Taylor v. Ground, No. 12-2632 (7th Cir. 2013)
Annotate this CaseTaylor, convicted of murder in Illinois state court, was sentenced to 35 years in prison. In his habeas corpus petition, Taylor claimed that his counsel operated with a conflict of interest by jointly representing him and his brother, Lowell, in simultaneous murder trials. He claimed that the conflict adversely affected his representation because his lawyer refused to call certain exculpatory witnesses, because they might implicate his brother in the murder. The Illinois Supreme Court denied relief, finding that Taylor’s interests did not conflict with those of his brother and relied upon a purported credibility finding by the trial court that any conflict did not adversely affect the performance of Taylor’s lawyer. In a petition under 28 U.S.C. 2254, the district court rejected the arguments. The Seventh Circuit remanded for an evidentiary hearing to determine whether the conflict of interest between Taylor and Lowell adversely affected Taylor’s representation. The state court unreasonably applied Supreme Court precedent in holding that Taylor’s interest in presenting exculpatory witnesses did not conflict with his brother’s interest in preventing admission of inculpatory testimony and unreasonably determined that the trial court’s bare rejection of the claim must have constituted an implicit credibility finding concerning the motivation of the lawyer.
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