People v. Coleman

Following a bench trial, defendant James Coleman was convicted of the attempted murder and the attempted armed robbery of the victim, Jimmy Love. The trial judge sentenced defendant to two concurrent terms of 25 years’ imprisonment. On appeal, this court affirmed defendant’s convictions, but reduced the sentence imposed for the armed robbery to 15 years. Defendant then filed a petition for post-conviction relief on the ground that he had been denied the effective assistance of counsel. The State filed a motion to dismiss defendant’s petition on the grounds that it contained insufficient…