Nathan Dunlap, Defendant-Appellant/cross-Appellee v. the People of the State of Colorado…

Summary

The Supreme Court of Colorado affirmed in part and reversed in part the postconviction court's denial of relief to Nathan Dunlap, holding that trial counsel was not constitutionally ineffective on any ground urged. The court reversed the 35(c) court's findings that counsel performed deficiently in limiting the mental health mitigation investigation and in failing to object to the prosecutor's penalty-phase closing, reasoning that both were reasonable strategic choices, and it rejected Dunlap's conflict-of-interest, jury-selection, instructional, juror-misconduct, and constitutional challenges, several on harmless-beyond-a-reasonable-doubt or abuse-of-discretion grounds. Because no deficiency was established—and no Strickland prejudice in any event—Dunlap received no postconviction relief and his convictions and death sentence stand.