Johnson v. Premo
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Petitioner Martin Johnson was convicted of eight counts of aggravated murder and sentenced to death. After an unsuccessful direct appeal, petitioner sought post-conviction relief, arguing (among other things) ineffective assistance of trial counsel. At the post-conviction hearing, petitioner was represented by counsel. He also filed more than 100 pro se motions, totaling more than 6,000 single-spaced pages of argument. The post-conviction court refused to accept most of those pro se filings because they were not signed by counsel, but allowed others, along with the claims raised by petitioner’s attorneys. The court ultimately determined that petitioner had received inadequate and ineffective assistance of trial counsel during the guilt phase of his aggravated murder trial. The court vacated his convictions and remanded the case for a new trial. The issue this case presented for the Supreme Court's review was whether a petitioner in a post-conviction appeal is entitled both to be represented by counsel and to appear pro se. The Court of Appeals held that, under the Oregon Supreme Court’s decision in "Church v. Gladden," (417 P2d 993 (1966)), a post-conviction petitioner is entitled to be represented by counsel on appeal and, in the same appeal, to file any motions on his own behalf that his counsel has declined to file, provided the petitioner has a good faith and objectively reasonable basis for believing that competent counsel would have filed such motions. The Supreme Court concluded that nothing in the Church opinion could "be fairly understood to state an exception to the requirement of ORS 9.320 that represented parties ordinarily must appear through counsel. And nothing in the opinion sanctions the sort of hybrid representation that permits a post-conviction petitioner to be represented by counsel and, at the same time, flood the court with pro se motions and other requests for relief any time the petitioner disagrees with counsel’s prosecution of the case. Church says
no more than this: If a post-conviction petitioner’s attorney fails to assert a ground for relief, the petitioner must bring that fact to the attention of the court to avoid the effect of ORS 138.550(3)."
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