Porter and Ineffective Assistance of Counsel at Capital Sentencing Hearings

The United States Supreme Court recently decided Porter v. McCollum, a capital case in which the defendant claimed that his lawyer performed ineffectively at the penalty phase of his trial. It's interesting for a couple of reasons, including the strong language it contains about the mitigating value of a defendant's military service. George Porter shot and killed his ex-girlfriend and her new boyfriend. He was charged, in a Florida state court, with two counts of first-degree murder. He elected to represent himself during the guilt phase of the trial and was convicted on both counts. He then asked that his standby counsel represent him during the penalty phase. Although the lawyer had a month to prepare for the hearing, he had never represented a defendant in a capital sentencing proceeding, and he did very little. He met with Porter just once, "did not obtain any of Porter’s school, medical, or military service records or interview any members of Porter’s family," and ignored indications in competency evaluations that Porter's childhood had been troubled and that his military service had been traumatic. As a result, his penalty phase presentation was limited to a single witness -- Porter's ex-wife -- and a deposition excerpt. "The sum total of the mitigating evidence was inconsistent testimony about Porter’s behavior when intoxicated and testimony that Porter had a good relationship with his son." The jury recommended death for both crimes, but the trial judge imposed a sentence of death only for the murder of the ex-girlfriend, opting [...]