February 20, 2026 Cases of Interest

A four-member majority of the court walks back Segura and decides that they have given too much justice to pro se postconviction petitioners. When raising a claim of ineffective assistance, the pro se petitioner must assert factual support to establish prejudice from counsel’s deficient performance. Specifically, in this DNA-focused case, this incarcerated pro se person should explain the results of DNA testing that would require an expert’s opinion before the court can appoint counsel. Actually, the Court only required the pro se person to explain to the court that if the DNA was not his, then it would belong to another person and not an elephant, or something other than another person. Do I sound bitter? I am.

(February 17, 2026) The jury’s finding on a COV interrogatory that Shockey did not use a deadly weapon does not negate an element of his second-degree murder conviction. And since the jury’s intent was unambiguous, there was no legal or logical inconsistency rendering the verdict infirm.

The trial court reversibly erred in denying Martin’s request for a self-defense jury instruction on multiple assailants or apparent necessity.

The sentencing court needed to correct the mittimus to reflect the oral pronouncement that the 182 days of presentence confinement should be applied to all of Cummins’ concurrent sentences.

“Arguably inconsistent” descriptions of travel plans by the driver and the passenger were not enough, by themselves, for reasonable suspicion to believe they were transporting drugs.