Whether the petitioner was denied effective assistance of counsel due to failure to object and preserve for appeal jury instructions on the elements of aiding and abetting

Questions Presented for Review IL The Petitioner seeks review of the denial of a certificate of appealability by the First Circuit which review of the decision of U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island and ultimately seeks direct collateral review of the decision of the Rhode Island Supreme Court reversing and vacating the decision of the trial justice of the Superior Court holding in a post-conviction relief action that the Petitioner was denied effective assistance of counsel in violation of the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution where counsel failed to object and preserve for appeal jury instructions on the elements of a charge of aiding and abetting; specifically that they required on the accused part advanced knowledge that a firearm would be used in the offense and that he or she had a reasonable chance to disengage, leave or terminate his or her involvement in actions. Petitioner has exhausted all other manner of relief. Il. Where the Petitioner is possessed of due process rights under the 5‘ and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and a new substantive rule is announced by this Court specifying the elements that must be present to be convicted as an aider and abettor, that rule applies retroactively to Petitioner’s Case. The Rhode Island Supreme Court restrictive interpretation of the ruling Page |i in Rosemond to only effecting a federal statute, namely 924(c), ought to be corrected by this Court as failing to afford due process. Il. Where the Rhode Island Supreme Court reversed the trial justice’s post-conviction ruling that there was insufficient evidence presented by the prosecution at the Petitioner’s trial to the beyond a reasonable doubt standard, on the critical elements of aiding and abetting liability, namely advanced knowledge of the plan to use a fire arm in the offense and a reasonable opportunity for the accused to quit the activity, a great injustice has occurred removing both the defendant’s right to a jury trial with a properly instructed jury and a substitution of its judgment as to the trial facts of the 13 juror in frustration as well of the accused right to a fair trial. IV. Where the Superior Court specifically found that the State had pursued several theories of guilt due to the dubious strength of its evidence, some versions of which were specifically found by the Superior Court justice to be based on the untrustworthy dubious statements of co-defendants clearly supports the trial court’s postconviction relief finding of insufficient evidence. The trial justice was convinced to the point that she opined that she ought to have been reversed for finding otherwise at trial. Having determined the witnesses not reliable she resolved as the thirteenth juror that she could not accept their unreliable testimony at all. In that finding Page | ii she properly discharged her role and upheld fundamental fairness; the reversal of that finding worked a manifest injustice, which cries out for correction. Page | ili