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091555P.pdf   03/04/2010  Armando Rodela-Aguilar  v.  United States
   U.S. Court of Appeals Case No:  09-1555
   U.S. District Court for the Western District of Missouri - Kansas City   
   [PUBLISHED] [Loken, Author, with Arnold and Benton, Circuit Judges]
   Prisoner case - habeas. Without specific testimony from a handwriting
   expert at the Section 2255 hearing, it was not possible to establish
   Strickland prejudice based on trial counsel's failure to call a handwriting
   expert at trial, and the district court erred in finding counsel's
   performance was deficient on this issue; trial counsel's failure to call the
   prisoner's employer was a strategic decision based on her analysis of the
   benefits of any testimony he could offer and the possibility that he might
   disclose information concerning drug dealing at the restaurant where the
   prisoner had been employed; as a result, the district court's order granting
   the prisoner a new trial based on ineffective assistance of counsel is
   reversed.