Thanks for visiting! Welcome to a new way to research case law. You are viewing a free summary from Descrybe.ai. For citation and good law / bad law checking, legal issue analysis, and other advanced tools, explore our Legal Research Toolkit — not free, but close.
Covington v. Lord
Citation: 111 F. App'x 647Docket: No. 03-2545
Court: Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; November 7, 2004; Federal Appellate Court
Rhonda Covington appeals the district court's denial of her habeas corpus application concerning her 1987 convictions for second-degree murder, first-degree robbery, and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon. Covington claims she was denied a public trial when the state trial court excluded her six-year-old son from the courtroom and argues ineffective assistance of appellate counsel due to failure to challenge her trial counsel's actions, including waiving her right to attend her Sandoval hearing and multiple bench conferences. The court reviews Covington’s claims de novo and finds no established federal law indicating that the Sixth Amendment's public trial right requires a defendant's young child to be present in the courtroom. It distinguishes her case from Waller v. Georgia, where a public trial was closed to everyone, asserting that Covington's son’s exclusion does not infringe upon her right to a fair trial, as the integrity of the trial was not compromised. The court concludes that the exclusion was "too trivial" to warrant relief. Regarding the ineffective assistance claim, the court notes a lack of clarity in federal law concerning a defendant's absolute right to be present at every trial stage. Covington's reference to People v. Dokes, which was decided post-conviction and did not establish new legal standards, does not support her argument. The court finds no error in her trial attorney's decision to waive her presence at the Sandoval hearing or subsequent conferences, nor in her appellate attorney’s choice not to challenge this on appeal, concluding Covington was not unfairly prejudiced. The district court's judgment is therefore affirmed.