# Ex Parte McFarland

> Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas · May 18, 2005 · 163 S.W.3d 743

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9668999

## Case

- **Full name:** Ex Parte George Edward McFARLAND, Applicant
- **Court:** Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas
- **Decided:** May 18, 2005
- **Citations:** 163 S.W.3d 743; 2005 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 740; 2005 WL 1162800
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Womack
- **Judges:** Cochran, Womack, Keller, Johnson
- **Cited by:** 232 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9668999

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- holding appellant failed to establish trial counsel’s deficient performance for failure to call witnesses at guilt-innocence and punishment stage when appellant could not identify specific witnesses that should have been called, that such witnesses were available to testify, a…
- holding applicant failed to show prejudice prong of Strickland where he failed to name any specific witnesses who should have been contacted, and failed to show unnamed witnesses were available to testify or that their testimony would have benefitted him
- explaining appellant “must overcome a ‘strong presumption that counsel’s performance fell within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance’” when proving counsel’s performance was deficient (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689 )
- holding defendant failed to show prejudice to establish ineffective assistance of counsel when he failed to show that unnamed witnesses were available to testify or that their testimony would have benefitted him

## Opinion text

WOMACK, J.,
filed a concurring opinion in which KELLER, P.J., and JOHNSON, J., joined.
In addition to the reasons for denying relief that the Court gives in its opinion, which I join, I wish to add another: The applicant waived, at trial, the complaint that he brings today.
As the Court’s account says, the applicant chose and hired an attorney (ante, at 750), spurned the trial court’s efforts to give him the assistance of another attorney (ante, at 750) or to let him change attorneys (ante, at 751). He insisted on going to trial with the counsel of his choice. This was his right, which the trial court could not have denied him.
The careful trial court, seeing that the applicant had chosen poorly, provided him with the assistance of a qualified attorney at the public’s expense.
When it was obvious that his chosen counsel fell asleep during trial (see ante, at 751), the trial court asked the applicant if he wanted to have the trial continue in the charge of a capable- attorney (again, at public expense). The applicant refused. (Ante, at 751, n. 9.)
Having resisted the efforts of the trial court to give him the effective assistance of counsel,' and having knowingly exercised his right to continue being represented by a lawyer who slept rather than a capable lawyer, the applicant may not now complain about his choice.

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9668999. Public record. Not legal advice.