Nicholas Godejohn asks judge for a new trial, attorneys argue he had ineffective counsel
Nicholas Godejohn, the 32-year-old Wisconsin man who is serving a life sentence for the infamous 2015 murder of Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard, was back in the courtroom this week.
Godejohn was convicted of first-degree murder and armed criminal action after a jury trial in 2018 for stabbing Dee Dee Blanchard after planning the murder with her daughter, Gypsy Rose Blanchard. He was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole plus an additional 25 years for armed criminal action.
However, Godejohn was back in a Greene County courtroom this week with new attorneys, asking the judge to set aside that conviction and order a new trial on the grounds that he had ineffective counsel in his trial.
For two days this week, Godejohn and his team of attorneys presented evidence to Circuit Court Judge David Jones, the same judge who presided over the trial. Meanwhile, Greene County Prosecutor Dan Patterson presented the state's side of the motion.
Godejohn’s attorneys' argument of ineffective assistance of counsel seemed to boil down to three key points: One, that his original lawyers failed to move for a change of venue even after the case gained significant traction in local and national media making it harder to seat an impartial jury; two, Godejohn’s lawyers failed to investigate or present the jury with enough witnesses or evidence that would have bolstered their claim that Godejohn had diminished capacity due to his autism; and three, his original lawyers failed to investigate or present the jury with evidence that Gypsy Blanchard was the one who planned most of the murder and Godejohn simply acted out her wishes.
Godejohn’s new lawyers introduced hundreds of pieces of evidence, which included dozens of examples of media coverage of the murder and subsequent court proceedings, including local coverage from TV stations like KY3, KOLR10 and articles from the News-Leader. Documentaries created by HBO and other streaming services were also introduced, and clips from the 2017 HBO documentary, “Mommy Dead and Dearest” as well as the 2018 TV movie “Gyspy’s Revenge” and the ABC 20/20 special "Gypsy's Truth and Lies" were played. Some of those featured discovery evidence that had been leaked to the media.
During this week's hearing, Godejohn’s post-conviction attorneys asked his trial attorneys Dewayne Perry and Andrew Mead why they didn’t move for a change of venue before selecting a jury when coverage of the case picked up, and the two offered very different answers.
Mead, who along with Perry was called on the second day of the post-conviction relief motion hearing, said he didn’t think it would have made a difference where the trial was held due to the national coverage.
“This case was televised nationally, it had national media attention, and I think there was a notion that a change in venue wouldn't have really assisted in getting us around those hurdles," Mead said.
While Perry said he actually thought the local media coverage and locals' potential prior knowledge of the case could have helped Godejohn.
“This was a case where the alleged victim was not viewed positively by the community, at least in my view, and I knew, as there normally is, that there was going to be an attempt on the part of the prosecutor to exclude any evidence of bad acts of Dee Dee Blanchard," Perry said. "I felt like that helped us, the fact that she was not a particularly innocent victim."
More: Gypsy Rose Blanchard marries Louisiana man during prison sentence
Godejohn’s post-conviction attorneys also questioned Mead, who led the defense’s jury selection during the trial, on why he didn’t question potential jurors more on what media they had consumed regarding the case, specifically they asked Mead if he had a specific strategy for not asking potential jurors whether or not they had seen the TV movie, "Gypsy’s Revenge," which premiered one to two weeks before jury selection began.
Mead said he didn't remember something premiering that close to trial.
Godejohn’s lawyers also asked both Mead and Perry about their decision to only call two witnesses, Gypsy Blanchard and Dr. Kent Franks, a Springfield psychologist who had done an evaluation on Godejohn and testified during trial that Godejohn had autism spectrum disorder level 2 and needed significant help.
More: Doctor says Godejohn struggles with deliberation, a basic component of 1st-degree murder
Specifically, Godejohn’s post-conviction lawyers questioned why members of Godejohn’s family, some of whom testified on the first day of the post-conviction relief hearing, were not called to provide anecdotal evidence as to the “severity” of his autism spectrum disorder and Asperger's syndrome.
Perry said he thought just using Franks was good enough.
"I didn't think we needed anyone else," Perry said.
Godejohn’s attorneys also questioned why Mead or Perry didn’t request Godejohn’s records from Waukesha County Jail in Wisconsin where he was arrested, which reportedly stated that Godejohn “did not understand the situation he was in and he was more concerned about asking how his girlfriend was and if she was okay." The records also apparently indicated that Godejohn was on suicide watch prior to his extradition to Greene County.
Perry said he had not received those records, but they could have been helpful during the trial.
The last major point Godejohn’s new attorneys hammered throughout the hearing was that the original defense attorneys failed to present multiple pieces of evidence that would have contradicted Gypsy Blanchard’s version of events, and her testimony that Godejohn did most of the planning of the murder.
Godejohn’s lawyers showed multiple videos in court, clips that were not shown at trial or to the jury, including one sent to Godejohn less than a month before the murder, where Gypsy Blanchard walked into her mother’s room, over to her side of the bed pointed at her pillow and then made a stabbing motion, almost identical to what is believed to have happened on the night Dee Dee Blanchard was killed.
More: With eye toward possible 2023 release, Gypsy Blanchard says she's working on a book
Other videos presented aimed to show that near the end of their relationship the dynamic had switched, and Godejohn was submissive while Gypsy Blanchard was dominant. Those videos included role-playing videos of Gypsy that were sent to Godejohn where she called Godejohn her “slave” and said she would take away his time with Gypsy if he disobeyed her. Another video showed Gypsy Blanchard talking about wanting to kill with Godejohn and how she felt they were both evil and could be evil together.
After watching the videos, Perry said they might have been helpful to show the jury.
In a cross-examination of Godejohn’s former attorneys, Patterson, the prosecutor, asked questions about plea deals that Godejohn rejected.
Perry said that as he remembers it, Godejohn rejected the two plea deals offered because he wanted something closer to what Gypsy Blanchard got, which was 10 years for second-degree murder. The lowest sentence Godejohn was ever offered was life with the possibility of parole on murder in the second degree.
"I don't know that he wanted exactly what she received, but I think he wanted something a lot closer to what she received than what the prosecutor was willing to give him," Perry said. "We felt like he deserved a lot closer to what she got than what he ended up getting, obviously."
Patterson also pointed out that prosecutors had a "mountain of evidence" to support premeditation, which is a key element to prove to get a first-degree murder conviction.
Both Perry and Mead agreed that there was significant evidence supporting that and that they had to fight it the whole trial.
"It was difficult because there was evidence of deliberation and we were trying to overcome that," Perry said. "There was a mountain of evidence we were trying to overcome just on that one issue."
Judge Jones also asked Perry and Mead some questions most notably whether their intent was to try to get a conviction lower than second-degree murder. Both Perry and Mead said, no. They thought second-degree murder was the lowest they could get for Godejohn given all of the evidence.
The judge did not make a decision on the motion for post conviction relief at the hearing, and both Godejohn's lawyers and prosecutors now have time to submit suggestions as to what the outcome should be and why. Jones will presumably make a decision on the appeal later this fall.
Jordan Meier covers public safety for the Springfield News-Leader. Contact her at jmeier@news-leader.com, or on Twitter @Jordan_Meier644.
This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Nicholas Godejohn asks judge to set aside conviction, order new trial
