SIXTH DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL STATE OF FLORIDA _____________________________
Case No. 6D2023-1319 Lower Tribunal No. 2012-CF-001864-A-O _____________________________
NIMA MORADI,
Appellant, v.
STATE OF FLORIDA,
Appellee. _____________________________
Appeal from the Circuit Court for Orange County. Julie H. O’Kane and Wayne C. Wooten, Judges.
January 10, 2025
ON MOTION FOR REHEARING AND WRITTEN OPINION
We grant in part the motion for rehearing and written opinion filed by
Appellant, Nima Moradi, withdraw our prior per curiam affirmance, and substitute
this opinion in its place. We will not entertain a subsequent motion for rehearing
except on the postconviction ground raised in Moradi’s motion for rehearing and
written opinion and addressed here. TRAVER, C.J.
Nima Moradi appeals the postconviction court’s denial of his motion for
postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850. 1 Moradi
raised six grounds for relief, and we affirm five without further discussion. On the
sixth ground, the postconviction court correctly concluded Moradi suffered no
Strickland2 prejudice when trial counsel failed to object to a justifiable use of deadly
force instruction. Moradi cannot demonstrate a reasonable probability that the result
of his trial would have been different had counsel submitted a proper instruction.
We thus affirm.
I. Background
In 2012, the State charged Moradi with first-degree murder, carjacking, and
kidnapping. Following his unsuccessful attempt to dismiss the indictment under
Florida’s Stand Your Ground law, the case proceeded to trial in 2015. The State
theorized that Moradi lured Richard Luyo to his home intending to rob Luyo, a plan
that ended in Luyo’s murder. Moradi focused on self-defense, insisting that he
stabbed Luyo five times to protect himself from a knife attack.
1 This case was transferred from the Fifth District Court of Appeal to this Court on January 1, 2023. 2 Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 685 (1984). 2 Moradi was the only eyewitness to the first part of the encounter because Luyo
died before he could make a statement. At the time of the charged offenses, Moradi
was twenty-one years old. He was an unemployed community college student who
lived at home with his parents and younger sister. Moradi testified that his parents
upgraded the family’s phones for Christmas, and he asked if he could sell the old
ones. His parents agreed, and his mother also gave him another phone to sell that
she had purchased from her boss. Moradi responded to Luyo’s online advertisement,
and the two began texting, eventually negotiating a purchase price.
Luyo was a stay-at-home dad who had a side business buying, restoring, and
selling old phones. Luyo wanted to meet Moradi in a public place, but Moradi said
he could not drive because he had a suspended license. Moradi admitted that his
license was not suspended, but he claimed that he was embarrassed to tell Luyo that
his father forbade him from taking the family car out on weekdays except for
college-related purposes. But Moradi later admitted he could have met Luyo at the
library. Ultimately, though, Luyo offered to drive to Moradi’s home.
Luyo parked on the street, with his car facing towards the subdivision’s exit.
He left his five-year-old son in the car’s back seat while he went into Moradi’s home.
Luyo wore a t-shirt that said “Abercrombie Warrior.” Moradi noticed that Luyo had
an athletic build, and that he walked like he played sports. He also noticed that Luyo
3 appeared Asian, and Moradi assumed this meant Luyo knew martial arts. He did
not. Luyo followed Moradi through his garage and into his house.
Moradi reported that he presented the four phones to Luyo at the kitchen
counter. Luyo took the phones out of their boxes to inspect them. He unlocked three
phones but the fourth phone was locked. According to Moradi, Luyo already seemed
agitated, and the locked phone caused him further consternation. When Moradi
refused to reduce the negotiated price, Luyo—who was 5’7” and weighed 140
pounds—walked around the kitchen counter and shoved him. Luyo then punched
Moradi—who is 6’3” and weighed 200 pounds—in the face. Moradi said that he
fled the kitchen because he wanted to get Luyo out of the house before his mother
and sister came home. He thus retreated down the hallway leading to the garage.
He testified that Luyo jumped on his back, clinging to his neck with one arm and
punching him with the other. They spilled over a small step and fell into the garage,
where they separated.
Moradi said that Luyo looked to the top of a five-foot-tall white refrigerator,
where amid clutter, Luyo saw a white-handled steak knife with a five-inch blade and
a five-inch handle. According to Moradi, Luyo grabbed the knife and approached
Moradi in a way that—coupled with Luyo’s ethnicity—gave Moradi concern Luyo
knew how to handle himself in a knife fight. Moradi said that Luyo lunged at him
with the knife in his right hand, and Moradi dodged. Moradi then grabbed Luyo’s
4 right arm with his left hand, and the two locked up like football players. Moradi
testified Luyo poked his kneecap with the tip of the knife. He declared that it felt
like “a bolt of lightning” and caused him excruciating pain.
Moradi testified that he then wrested the knife from Luyo, cutting Luyo’s
hand. But Luyo “came right” at him, and he delivered three to four “quick jabs”
aimed downwards towards Luyo with the knife. Moradi alternatively testified to the
“quick jabs” as “pokes.” A medical examiner testified that one of these “quick jabs”
or “pokes” went six and three-quarters inches into Luyo’s chest, piercing his heart.
Moradi explained that the knife was very sharp, and this was why a “quick jab” or
“poke” with a five-inch blade caused a near-seven-inch fatal chest wound. The
medical examiner disagreed, stating that Moradi needed to stab Luyo with a forceful
motion to compress Luyo’s chest muscles the necessary two and three-quarters
inches to create this injury.
Luyo had four other stab wounds, and including the injuries to his hand, three
other knife injuries. The second stab wound superficially cut Luyo’s neck; he also
had abrasions on his neck consistent with a slash wound. A third pierced the back
of his left arm, penetrating four-and-a-half inches into his shoulder muscles. A
fourth went two-and-a-quarter inches into his chest, nicking an artery and causing a
second fatal injury. Luyo also had a slice wound on the front of his left arm.
5 After causing these injuries, Moradi threw the knife away, in his words, to
“get it out of the equation.” Law enforcement would later find the bloody knife at
the entry to the garage, which meant Moradi would have thrown it between Luyo
and Luyo’s car. Moradi theorized that the knife must have ricocheted off something
in the garage and landed there. Moradi said that at that time, Luyo did not seem to
be injured, had no blood on him, and “was still fighting pretty hard.” Subsequent
forensic testing would show only Luyo’s blood in the garage. But laboratory tests
did show Luyo’s touch DNA on the knife’s handle.
Multiple witnesses saw what happened next. Moradi’s neighbor was driving
past when she saw Luyo struggling to break free from Moradi’s grasp outside the
garage. Luyo escaped by slipping out of his shirt. Luyo then ran towards the
neighbor’s car while hollering “Help me, he’s going to kill me!” The neighbor could
see that Luyo had been stabbed and was bleeding. He left bloody handprints on her
car while banging on her window. She called 911 as he ran away from her car and
towards his.
At this point, the neighbor saw Moradi—who had been watching from the
garage’s entry—spring into action. As Luyo got into his car and started it, Moradi
ran to the car and jumped into the car’s back seat next to Luyo’s son. He did not
limp, and he showed no signs of injury. Moradi admitted that he knew Luyo was no
longer a threat to him. But the neighbor watched Moradi and Luyo fight for control
6 of the car. Moradi explained that he wanted to hold Luyo at the scene to answer for
his actions in the kitchen and garage.
Luyo drove his car towards the subdivision’s exit. Three house painters
returning to work in the neighborhood drove towards him. The neighbor and house
painters all witnessed Luyo’s car stop. Luyo fell out of it, with his legs still inside.
Moradi jumped on top of Luyo and hit him. He also placed his hands around Luyo’s
neck; the neighbor said Moradi was choking him. One painter described the scene
as “the littler guy was basically defenseless, and he was just getting beat, like,
nonstop. And he was defenseless, and all you see is blood pumping out of his arm.
It was like a main artery or something.” The second painter said Moradi was
“beating the snot out of [Luyo].” The third painter told Moradi to get off Luyo after
witnessing Moradi punch Luyo twice. Nobody saw Luyo fight back. All three
painters heard Luyo say, “He’s trying to kill me.” The third painter heard both
Moradi and Luyo say this. A picture admitted into evidence showed Luyo’s blood
sprayed and pooled all over the street, and not just beneath the locations of his stab
wounds.
Moradi got back into Luyo’s car and started driving away with the door open.
According to Moradi, he was trying to leave because he did not want Luyo alone on
the street when his mother came home from work. He also claimed that both he and
Luyo were sitting in the front seat at the same time, and Luyo put the car into drive.
7 By contrast, multiple witnesses watched Luyo grab the window or the steering wheel
of the car as Moradi drove away, dragging him down the street before crashing into
an electrical pole.
Moradi did not recall dragging Luyo; he said they were both in the car’s front
seat at the same time. But the medical examiner noted that Luyo had abrasions to
his knees and left shin consistent with being dragged. When Moradi hit the electrical
pole, he said he realized for the first time that Luyo was “badly hurt.” Moradi also
testified—at odds with his earlier “bolt of lightning” statement—that he first noticed
his knee was hurt when the car crashed. The neighbor witnessed Moradi exit the
car, step on Luyo, and limp away.
During this time, Moradi’s sister and her best friend drove up. The best friend
testified that she had to swerve to miss Luyo’s car, which Moradi drove “abnormally
quickly” while it dragged Luyo down the road. Moradi then got out of the car and
had a brief conversation with his sister and her best friend; he said that it was to alert
them of the child’s presence in the car’s back seat. He did not tell them that Luyo
had stabbed him in the knee or that he had stabbed Luyo five times. He then grabbed
the best friend’s keys and drove back to the house.
At the house, Moradi took the keys to the family car, his wallet, his phone,
and the four phones and their boxes from the kitchen counter. He did not have his
shoes or his glasses, and he ran over the family’s bicycles while backing out of the
8 driveway. He sped past the painters, his neighbor, his sister, and her best friend,
Luyo’s car, and Luyo’s body on the way out of the neighborhood. Moradi’s sister
and her best friend went to the house and started cleaning up blood from the garage.
Moradi drove the family car two to three miles away, where he called a friend
who had an affiliation with a local street gang. She pulled up, and he approached
from a nearby home where he had been washing blood off himself using a garden
hose. He was limping and covered in blood. She first told law enforcement officers
that Moradi would not give her a straight answer why he stabbed Luyo. But at trial,
she testified that Moradi told her he had been stabbed and showed her his knee
injury. She also recounted that Moradi said he stabbed someone, and there was a
child involved. From the friend’s car, Moradi called the lawyer who would
ultimately first chair his trial. But he told his friend that he did not want to be found.
First responders rushed Luyo to the hospital, where doctors transfused
eighteen units of blood into him (the medical examiner testified the typical male has
ten units of blood). They tried to sew up the cut to Luyo’s heart, but by the time
they did, it had started necrosing. They also had to “keep going back and operating
until they could find” the second stab wound that cut Luyo’s artery. He died that
night.
Meanwhile, Moradi’s friend took him to an apartment rented by a street gang,
where he cleaned himself up. She also got him new clothes, new shoes, and a bus
9 ticket to Tallahassee under an assumed name. She claimed Moradi threw away his
clothes in the apartment dumpster; Moradi testified that the friend took his clothes.
On the day of the stabbing, Moradi repeatedly spoke to his lawyer about turning
himself in. But Moradi never contacted or surrendered to authorities. Instead, the
United States Marshals arrested him in Tallahassee eight days later. He had no
injuries. He testified that he gave the family’s phones to a friend to sell before his
arrest.
After an abbreviated charge conference, the trial court instructed the jury on
the justifiable use of deadly force using an agreed-upon standard instruction. The
instruction correctly informed the jury that Moradi’s use of deadly force on Luyo
was justifiable if the jury found Moradi had been resisting an attempt to commit
aggravated battery or aggravated assault upon him. But instead of just stating the
elements of aggravated battery or aggravated assault, the instruction improperly
informed the jury that the State needed to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.3
3 The operative portions of the instructions stated:
To prove the crime of Aggravated Battery, the State must prove the following two elements beyond a reasonable doubt. The first element is a definition of battery. 1. Richard Luyo intentionally caused bodily harm to Nima Nash Moradi. 2. Richard Luyo in committing the battery used a deadly weapon. .... 10 Trial counsel did not object to this instruction at the charge conference or after the
trial court delivered it.
The jury found Moradi guilty of the lesser-included offenses of second-degree
murder of Luyo and false imprisonment of his son; it returned an as-charged verdict
for carjacking Luyo. The trial court sentenced Moradi to thirty years in prison. The
Fifth District affirmed his direct appeal without opinion. Moradi v. State, 234 So.
3d 765 (Fla. 5th DCA 2017).
Moradi then moved for postconviction relief, asserting that his counsel had
been ineffective for failing to object to the self-defense instruction. The
postconviction court set the matter for an evidentiary hearing. At the hearing,
Moradi’s lead trial counsel, a criminal defense specialist with over thirty years of
experience, testified that he delegated jury instruction preparation and the handling
of the charge conference to his co-counsel. At the time of trial, co-counsel had been
To prove the crime of Aggravated Assault, the State must prove the following four elements beyond a reasonable doubt. The first three elements define assault. 1. Richard Luyo intentionally and unlawfully threatened, either by word or by act, to do violence to Nima Nash Moradi. 2. At the time, Richard Luyo appeared to have the ability to carry out the threat. 3. The act of Richard Luyo created in the mind of Nima Nash Moradi a well-founded fear that the violence was about to take place.
11 an attorney for “several decades,” but at the time of the hearing, he worked as a
paralegal because he resigned his license for trust account violations following an
agreement with The Florida Bar.4
Co-counsel did not recall doing any independent research on the justifiable
use of deadly force before trial. Instead, he relied on the standard jury instruction.
He did not notice any errors in the final written instructions, and he did not notice
any errors when the trial court read them to the jury. He testified, though, that if he
had noticed the justifiable use of deadly force instruction placed the burden on the
State to prove Luyo committed aggravated assault or battery on Moradi, he would
have “made some sort of objection or comment.”
Both Moradi’s lawyers testified they were unfamiliar with a four-year-old
case—binding at the time—that held it was fundamental error to deliver a justifiable
use of deadly force instruction that referred to a burden when discussing the forcible
felony that can be used to establish a self-defense claim. See Montijo v. State, 61
So. 3d 424, 427 (Fla. 5th DCA 2011). 5 The Montijo court reasoned that even though
4 The Florida Supreme Court would later disbar him. See Fla. Bar v. Brodersen, No. SC2022-1691, 2024 WL 3519614, at *1 (Fla. July 24, 2024). 5 See also § 776.012(2), Fla. Stat. (2012) (“[A] person is justified in the use of deadly force and does not have a duty to retreat if: (1) [h]e or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony; or (2) [u]nder those circumstances permitted pursuant to s. 776.013.”); § 776.013(3), Fla. Stat. (2012) (“A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity 12 the jury instruction6 did not say whose burden it was, the jury would have understood
it was the defendant’s. 61 So. 3d at 426. A year after Moradi’s trial, the Florida
Supreme Court approved revised jury instructions for justifiable use of deadly force,
directing the omission of any reference to the burden of proof related to the forcible
felony the victim was allegedly committing or about to commit. See In re Std. Jury
Instr. in Crim. Cases—Report No. 2014–06, 191 So. 3d 411, 414 (Fla. 2016) (citing
Montijo, 61 So. 3d 424).
The postconviction court denied Moradi’s motion after the hearing.7
Although it noted that the justifiable use of deadly force instruction was “defective,”
the postconviction court’s opinion did not address whether Moradi’s attorneys
and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.”); § 776.031, Fla. Stat. (2012) (“A person is justified in the use of deadly force only if he or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony. A person does not have the duty to retreat if the person is in a place where he or she has a right to be.”); § 782.02, Fla. Stat. (2015) (“The use of deadly force is justifiable when a person is resisting any attempt to murder such person or to commit any felony upon him or her or upon or in any dwelling house in which such person shall be.”). 6 The operative part of the Montijo instruction stated: “To prove the crime of Aggravated Battery, two elements must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.” 61 So. 3d at 425 (emphasis omitted). 7 Neither the postconviction judge who granted the evidentiary hearing nor the successor postconviction judge who denied Moradi’s motion presided over his trial. 13 performed in a deficient manner. Instead, it concluded that Moradi suffered no
prejudice. It reasoned that Moradi’s self-defense claims were “thoroughly refuted
by the evidence” and the case against him was “strong.” It also declared that the
evidence of Moradi’s guilt was “overwhelming.” Moradi appealed.
II. Legal Standard
The Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that “[i]n all criminal
prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to have the Assistance of Counsel
for his defence.” Amend. VI, U.S. Const. This “fundamental right” applies to
Florida through the Fourteenth Amendment. See Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S.
335, 342–43 (1963). “The right to counsel plays a crucial role in the adversarial
system embodied in the Sixth Amendment, since access to counsel’s skill and
knowledge is necessary to accord defendants the ‘ample opportunity to meet the case
of the prosecution’ to which they are entitled.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 685 (quoting
Adams v. United States ex rel. McCann, 317 U.S. 269, 275 (1942)). “[T]he right to
counsel is the right to the effective assistance of counsel.” McMann v. Richardson,
397 U.S. 759, 771 n.14 (1970) (citations omitted).
The Strickland Court noted that “[t]he purpose [of the effective assistance
guarantee of the Sixth Amendment] is simply to ensure that criminal defendants
receive a fair trial.” 466 U.S. at 689. Claims of ineffective assistance of counsel,
however, are “extraordinary,” and criminal defendants should make them “only
14 when the facts warrant it.” Downs v. State, 453 So. 2d 1102, 1107 (Fla. 1984).
Downs emphasized that these claims are not “appropriate in every case,” and “[i]t
should be the exception rather than the rule.” Id.
To prevail on his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, Moradi must first
show that his lawyers’ performance was deficient. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687.
He must then prove that the deficient performance prejudiced his defense. See id.
“Unless [Moradi] makes both showings, it cannot be said that the conviction . . .
resulted from a breakdown in the adversary process that renders the result
unreliable.” See id.
Our standard of review “also is two-pronged.” See Bruno v. State, 807 So. 2d
55, 61–62 (Fla. 2001). We defer to the postconviction court’s factual findings, but
we review de novo its ultimate conclusions on deficient performance and prejudice.
See id.
III. Analysis
The postconviction court correctly ruled that Moradi suffered no prejudice
from trial counsel’s “defective” justifiable use of deadly force jury instruction.8
8 We need not consider Strickland’s deficiency prong if Moradi cannot demonstrate prejudice. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 697 (“[T]here is no reason for a court deciding an ineffective assistance claim . . . even to address both components of the inquiry if the defendant makes an insufficient showing on one . . . If it is easier to dispose of an ineffectiveness claim on the ground of lack of sufficient prejudice, which we expect will so often be, that course should be followed.”). 15 While the postconviction court included an inappropriate discussion of fundamental
error, which has no relevance to a postconviction prejudice analysis, it ultimately
applied the appropriate legal standard. Our thorough review of this vast record and
lengthy trial transcript reveals that there is no reasonable probability that, but for
counsel’s failure to object to the erroneous jury instruction, the result of the
proceeding would have been different. Finally, this case is distinguishable, both
factually and legally, from Routenberg v. State, 301 So. 3d 325 (Fla. 2d DCA 2020),
a Second District decision addressing ineffective assistance of appellate counsel.
A. The Prejudice Standard
The postconviction court ultimately applied the correct legal standard in
determining Moradi suffered no prejudice. But Moradi contends that the
postconviction court inappropriately discussed the fundamental error standard,
which is inapplicable to postconviction proceedings. We agree, but this does not
affect our ultimate determination.
To establish Strickland prejudice, Moradi must prove that “counsel’s errors
were so serious as to deprive [him] of a fair trial, a trial whose result is reliable.”
466 U.S. at 687. To make this showing, Moradi “must show that there is a
reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of this
proceeding would have been different.” See id. at 694. “A reasonable probability is
a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.” Id. In a challenge
16 to a criminal conviction, “the question is whether there is a reasonable probability
that, absent the errors, the factfinder would have had a reasonable doubt respecting
guilt.” Id. at 695.
The Strickland Court emphasized that in evaluating prejudice, “a defendant
need not show that counsel’s deficient conduct more likely than not altered the
outcome in the case.” Id. at 693. But the distinction between the Strickland
prejudice standard and the preponderance of the evidence standard is “slight and
matters ‘only in the rarest case.’” Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 112 (2011)
(quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 693). Important here, it is not enough for Moradi
to show that his lawyers’ errors “had some conceivable effect” on his trial’s
outcome. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 692. Rather, “[t]he likelihood of a different
result must be substantial, not just conceivable.” Harrington, 562 U.S. at 112.
While the postconviction court’s order illustrates that it understood this
standard, portions of the order discussed fundamental error.9 This discussion had no
place because “ineffective assistance of trial counsel claims under Strickland afford
criminal defendants an easier path to relief than claims of fundamental error.”
Steiger v. State, 328 So. 3d 926, 930 (Fla. 2021). Fundamental error arises in direct
appeals when trial counsel fails to make a timely objection to an error. See Brown
9 The State may have contributed to this error by importing much of its answer brief in Moradi’s direct appeal into its response to his postconviction motion. 17 v. State, 124 So. 2d 481, 484 (Fla. 1960). Unlike typical errors requiring a preserved
objection, an appellant can raise fundamental error for the first time on appeal
because “the error [reaches] down into the validity of the trial itself to the extent that
a verdict of guilty could not have been obtained without [it].” Id.
Thus, the postconviction court’s reference to Florida Supreme Court
precedent discussing fundamental error in the context of improper justifiable use of
deadly force instructions was misplaced. See Martinez v. State, 981 So. 2d 449, 455
(Fla. 2008). The Martinez Court held that fundamental error did not occur when a
trial court delivered an unobjected-to jury instruction that negated a defendant’s self-
defense case. Id. at 455–56. It reasoned that self-defense was not the defendant’s
only defense, and his “claim of self-defense was extremely weak.” Id. at 456. This
particularized fundamental error standard has no direct application to a Strickland
prejudice determination. At any rate, the postconviction court ultimately held that
Moradi suffered no Strickland prejudice, and its correct application of the
appropriate legal standard is all that is relevant here. In other words, our decision
does not apply to challenges raised in the direct appeal of a criminal conviction
involving a defective justifiable use of deadly force instruction.
B. Moradi’s Self-Defense Case
Applying the Strickland prejudice standard shows there is no reasonable
probability that Moradi’s verdict would have been different even if his trial counsel
18 had submitted the appropriate justifiable use of deadly force instruction. Two key
legal principles shape our analysis. First, in evaluating whether Moradi suffered
prejudice, we consider “all the evidence—the good and the bad.” See Wong v.
Belmontes, 558 U.S. 15, 26 (2009). “[A] verdict or conclusion only weakly
supported by the record is more likely to be affected by errors than one with
overwhelming record support.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 696. Second, we presume
that the judge and the jury acted according to the law. See id. at 694; Downs, 453
So. 2d at 1109. Relatedly, and absent a contrary finding, “juries are presumed to
follow the instructions given them.” Carter v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp.,
778 So. 2d 932, 942 (Fla. 2000). While it might be tempting—given trial counsel’s
trial-long focus on self-defense and a standard instruction that informed the jury that
Moradi did not have to prove anything—to speculate the jury knew they were
deliberating on self-defense, we assume they followed the trial court’s instructions
to the letter. And these instructions legally negated Moradi’s self-defense argument.
But it does not matter, because even under the lower Strickland prejudice
standard, he cannot establish a basis for relief. Before analyzing all the evidence,
we first note that neither party’s brief contained a complete and accurate statement
of what occurred at trial. Our determination is extremely fact-dependent, and the
background section of this opinion reflects it. Even though we may decline to
highlight a fact in our analysis, we have considered it in reaching our determination.
19 We concede Moradi offered the only eyewitness account of what happened
before Luyo ran shirtless, hollering, and bleeding from Moradi’s garage. But that is
far from the only record evidence illustrating their initial confrontation. The forensic
evidence against Moradi is damning, most particularly the number and force of the
stab wounds he inflicted on Luyo. Moradi also admitted that he caused a smaller
number of knife wounds than Luyo suffered but diminished the force he used to
inflict them. A near-seven-inch, heart-piercing stab with a five-inch blade is not a
“poke.” Still, Moradi’s self-defense case would have been far stronger—perhaps
strong enough to show Strickland prejudice—if his encounter with Luyo ended in
his garage. To be sure, Luyo’s touch DNA was on the knife’s handle. But the
encounter did not end in the garage, and Luyo would suffer greatly for that.
Luyo parked his car on the street. It was not on Moradi’s property, and when
Luyo tried to leave, Moradi testified that he knew Luyo was no longer a threat to
him. He had no legal basis to use force, much less deadly force, against Luyo.
Nevertheless, and despite his earlier testimony about his excruciating knee pain,
Moradi ran to Luyo’s car, jumped in the back seat with the child, and started to fight
Luyo for control of the car.
Four witnesses saw Moradi and Luyo fall out of the car’s front seat, with
Moradi on top of Luyo. Moradi then beat Luyo, also placing his hands around
Luyo’s neck, while blood gushed out of Luyo’s body. Nobody saw Luyo fight back.
20 Even Moradi did not assert this happened, and he conceded he beat Luyo because
he was angry. Luyo had cuts in his heart and one of the arteries leading away from
it, and he needed urgent medical attention. He remained no threat to Moradi
throughout this violent assault.
Then, Moradi started to drive Luyo’s car towards the neighborhood exit with
the child still in the back seat. Luyo hung onto the car, and his wounds supported
multiple eyewitnesses’ testimony that Moradi dragged him down the road. When
Moradi crashed into an electrical pole, he stepped on Luyo, grabbed his sister’s best
friend’s keys, and commenced his eight-day flight.
Moradi’s behavior over this time further undermines his self-defense case. He
told his friend that he could not be found and wished to flee to Tallahassee, despite
talking to his lawyer minutes after stabbing and cutting Luyo eight times. He
destroyed evidence or allowed his friend to destroy it for him. He hid out for eight
days, and despite several calls with his lawyer geared towards getting Moradi to turn
himself in, the U.S. Marshals ultimately arrested him with none of the phones he
wanted to sell Luyo and no injuries.
We do not suggest that anyone in Moradi’s situation has an obligation to speak
to law enforcement, or that there is any one type of behavior that best supports the
establishment of Strickland prejudice in a self-defense case. We note, however, that
Moradi’s behavior contrasts with that of at least one defendant who was able to
21 establish Strickland prejudice in such a case. See McCullough v. State, 327 So. 3d
955 (Fla. 5th DCA 2021) (granting postconviction relief involving confrontation
with no other witnesses where forensic evidence equally supported victim’s and
movant’s accounts, and movant remained at scene, cooperated with law
enforcement, and encouraged police to seek recorded evidence of confrontation).
And, although the fact of Moradi’s flight is not dispositive, we are tasked with
considering the entire record before us. 10 See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 695 (“[A] court
hearing an ineffectiveness claim must consider the totality of the evidence before the
judge or jury.”). Here, Moradi’s conduct does nothing to strengthen his self-defense
claim. It only weakens it.
Under these specific circumstances, we conclude Moradi cannot meet his
burden to show Strickland prejudice, and the postconviction court properly denied
his motion.
C. Routenberg v. State
Still, Moradi asserts that because of the Routenberg decision, “this is one of
the rare cases where it is not appropriate to render a decision without a written
opinion.” Upon reflection, we agree. But Routenberg does not bind us. See CED
10 We note too that Florida courts deem such evidence relevant to a defendant’s consciousness of guilt. See Thomas v. State, 748 So. 2d 970, 982 (Fla. 1999) (“In prior cases, we have upheld the introduction of similar flight evidence as consciousness of guilt where the defendant flees from police after committing a murder.”) (citations omitted). 22 Cap. Holdings 2000 EB, LLC v. CTCW-Berkshire Club, LLC, 363 So. 3d 192, 195
(Fla. 6th DCA 2023) (“In addressing this disagreement between Florida’s
intermediary courts, we begin by repeating a well-known rule—that an appellate
court is not bound by any of the decisions issued by its sister appellate courts.”). It
is also distinguishable on multiple grounds.
Routenberg was a drug dealer who represented himself at his murder trial.
Routenberg, 301 So. 3d at 326. He often allowed his customers to stay at his home,
including the decedent, a “little 115-pound girl.” Id. at 326, 329. Law enforcement
found her buried body in Routenberg’s backyard six weeks after he killed her. Id.
at 326–27. At first, Routenberg lied to police about the decedent’s whereabouts,
saying that he did not know where she was. Id. at 327. But when he learned police
had found her body, he said he killed her in self-defense. Id. According to
Routenberg, she tried to steal his oxycodone while brandishing a knife. Id. He said
she cut him a few times before he could wrest the knife away, and he showed police
his scars from the altercation. Id. He acknowledged that she “couldn’t hurt him”
but said he had been startled when she woke him up. Id. at 329.
Routenberg did not object to a jury instruction that required the state to prove
the decedent committed robbery and aggravated battery against him. Id. at 328. His
appellate counsel did not raise this error on direct appeal, and Routenberg petitioned
for ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. Id. at 326. To prevail on such a
23 claim, a petitioner “must show: 1) specific errors or omissions which show that
appellate counsel’s performance deviated from the norm or fell outside the range of
professionally acceptable performance; and 2) the deficiency of that performance
compromised the appellate process to such a degree as to undermine confidence in
the fairness and correctness of the appellate result.” Wilson v. Wainwright, 474 So.
2d 1162, 1163 (Fla. 1985). The Routenberg court conducted a fundamental error
analysis, applying Martinez. See 301 So. 3d at 328–29 (citing Martinez, 981 So. 2d
at 455). It reasoned that self-defense was Routenberg’s only defense, and that his
self-defense claim was “viable,” and not, as in Martinez, “extremely weak” or
“strain[ing] even the most remote bounds of credulity.” Id. at 329–30 (quoting
Martinez, 981 So. 2d at 456).
Moradi argues that Routenberg had the same jury instruction error, and its
fundamental error analysis applied a more stringent standard than the Strickland
prejudice analysis we conduct in his case. While this argument is understandable, it
presupposes we agree with Routenberg’s outcome. Reasonable minds could differ
on the Routenberg court’s application of the Martinez fundamental error test, at least
based on the limited facts contained in the opinion. But we need not express any
conflict with our sister court’s holding—which also addressed a different procedural
posture and applied a different legal standard—when we can distinguish it on its
facts.
24 There were no witnesses to Routenberg’s and his victim’s altercation. Other
than Routenberg’s wounds, the Routenberg court referenced no forensic evidence.
Routenberg did not testify that he pursued and continued to attack the victim outside
his property when he knew she was no longer a threat to him. Routenberg could
prove the decedent had stabbed him—his alleged wounds had not disappeared after
an eight-day flight out of town against his lawyer’s best efforts to get him to turn
himself in. We therefore decline to analogize Routenberg to Moradi’s different and
unique circumstances.
IV. Conclusion
Postconviction cases analyzing Strickland prejudice, and the determinations
that arise from them, are fact-specific, and they naturally invite comparison. We do
not find the fact pattern in Routenberg a useful comparison to what happened in
Moradi’s case. Based on a diligent review of the unique facts contained in our
extensive record, we conclude that Moradi failed to establish Strickland prejudice.
There is no reasonable probability, even considering counsel’s errors, that the result
of this proceeding would have been different. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694. We
therefore affirm.
AFFIRMED.
STARGEL and BROWNLEE, JJ., concur.
25 William R. Ponall, of Ponall Law, Maitland, for Appellant.
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Alyssa M. Williams, Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, for Appellee.
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE MOTION FOR REHEARING AND DISPOSITION THEREOF IF TIMELY FILED