The case provides a convenient synthesis of the principles applicable when incompetence of trial counsel is alleged on appeal: (1) the inquiry is primarily objective, examining the trial record; (2) conduct capable of rational explanation binds the client; (3) subjective evidence about counsel's reasoning is only exceptionally required; and (4) the ultimate question is whether the appellant lost a fairly open chance of acquittal. Trial counsel's rational tactical decisions — including editing an ERISP to remove prejudicial drug references, not calling the accused to give evidence, and not calling a co-offender who refused to confer — bound the applicant and did not give rise to a miscarriage of justice.
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