault with intent to murder, and felony firearm.

The evidence was sufficient to support defendant’s convictions.  Defendant and his accomplices planned and acted together to entice the victims to leave home under a pretext, to isolate the victims so that Defendant and another could shoot two victims and make a surprise attack on the third.  This evidence supported defendant’s convictions for murder, conspiracy to commit murder, aiding and abetting the assault with intent to murder, and felony firearm.
 
The prosecutor’s failure to disclose a transcript of a witness’s prior statements given pursuant to an investigative subpoena did not deny defendant a fair trial.  Omission of the statement from the discovery materials violated the discovery rule, but the trial court precluded the prosecutor from using the transcript in his case in chief and allowed defendant an opportunity to review it before cross examining the witness.  The transcript did not contain exculpatory material.  The trial court’s remedy for the discovery violation was not an abuse of discretion.

The trial court did not commit plain error by failing to examine the other jurors when one juror was dismissed after disclosing that she was not emotionally able to proceed.  The court questioned the dismissed juror and that questioning did not reveal anything suggesting that other jurors had been exposed to improper influences.
 
Defendant was not denied his right of confrontation by the introduction of testimony concerning a witness’s responses to questions as relayed by a nurse.  The witness was unable to speak and, in response to a police officer’s questions, he squeezed the nurse’s hand to indicate “yes” and did not squeeze her hand to indicate “no.”  These responses were admissible under the “language conduit” rule; the “interpreter’s” statements are regarded as the statements of the declarant and are not hearsay.  None of the relevant considerations militate against application of the “language conduit” rule: defendant did not claim the nurse was unqualified or biased, and there was no indication that the officer chose her for any reason other than she was immediately available.  Defendant had the opportunity to cross-examine the witness himself, and there was no confrontation violation.
 
The pattern of rulings and comments by the trial court did not establish that the court was biased against defendant.  The court provided principled reasons grounded in the evidence and the law for its evidentiary rulings.  Comments made by the court in response to defendant’s opening statement were not accurate, but, considered in context, they were not sufficient to pierce the veil of judicial impartiality.
 
Defendant was not deprived of the effective assistance of counsel.  Defendant failed to establish that he was prejudiced by counsel’s alleged failure to provide him discovery materials prior to trial.  Defense counsel was not ineffective for failing to request the addict-informant jury instruction with regard to a witness who was medicated in the hospital when he gave his statement.  The fact that he was medicated did not make him an addict-informant.