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Petitioner Receives Relief Because Trial Counsel Recommended Rejecting Plea Offer

By Shari Allison

Williams v. Jones, No. 06-7103, 7/8/09 - Defendant was charged in Oklahoma state court with first degree murder and was offered plea to second degree and a ten year sentence. Believing defendant to be innocent, his lawyer told him to reject the offer or get a new lawyer. Defendant went to trial, was convicted, and got life without parole. State courts agreed that counsel rendered ineffective assistance, and the OCCA also found prejudice, but limited its remedy to reducing sentence to life with the possibility of parole, the lowest possible sentence for first degree. On federal habeas, defendant claimed the remedy was inadequate. The district court found the reduced sentence to be inherently constitutional and denied the petition. The 10 reversed, holding that the remedy was an objectively unreasonable application of federal law...continue to full post

Full post as published by Tenth Circuit Blog on July 10, 2009 (boomark / email).