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Snow v. State

Defendant failed to show that his counsel was deficient for advising him not to take the stand in his own defense.

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Damon Snow was indicted for statutory rape, and two counts of child molestation. A Walker County jury found him guilty of statutory rape. In his sole claim of error, Snow alleges he received ineffective assistance of counsel because his trial attorney advised him not to take the stand and testify on his own behalf. However, we have reviewed the testimony of Snow’s defense counsel on this issue. We do not find error in counsel’s advice. He testified that

my client is not a professional as far as answering questions is concerned. If he voluntarily takes the stand and opens the door to the prosecutor, the prosecutor is an experienced professional and he knows how to ask questions that could be answered in different fashions and different ways. I was afraid that my client would not come across looking particularly well in that set of circumstances. And since the law also states that no negative presumption can be drawn when the accused does not take the stand in his own defense, I felt that it was better that he did not do so.

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