Criminal – Second-degree murder – Effective assistance

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Where a defendant moved for a new trial after being convicted of second-degree murder, the motion was correctly denied given the defendant’s inability to show that his trial counsel was ineffective.

“The issue on appeal is whether the defendant was denied effective assistance of counsel at trial because his defense counsel asked the judge not to instruct the jury on voluntary manslaughter based on reasonable provocation, even though the evidence permitted such an instruction. Stating that an instruction on reasonable provocation would be ‘counter productive’ to his argument that the defendant acted in self-defense, defense counsel instead asked the judge to instruct the jury exclusively on self-defense and voluntary manslaughter based on excessive use of force in self-defense. We conclude that the defense attorney’s strategic decision was not manifestly unreasonable and that there was no substantial risk of a miscarriage of justice. Therefore, we affirm the denial of the defendant’s second motion for a new trial.”

Commonwealth v. Glover (Lawyers Weekly No. 10-085-11) (17 pages) (Gants, J.) (SJC) Motion for new trial heard by Welch, J., in Superior Court. David Keighley for the defendant; David F. O’Sullivan for the commonwealth (Docket No. SJC-10800) (June 1, 2011).