Edward Lamon Blunt v. State of Mississippi
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI
NO. 2009-CA-00452-COA
EDWARD LAMON BLUNT
APPELLANT
v.
STATE OF MISSISSIPPI
DATE OF JUDGMENT:
TRIAL JUDGE:
COURT FROM WHICH APPEALED:
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT:
ATTORNEY FOR APPELLEE:
NATURE OF THE CASE:
TRIAL COURT DISPOSITION:
DISPOSITION:
APPELLEE
02/27/2009
HON. LEE J. HOWARD
LOWNDES COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
JULIE ANN EPPS
OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
BY: DEIRDRE MCCRORY
CIVIL - POST-CONVICTION RELIEF
MOTION FOR POST-CONVICTION RELIEF
DENIED
REVERSED AND REMANDED - 02/22/2011
MOTION FOR REHEARING FILED:
MANDATE ISSUED:
BEFORE KING, C.J., ISHEE AND CARLTON, JJ.
CARLTON, J., FOR THE COURT:
¶1.
On May 6, 1996, a Lowndes County grand jury indicted Edward Lamon Blunt for the
murder of Michael Taylor. Following a jury trial in August 1996, a jury convicted Blunt of
murder. Blunt received a life sentence in the custody of the Mississippi Department of
Corrections (MDOC). This Court affirmed Blunt’s conviction on direct appeal in an
unpublished opinion dated June 30, 1998 (96-KA-01095-COA). Blunt v. State, 726 So. 2d
596 (Miss. Ct. App. 1998). Attorney Richard Burdine represented Blunt at both his trial and
before this Court on appeal. New counsel represented Blunt in his petition for postconviction relief and in this current appeal.
¶2.
With new representation, Blunt, in accordance with Mississippi Code Annotated
section 99-39-27 (Supp. 2010), filed an application on June 26, 2001, with the Mississippi
Supreme Court for leave to proceed in the trial court on a motion for post-conviction relief.
The supreme court granted Blunt’s motion, and he thereafter filed his motion for postconviction relief on December 11, 2002, alleging that he had received constitutionally
ineffective assistance of counsel at his trial and on direct appeal. The circuit court ordered
the State to file a response to Blunt’s motion for post-conviction relief. The circuit court held
evidentiary hearings on August 18, 2008, and on February 9, 2009, in which Blunt called an
expert witness and his trial attorney as witnesses. The State called Dr. Steven Hayne, who
had served as the State’s expert witness at the 1996 trial.
¶3.
The circuit court entered an order denying Blunt’s motion for post-conviction relief
on February 27, 2009, and Blunt filed his notice of appeal on March 19, 2009. On appeal,
Blunt argues that the circuit court erred in denying his motion for post-conviction relief, as
Blunt asserts that he proved that he had received ineffective assistance of counsel at trial.
¶4.
We find that Blunt received ineffective assistance of counsel at his murder trial, based
on trial counsel’s request for an improper self-defense instruction. Therefore, we reverse and
remand this case for a new trial. Since we reverse based on plain error created by the defense
counsel’s requested self-defense instruction, we do not address the remaining alleged errors.
FACTS
¶5.
In the early morning hours of January 6, 1996, Blunt sat in his car outside a radio
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station in Columbus, Mississippi, waiting for a friend to complete his shift as a deejay.
According to Blunt, Taylor, the deceased, approached Blunt’s car and reached in as if to
choke Blunt. Taylor apparently suffered from schizophrenia, which, if left untreated, caused
Taylor to suffer from delusions and exhibit violent behavior. In fact, earlier in the night,
before he encountered Blunt, Taylor had instigated a number of violent confrontations with
residents in his neighborhood.
¶6.
According to witnesses, Taylor approached Blunt claiming that Taylor was God. An
altercation ensued during which Blunt admitted to hitting Taylor on the head twice with a tire
tool he retrieved from his car. Taylor walked away from the scene of the altercation with
Blunt. Taylor’s mother found his body later that day, slumped over the bathtub in the
bathroom of his home.
¶7.
After an investigation, the State charged Blunt with Taylor’s murder. At trial, Dr.
Hayne, who had conducted the autopsy of Taylor’s body, testified as an expert for the State
that Taylor had died as a result of blunt-force trauma to his head. Dr. Hayne testified that the
injuries which caused Taylor’s death were consistent with Taylor being hit with a tire tool.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
¶8.
“In reviewing a trial court’s decision to deny a motion for post-conviction relief, the
standard of review is clear. The trial court’s denial will not be reversed absent a finding that
the trial court’s decision was clearly erroneous. However, when reviewing issues of law, this
Court’s proper standard of review is de novo.” Heafner v. State, 947 So. 2d 354, 356 (¶2)
(Miss. Ct. App. 2007) (internal citations omitted).
DISCUSSION
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Ineffective Assistance of Counsel
¶9.
Blunt argues that he received ineffective assistance of counsel at trial because his trial
counsel, Burdine: (1) failed to make an investigation prior to the trial, (2) failed to use readily
available exculpatory evidence in his defense, (3) failed to obtain an expert witness to testify
as to Taylor’s cause of death, (4) failed to object to the jury instructions and to improper
argument by the State which impermissibly vouched for the credibility of the State’s
witnesses and appealed to the passions and prejudices of the jury, (5) failed to object to the
prosecution’s closing argument that the jury’s decision need not be unanimous, and (6) failed
to render effective assistance on appeal.
¶10.
Blunt argues that Burdine failed to object to the jury instructions, and as a result, the
instructions given to the jury prevented it from considering Blunt’s defenses of manslaughter
and self-defense. Specifically, Blunt alleges that Burdine rendered ineffective assistance of
counsel by his (1) failure to distinguish between malice murder and manslaughter, (2) failure
to distinguish between depraved-heart murder and manslaughter, (3) failure to instruct the
jury that Blunt had no duty to retreat, (4) failure to instruct the jury properly on self-defense,
and (5) objecting to the State’s proffered instruction on imperfect self-defense.
¶11.
In Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 686 (1984), the United States Supreme
Court held that: “The benchmark for judging any claim of ineffectiveness [of counsel] must
be whether counsel's conduct so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process
that the trial cannot be relied on as having produced a just result.” See Gilliard v. State, 462
So. 2d 710 (Miss.1985) (adopting the Strickland test for reviewing claims of ineffective
assistance of counsel). In order to prevail on a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel,
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Blunt must satisfy a two-pronged analysis and show that: (1) counsel’s performance was
deficient, and (2) counsel’s deficiencies deprived him of a fair trial. Nix v. State, 8 So. 3d
141, 144 (¶12) (Miss. 2009) (citing Stringer v. State, 454 So.2d 468, 476 (Miss. 1984)).
Furthermore, the defendant faces a strong but rebuttable presumption that counsel's
performance falls within the broad spectrum of reasonable professional assistance. Id. at
(¶13). Additionally, we presume that counsel’s decisions are strategic. Leatherwood v.
State, 473 So. 2d 964, 969 (Miss. 1985) (citing Murray v. Maggio, 736 F.2d 279, 282 (5th
Cir. 1984)). Accordingly, “[j]udicial scrutiny of counsel’s performance must be highly
deferential. . . . [A] fair assessment of [an] attorney[’s] performance requires that every effort
be made to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight, to reconstruct the circumstances of
counsel’s challenged conduct, and to evaluate the conduct from counsel’s perspective at the
time.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 669.
¶12.
When examining a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, we conduct a de novo
review of the record as a whole to determine whether there is a deficiency in the trial
counsel’s performance, and if so, whether the deficiency prejudiced the defendant. See
Kambule v. State, 19 So. 3d 120, 122 (¶6) (Miss. Ct. App. 2009) . The Mississippi Supreme
Court has held that the appellate courts must look at the totality of the circumstances in
determining whether trial counsel’s performance was deficient. Parker v. State, 30 So. 3d
1222, 1223 (¶37) (Miss. 2010). The appellant bears the burden of proving that trial counsel’s
performance was deficient and prejudicial. Id. Finally, a defendant has no constitutional
right to errorless counsel, only competent counsel. Id.
¶13.
Despite the high burden on Blunt to show that Burdine rendered ineffective assistance,
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we find that Blunt has demonstrated both a deficiency on Burdine’s part and prejudice as a
result of the deficiency. Burdine requested only one jury instruction, Instruction D-1, at the
close of Blunt’s trial. The circuit court granted the instruction, which contained in incorrect
recitation of the law on self-defense in Mississippi. Instruction D-1 reads, in part, as follows:
The [c]ourt instructs the [j]ury that the [d]efendant, Edward Lamon Blunt is
claiming that the killing of Michael Taylor was done in self[-]defense and thus
under the law [was] a justifiable homicide. To make a killing justifiable on the
grounds of self[-]defense, the danger to the [d]efendant must not have been
created, initiated or caused by him; the danger must be either actual, present,
and urgent or the defendant must have reasonable grounds to apprehend a
design on the part of the victim to kill, or do some great bodily harm to him,
and in addition to this, that there was apparent imminent danger of such design
being accomplished. Hence, the mere fear, apprehension or belief, however
sincerely entertained by one person that another designs to take his life or to
do him some great bodily harm, will not justify the accused taking the life of
the deceased. A party may have an apprehension that his life is in danger and
believe the grounds of his apprehension just and reasonable, and yet he acts
at his peril. He is not the final judge; the [j]ury may determine the
reasonableness of the grounds upon which he acted.
(Emphasis added).
¶14.
The supreme court in Flowers v. State, 473 So. 2d 164, 165 (Miss. 1985) condemned
almost identical language in a jury instruction. Following a lengthy discussion of earlier
criticism of similar instructions, the supreme court stated the following:
It appears from our review that criticism by this Court is construed to mean
this instruction is approved for continued use. We intend precisely the
opposite effect, that its use be discontinued. Presently to remove any such
doubt, we now condemn Instruction S-2 and forthrightly hold it constitutes
reversible error in this case and will be so considered in future cases.
Id. Relying on Flowers, the supreme court in Johnson v. State, 908 So. 2d 758, 764 (¶22)
(Miss. 2005) noted that an instruction like the one Burdine requested in Blunt’s trial “is
contradictory and confusing and does not correctly state the applicable law because one
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acting in self-defense does not act at his own peril.” The Johnson court held that the jury
instructions in his case were prejudicial. The Johnson court reversed and remanded the case
for a new trial. Id.
¶15.
The Flowers court unequivocally condemned jury instructions such as the one Burdine
offered in 1987. Blunt’s trial took place in 1996, nearly ten years after the supreme court had
determined that the use of jury instructions of that type constituted reversible error.
Burdine’s request of this instruction certainly satisfies the first prong of the Strickland
analysis and shows that Burdine’s performance was deficient.
¶16.
To satisfy the second prong of the Strickland analysis, Blunt must show that the
deficient performance prejudiced the outcome of his trial. We find Blunt has met this
burden. Blunt admits that he hit Taylor, but he asserted at trial that he had acted in selfdefense. Blunt’s entire theory of defense centered on Taylor being the initial aggressor and
Blunt hitting Taylor in self-defense. Burdine’s proffered jury instruction misstated the law
on self-defense to the jury, and it essentially left Blunt with no instruction on his theory of
the defense. Since the instruction constituted an improper statement of law that was not
corrected by other instructions, this Court may review the effect of the improper instruction
of the jury under the plain-error doctrine. In order to prevail under the plain-error doctrine,
an appellant must show that there was an error in the trial court and that the error resulted in
a “manifest miscarriage of justice.” Flora v. State, 925 So. 2d 797, 811 (¶42) (Miss. 2006)
(quoting Williams v. State, 794 So. 2d 181, 187 (¶23) (Miss. 2001) (overruled on other
grounds)). Furthermore, this Court may only apply the plain-error doctrine when the error
complained of affects a defendant’s fundamental or substantial rights. Id. (citing Grubb v.
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State, 584 So. 2d 786, 789 (Miss. 1991)). Burdine’s proffered jury instruction no doubt
prejudiced Blunt, whose due-process rights include the right to a properly instructed jury.
See Shaffer v. State, 740 So. 2d 273, 282 (¶31) (Miss. 1998) (holding that the trial court's
failure to instruct the jury properly on the elements of the crime charged implicated Justin
Shaffer's due-process rights); but see Kolberg v. State, 829 So. 2d 29, 50-51 (¶40) (Miss.
2002) (employing a harmless-error analysis to a challenge to jury instructions).
¶17.
Because we find Burdine’s request of Jury Instruction D-1 constituted a deficient
performance of trial counsel and caused actual prejudice to Blunt, we find that Blunt has met
his burden of showing that he received ineffective assistance of counsel at trial. We,
therefore, reverse the circuit’s denial of Blunt’s motion for post-conviction relief and remand
this case for a new trial consistent with this opinion.
¶18. THE JUDGMENT OF THE LOWNDES COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT
DENYING THE MOTION FOR POST-CONVICTION RELIEF IS REVERSED, AND
THIS CASE IS REMANDED FOR FURTHER PROCEEDINGS CONSISTENT WITH
THIS OPINION. ALL COSTS OF THIS APPEAL ARE ASSESSED TO LOWNDES
COUNTY.
KING, C.J., LEE, P.J., IRVING, GRIFFIS, BARNES, ISHEE, ROBERTS AND
MAXWELL, JJ., CONCUR. MYERS, P.J., NOT PARTICIPATING.
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