*********************************************** The “officially released” date that appears near the be- ginning of each opinion is the date the opinion will be pub- lished in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it was released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the be- ginning of all time periods for filing postopinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecticut Reports and Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the latest version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying the opinion as it appears in the Connecticut Law Journal and bound volumes of official reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced and distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publica- tions, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. *********************************************** TAJAY HEYWOOD v. COMMISSIONER OF CORRECTION (AC 44198) Cradle, Clark and Norcott, Js. Syllabus The petitioner, a citizen of Jamaica, sought a writ of habeas corpus, claiming that his trial counsel, R, had provided ineffective assistance by failing to unequivocally advise him that a guilty plea to the charge of risk of injury to a child would subject him to mandatory deportation. The petitioner initially was charged with offenses that exposed him to 160 years of incarceration before he pleaded guilty and received a lesser sentence, with the potential of no jail time, under a plea agreement offered by the state. The habeas court rendered judgment denying the habeas petition, concluding that, although R had rendered deficient performance by failing to clearly and unambiguously convey to the petitioner the certainty of his deportation, the petitioner had failed to demonstrate that he was prejudiced by that performance. Following the granting of the petition for certification to appeal, the petitioner appealed to this court. Held that the petitioner could not prevail on his claim that the habeas court improperly concluded that he had failed to satisfy the prejudice prong of Strickland v. Washington (466 U.S. 668); the court’s conclusion that the petitioner had not satisfied the prejudice prong was supported by evidence in the record that the court found to be credible, namely, R’s testimony that the petitioner was concerned with both the risk of deportation and the risk of incarceration, the state’s case against the petitioner was strong, and it was likely that, if the petitioner had gone to trial and been convicted, the petitioner would have received a sentence of thirty years of incarceration; moreover, the court, having assessed the petitioner’s testimony and having considered whether the petitioner rationally would have rejected the plea offer had he known that accepting it would result in mandatory deportation, did not find the petitioner’s testimony to …
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals