☢ test - Í

evidence directly from the hotel was deficient performance. See id. (‘[W]e cannot conclude that delaying some interviews [of alibi witnesses until two years after the murder] falls outside the wide range of reasonable professional assistance.’). Moreover, King has not shown prejudice. There was no evidence that the hotel had any video surveillance, much less whether the surveillance covered all entrances to the hotel. Thus, assuming trial counsel had been successful in obtaining video surveillance footage showing King arriving at the hotel alone, this would not necessarily contradict M.P.’s testimony.” Bryant v. State, S15A1738, ___ Ga. ___, ___ S.E.2d ___, 2016 WL 1085388 (March 21, 2016). Malice murder and related convictions affirmed. Even if counsel was deficient “for failing to discover outstanding warrants [for State’s witnesses] pretrial, … appellant was not prejudiced. When counsel learned of the warrants during trial, he obtained the trial court’s permission to extensively cross-examine Cook and Carmichael about the warrants and, through that cross- examination, was able to suggest to the jury that the two witnesses were not arrested on the warrants because they were testifying for the State. Having the information pretrial might have been more convenient for the defense, but appellant cannot show that the outcome of the trial would have been different.” Goodrum v. State, 335 Ga.App. 831, 783 S.E.2d 354 (February 25, 2016). Aggravated assault conviction affirmed; no ineffective assistance in failing to prepare defendant for trial. “Counsel testified … that he met with Goodrum several times, including one long initial interview, and they discussed ‘every aspect of the case.’ Goodrum claimed at the new trial hearing that he asked counsel for more meetings. But he offered no insight into what additional steps counsel should have taken to prepare him for trial, and he demonstrated no reasonable probability that the trial outcome would have changed had counsel acted differently. Accordingly, the trial court properly rejected this claim.” Maryland v. Kulbicki, 14-848, ___ U.S. ____, 136 S.Ct. 2, 193 L.Ed.2d 1 (October 5, 2015). Reversing Maryland Court of Appeals. Following defendant’s murder conviction, trial court properly denied motion for new trial. Trial counsel wasn’t deficient for failing to discover the deficiency in a commonly-accepted method of forensic bullet analysis used to help convict defendant. Defendant’s 1995 conviction was based in part on Comparative Bullet Lead Analysis (CBLA), then a commonly-accepted forensic tool. In 2006, however, “CBLA had fallen out of favor.” The Maryland Court of Appeals held that counsel should have foreseen this based on a 1991 report co-authored by the agent who testified at defendant’s trial. Although the report supported use of CBLA, it briefly mentioned one concern, but suggested why that concern wasn’t valid. That concern “ultimately led the court to reject CBLA evidence 15 years later.” In this case, the Maryland Court concluded that “any good attorney should have spotted this methodological flaw. The court held that counsel’s failure to unearth the report, to identify one of its findings as ‘at odds with the scientific method,’ and to use this methodological flaw to cast doubt on CBLA during counsel’s cross-examination of Peele, ‘fell short of prevailing professional norms.’ … We reverse . The Court of Appeals offered no support for its conclusion that Kulbicki’s defense attorneys were constitutionally required to predict the demise of CBLA. Instead, the court indulged in the ‘natural tendency to speculate as to whether a different trial strategy might have been more successful.’ Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U.S. 364, 372, 113 S.Ct. 838, 122 L.Ed.2d 180 (1993). … At the time of Kulbicki’s trial in 1995, the validity of CBLA was widely accepted, and courts regularly admitted CBLA evidence until 2003. [Cit.] As the Court of Appeals acknowledged, even the 1991 report itself did not question the validity of CBLA, concluding that it was a valid and useful forensic tool to match suspect to victim. [Cit.] Counsel did not perform deficiently by dedicating their time and focus to elements of the defense that did not involve poking methodological holes in a then-uncontroversial mode of ballistics analysis.” State v. Shelton, 329 Ga.App. 582, 765 S.E.2d 732 (November 13, 2014). Following conviction for cocaine possession and related offenses, trial court erred by granting motion for new trial based on ineffective assistance of counsel. Counsel wasn’t ineffective “for failing to follow up on information that the digital scales were put in his vehicle by someone else while his vehicle was being repaired and detailed prior to the stop. Shelton did not testify at the new trial hearing, and he admittedly failed to give trial counsel the name or location of the place where his vehicle was repaired and detailed, even though trial counsel met with and spoke to Shelton numerous times prior to his trial. Moreover, Shelton specifically informed the trial court during his trial that he did not wish to present any witnesses in his case; there were no witnesses whom he wanted his trial counsel to call on his behalf; and trial counsel had done everything he wanted her to do in connection with trial counsel's representation of him. Under these circumstances, Shelton failed to establish that trial counsel was deficient in investigating or preparing the case.” Davis v. State, 295 Ga. 168, 758 S.E.2d 296 (May 5, 2014). Malice murder and related convictions affirmed; record didn’t support defendant’s contention that trial counsel was unprepared. Defendant brought in retained counsel, Winner, on the