Gray v. State
Annotate this CaseA jury convicted Levonia Gray of first-degree battery and first-degree terroristic threatening. The court of appeals affirmed. Appellant then filed a petition for postconviction relief, claiming that his counsel was ineffective for failing to move for a directed verdict and that counsel's failure to address whether the victim was battered by means of a firearm in a directed-verdict motion resulted in prejudice to him. The circuit court denied Appellant's petition. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the circuit court's denial of relief was not clearly erroneous because (1) Appellant failed to demonstrate that he was prejudiced by counsel's failure to move for a directed verdict and failed to establish a reasonable probability that the circuit court would have acquitted him if counsel had presented the "by means of a firearm" argument to the court in a motion for directed verdict, and (2) therefore, Appellant failed to satisfy the second prong of Strickland v. Washington in his argument that his trial counsel was ineffective.
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