On Point: j. Appeals

Brumfield v. Cane, USSC No. 13-1433, (June 18, 2015), reversing Brumfield v. Cain, 744 F.3d 918 (5th Cir. 2014); SCOTUSblog page (including links to briefs and commentary); Majority opinion by Sotomayor; dissenting opinion by Thomas (joined in part by Roberts, Scalia and Alito)

Brumfield was convicted of murder and sentenced to death before Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002) prohibited the execution of the intellectually disabled. Afterwards, Brumfield, who has an IQ of 75, sought to prove is intellectual disability in state court, but was denied the time and funding to get an expert as well as an evidentiary hearing. In a 5-4 decision, SCOTUS found this an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented under 28 USC §2254(d)(2) and allowed Brumfield to have his Atkins claim considered on the merits in federal court.

Davis v. Ayala, USSC No. 13-1428 (June 18, 2015), reversing Ayala v. Wong, 756 F.3d 656 (9th Cir. 2013); majority opinion by Justice Alito; concurrences by Justices Kennedy and Thomas; dissent by Justice Sotomayor

SCOTUSblog page (including links to briefs and commentary)

Jury selection for Hector Ayala’s murder trial spanned 3 months and involved more than 200 prospective jurors. So when the prosecutor used peremptory challenges to strike every single Black and Hispanic juror from the pool, the defense objected based on  Batson v. Kentucky. The trial court gave the prosecution a chance to present race neutral reasons for its strikes, but excluded the defense from the hearing. Ayala, who was convicted, said excluding him and his lawyer violated his constitutional rights. The majority assumed, but did not decide that, a constitutional violation occurred  and then held . . . (all together now) “harmless error!”

The California Supreme Court held that it was error (as a matter of state law)

Jennings v. Stephens, USSC No. 13-7211, 2015 WL 159277 (January 14, 2015), reversing Jennings v. Stephens, 537 Fed. Appx. 326 (5th Cir. July 22, 2013); Scotusblog page (includes links to briefs and commentary)

A federal district court granted Jennings’s habeas relief, ordering a new sentencing hearing based on two of the three theories of ineffective assistance of counsel that Jennings raised. The state appealed, and Jennings defended the district court judgment on all three theories. The Fifth Circuit held that Jennings’s claim on the third theory was procedurally barred because it was rejected by the district court and Jennings hadn’t cross-appealed or obtained a certificate of appealability. In a majority opinion authored by Justice Scalia the Supreme Court reverses, holding that Jennings may defend the district court’s judgment based on the third theory.

Questions presented:

I.   Whether a state court that considers the evidence presented at a petitioner’s penalty phase proceeding as determinative of the petitioner’s claim of mental retardation under Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304 (2002), has based its decision on an unreasonable determination of facts under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2).

II.   Whether a state court that denies funding to an indigent petitioner who has no other means of obtaining evidence of his mental retardation has denied petitioner his “opportunity to be heard,”

Glebe v. Frost, USSC No. 14-95, 11/17/14 (per curiam), reversing Frost v. Van Boening, 757 F.3d 910 (9th Cir. 2014) (en banc); docket and Scotusblog page

Supreme Court precedent has not clearly established that improper restriction of a defendant’s closing argument is structural error, so the Ninth Circuit erred in granting habeas relief on that ground.

Questions presented:

(1) Whether a state court’s rejection of a claim of federal constitutional error on the ground that any error, if one occurred, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt is an “adjudicat[ion] on the merits” within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), so that a federal court may set aside the resulting final state conviction only if the defendant can satisfy the restrictive standards imposed by that provision; and

(2) Whether the court of appeals properly applied the standard articulated in Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619 (1993).

Lopez v. Smith, USSC No. 13-946, 10/6/14 (per curiam), reversing Smith v. Lopez, 731 F.3d 859 (9th Cir. 2013); docket

When a state prisoner seeks federal habeas relief on the ground that a state court, in adjudicating a claim on the merits, misapplied federal law, a federal court may grant relief only if the state court’s decision was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). We have emphasized, time and again, that the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), … prohibits the federal courts of appeals from relying on their own precedent to conclude that a particular constitutional principle is “clearly established.” …. Because the Ninth Circuit failed to comply with this rule, we reverse its decision granting habeas relief to respondent Marvin Smith. (Slip op. at 1).

Randy White v. Robert Keith Woodall, USSC No. 12-794, 4/23/14, reversing and remanding Woodall v. Simpson, 685 F.3d 574 (6th Cir. 2012); case activity

It’s getting harder and harder to win a habeas case.  Woodall requested an instruction forbidding jurors from drawing adverse inferences from his decision to not testify during the penalty phase of his capital murder trial.  The majority opinion, authored by Scalia, held that SCOTUS precedent requiring a “no adverse inference” instruction was clearly established for the guilt phase of a trial, but not the penalty phase.

Question Presented:

 Did the Fifth Circuit err in holding that a federal habeas petitioner who prevailed in the district court on an ineffective assistance of counsel claim must file a separate notice of appeal and motion for a certificate of appealability to raise an allegation of deficient performance that the district court rejected even though the Fifth Circuit acquired jurisdiction over the entire claim as a result of the respondent’s appeal?

Burt v. Titlow, USSC No. 12-414, 11/5/13

United States Supreme Court decision, reversing Titlow v. Burt, 680 F.3d 577 (6th Cir. 2012)

When a state prisoner asks a federal court to set aside a sentence due to ineffective assistance of counsel during plea bargaining, our cases require that the federal court use a “‘doubly deferential’” standard of review that gives both the state court and the defense attorney the benefit of the doubt.