Darden, S.J.
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[After Talley ran away from police officers who were investigating a burglary,] Officer Campos handcuffed Talley, secured the handgun [that was in Talley’s pants], and called for backup. When another officer arrived, Officer Campos put Talley in his patrol car. At that point, Talley blurted out to Officer Campos, “Let me go. I’m a convicted felon.” [Record citation omitted.] As Talley sat in the car, Officer Campos took a picture of him with a cell phone. Later, Officer Campos showed the picture to the burglary victim, and she said Talley was not the burglar.
Subsequently, the State charged Talley with unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon (SVF), a Class B felony, resisting law enforcement as a Class D felony, and resisting law enforcement as a Class A misdemeanor. The State alleged that Talley was a SVF because he had been convicted of armed robbery in Illinois in 2001. [Talley was convicted by jury, invoked the Davis-Hatton procedure to stay his direct appeal while pursuing PCR, and then appealed denial of PCR.]
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Talley asserts that his trial counsel should have filed a motion to bifurcate the charge of possession of a handgun by a SVF from the charges of resisting law enforcement because he was unduly prejudiced as to the resisting charges when the jury heard evidence that he was a SVF. The State responds that a motion to bifurcate would have failed and that counsel’s decision to refrain from seeking bifurcation was a strategic choice that this Court cannot second-guess.
We turn to whether trial counsel performed deficiently. In preparation for trial, Talley’s counsel, who has sixteen years alone of criminal defense experience as a part-time attorney with the Lake County public defender’s office, sent an investigator to examine the scene of the crimes and to interview witnesses, conducted depositions of the State’s witnesses, reviewed discovery provided by the State, and consulted with Talley.
After reviewing the State’s documents and talking with witnesses for both sides, counsel chose a strategy of directly challenging the State’s evidence that Talley possessed a handgun. She intended to call witnesses to testify that Talley did not have a gun during the events at issue.
The evidence shows that counsel is familiar with the case law that governs bifurcation of trials. She considered filing a motion to bifurcate, but she concluded that it would not succeed because the facts related to the various offenses were interconnected. Furthermore, she thought that Talley’s prior conviction, although prejudicial, could be properly admitted as evidence of motive. Conversely, the prior conviction could have also established a motive to refrain from carrying a firearm. Counsel expected to call several witnesses to testify that Talley did not have a gun during the events at issue, and she believed those witnesses would tell the jury that Talley would never carry a gun because he was a convicted felon. Counsel concluded under these circumstances that moving to exclude the evidence of prior convictions on grounds of staleness was the best option to keep the jury from ever learning of the convictions.
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If Talley’s trial counsel had filed a motion to bifurcate, the trial court would not have been obligated to grant the motion because evidence of Talley’s prior conviction for armed robbery was relevant and admissible to prove his motive for resisting law enforcement. As a result, counsel made a strategic decision not to pursue bifurcation but rather to try to exclude Talley’s prior conviction and to challenge the State’s evidence by presenting evidence that Talley never possessed the handgun. We afford deference to such decisions.
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For the reasons stated above, we affirm the judgment of the post-conviction court.
Affirmed.
Baker, J., and Najam, J., concur.