Amman Reu-El files pleading claiming he had ineffective assistance of counsel in capital murder retrial

Claiming he received ineffective assistance from the two attorneys appointed to defend him in the retrial of his death penalty case, King Phillip Amman Reu-El is asking a Shawnee County District Court judge to conduct an evidentiary hearing.

Besides ineffective assistance of counsel, Amman Reu-El, 42, is asking District Court Judge Richard Anderson to void his two consecutive sentences and his convictions based on his no-contest pleas.

In effect, Amman Reu-El is starting the process to seek a third trial based on an allegation he received ineffectiveness of counsel, which got his case into court for a retrial starting in 2013.

Ten years ago Tuesday, a jury convicted him of capital murder and other charges in the killings of two women in Topeka. Those convictions were overturned, and the case was sent back for retrial.

During his second trial, Amman Reu-El’s defense attorneys were Paul Oller, of Hays, and John Val Wachtel, of Wichita. Both have worked on multiple death penalty cases.

Amman Reu-El said his no-contest plea was the result of advice of counsel and was “involuntary in character and unintelligently made made as (Amman Reu-El) was misled” by Oller and Wachtel.

Amman Reu-El said he was misled into thinking the no-contest plea wouldn’t be used by the Kansas Supreme Court as grounds to deny a pre-trial habeas corpus action filed by the defendant on Dec. 30, 2014.

Via the mail, Amman Reu-El wrote and filed the request, which was date-stamped in district court on Monday. As of Friday, a date hadn’t been selected for Anderson to hear Amman Reu-El’s filing seeking a hearing.

When Amman Reu-El made the “no contest” pleas on Feb. 27, a jury was being chosen to hear his retrial in the slayings of Annette Roberson, 38, and Gloria A. Jones, 42, on Dec. 13, 2003, in a southeast Topeka house. The pleas removed the death penalty as a sentence.

Amman Reu-El was charged with capital murder in the shooting deaths of Roberson and Jones; two alternative counts of premeditated first-degree murder of Roberson and Jones; attempted first-degree murder of Annetta D. Thomas; aggravated battery of Thomas; and criminal possession of a firearm. The Kansas Supreme Court previously ordered a new trial on the basis of ineffective assistance of counsel following Amman Reu-El’s trial conviction in the 2003 murders of two women and severe wounding of a third.

Amman Reu-El formally changed his name from Phillip D. Cheatham Jr. while awaiting retrial in the capital murder case.

Amman Reu-El’s interview

In a face-to-face interview with The Topeka Capital-Journal, Amman Reu-El said he entered a no-contest plea Feb. 27 because he had lost faith in his attorneys and the legal system. He said pretrial publicity had tainted the jury pool, and entering a plea was the only way to avoid the death penalty.

The interview occurred March 4 at the Shawnee County Jail.

“If I couldn’t get a fair trial the first time,” Amman Reu-El said, “and throughout the course of the delay leading up to the setting aside of convictions, then how was I supposed to get a fair trial now?”

Ozawkie attorney Dennis Hawver represented Amman Reu-El at the first trial and later was disbarred based on his legal work.

But Amman Reu-El in March said his attorneys “couldn’t protect my rights as they were obligated.”

“I knew from the start that the state has left me in a position that I couldn’t receive my constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel anyway,” Amman Reu-El said. “Because no matter how hard Mr. Hawver, no matter how hard Mr. Wachtel would have tried, they couldn’t protect my other rights — as in my right to confrontation, my right to present the theory of my defense in its entirety — and they were just pushing forward in total disregard of my rights.”

The retrial

A retrial was ordered for Amman Reu-El in 2013 after the Kansas Supreme Court overturned his capital murder convictions and death penalty based on a finding he received ineffective assistance by Hawver in 2005.

A jury convicted him of the charges on Sept. 8, 2005.

After months preparing for the second trial, prosecutors and defense attorneys began choosing a jury in February.

The plea

Then, abruptly on Feb. 27, the judge was told a plea agreement had been reached.

“We told the judge at 11:30 (a.m.) that we had come to an agreement,” Oller said.

Amman Reu-El pleaded no contest to capital murder and attempted murder, and the other charges were dismissed.

With the plea, the death penalty was removed as a sentencing option.

“It was a very difficult and thought-out decision by Phillip,” Oller told a reporter on the day of the plea. “He doesn’t come into this decision lightly.”

When sentenced on March 20, Amman Reu-El received a life term for the capital murder conviction and a sentence of 13 years and nine months for the attempted murder. He would have to serve a minimum of 25 years on the life term before he was parole eligible, the nearly 14-year term.

After he served 25 years, he could apply to the Kansas Prisoner Review Board to release him from the capital murder sentence, and if the request was granted, then he would begin serving the second sentence for attempted murder.

Since he was first convicted, Amman Reu-El has served almost 12 years.

At the earliest, Amman Reu-El has a little more than 13 years.

Speaking in March, Amman Reu-El said he would be out of prison “well before 14 years.”

“It really didn’t matter what the deal was or how much the time was because I have faith in Allah in that the truth will be revealed that the state in the process and in their treatment of me has been very unfair,” Amman Reu-El said.