Mark Everett McDaniel a/k/a Mark McDaniel a/k/a Mark E. McDaniel v. State of Mississippi

Summary

The Supreme Court of Mississippi affirmed Mark Everett McDaniel's conviction for second-degree murder and his sentence of twenty years' incarceration followed by ten years of post-release supervision. The court rejected his claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, prejudicial deliberate-design and manslaughter jury instructions, and a verdict against the overwhelming weight of the evidence. The court held that the evidence did not support an excusable-homicide or manslaughter instruction and that any conflict between the deliberate-design and manslaughter instructions was harmless.

Holdings

1. Counsel was not ineffective for failing to request an excusable-homicide instruction because the evidence did not support the instruction, counsel's pursuit of self-defense was a reasonable trial strategy, and McDaniel failed to establish prejudice.
2. Although deliberate-design and manslaughter instructions generally conflict, giving both instructions was harmless error here because the evidence did not warrant a manslaughter instruction and therefore did not result in a manifest miscarriage of justice.
3. The second-degree-murder conviction was not contrary to the overwhelming weight of the evidence because the evidence permitted the jury to find that McDaniel fired a gun into a crowd in an unnecessary and imminently dangerous manner, and conflicts concerning self-defense were for the jury to resolve.

Questions Presented

1. Whether trial counsel was ineffective for failing to request an excusable-homicide instruction under Mississippi Code Section 97-3-17.
2. Whether giving deliberate-design and manslaughter jury instructions together prejudiced McDaniel or constituted reversible plain error.
3. Whether McDaniel's second-degree-murder conviction was contrary to the overwhelming weight of the evidence.

Disposition

affirmed