Buchanan v. State

A DeKalb County jury found Byron Buchanan guilty of eleven counts of armed robbery, OCGA § 16-8-41 a, four counts of aggravated assault, OCGA § 16-5-21 a, and two counts of false imprisonment, OCGA § 16-5-41 a. Buchanan appeals from the denial of his motion for new trial, contending he received ineffective assistance of trial counsel. Finding no reversible error, we affirm. To prevail on a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, an appellant must show both that counsel’s performance was deficient and that but for this deficiency, the outcome of the trial would have been different. Strickland v. Washington , 466 U. S. 668, 687 III 104 SC 2052, 80 LE2d 674 1984. Failure to satisfy either prong of the Strickland standard is fatal to an ineffective assistance claim. Brewer v. State , 224 Ga. App. 656, 657-658 2 481 SE2d 608 1997. In evaluating an attorney’s performance, there is a strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance. Rucker v. State , 271 Ga. 426, 427 520 SE2d 693 1999. We will not reverse on the basis of ineffective assistance of counsel unless trial counsel’s conduct so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process that the trial court could not reliably have produced a just result. Glass v. State , 255 Ga. App. 390, 401 10 565 SE2d 500 2002. “The trial court’s determination with respect to effective assistance of counsel will be affirmed unless the trial court’s findings are clearly erroneous.” Citation omitted. Chapman v. State , 273 Ga. 348, 350 2 541 SE2d 634 2001.

The DeKalb County grand jury indicted Buchanan for eighteen counts of armed robbery, four counts of aggravated assault, and two counts of false imprisonment. The twenty-four count indictment pertained to six separate incidents that occurred within a five-mile radius of each other in the Buford Highway area of DeKalb County, over a period of a month, and involved eighteen Hispanic individuals. The State prosecuted all the crimes together, contending they were signature crimes which were admissible to prove identity. See Maggard v. State , 259 Ga. 291, 293 2 380 SE2d 259 1989.