59 results for 'cat:"Habeas" AND cat:"Murder"'.
J. Seeley finds the lower court properly denied the inmate's petition for a writ of habeas corpus because his claims of ineffective assistance related to the state's plea offer before a murder trial were meritless. The inmate's attorney properly explained the elements of the crimes with which he was charged and the state's burden of proof. Affirmed.
Court: Connecticut Court Of Appeals, Judge: Seeley, Filed On: October 13, 2023, Case #: AC45795, Categories: habeas, Ineffective Assistance, murder
J. Thomas finds that the district court properly denied serial killer Douglas Clark's habeas corpus petition challenging his California conviction and capital sentence for six counts of first-degree murder. Clark attempted a pro se defense but was found guilty and sentenced to death in 1983. The state court’s decision to consider Clark’s threat to “stand mute” before the jury in light of the record as a whole was not an unreasonable application of a precedent which permits the termination of self-representation when a defendant deliberately engages in serious and obstructionist misconduct. Affirmed.
Court: 9th Circuit, Judge: Thomas, Filed On: October 10, 2023, Case #: 21-99008, Categories: habeas, murder
J. Gilbert holds that the trial court erred in granting defendant's habeas petition after finding that the Governor lacked evidentiary support to deny him parole. Sufficient evidence supported the Governor's conclusion that defendant lacked insight into the 1995 murder of a 15-year-old. The depravity of the brutal killing after months of planning and his relative youth mean he remains a public safety risk. Reversed.
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Gilbert, Filed On: September 28, 2023, Case #: B321709, Categories: habeas, murder, Parole
J. Keller finds that upon reconsideration of defendant's habeas petition, which claimed false testimony related to his murder conviction, the court's previous denial stands. None of the newly presented material which alleges false testimony is convincing to likely change the outcome of his conviction.
Court: Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Judge: Keller, Filed On: September 27, 2023, Case #: WR-81,574-02, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Seeley finds the lower court properly dismissed the inmate's habeas petition. The possibility of undermining the defense's strategy of proving several witnesses intentionally misidentified the inmate as the shooter gave his attorney a legitimate reason not to call a witness who was allegedly willing to testify she saw "two masked men" commit the murder instead of the inmate. Affirmed.
Court: Connecticut Court Of Appeals, Judge: Seeley, Filed On: September 8, 2023, Case #: AC45841, Categories: habeas, Ineffective Assistance, murder
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J. Wilson finds that the district court properly denied defendant's habeas petition for relief from his death sentence for murder. Defendant failed to show that he was prejudiced by his sentencing counsel's failure to present additional evidence about his mental state at the time of the crime or his bipolar disorder. Affirmed.
Court: 11th Circuit, Judge: Wilson, Filed On: September 5, 2023, Case #: 22-10329, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
Per curiam, the Fifth Circuit finds the district court properly rejected the death row inmate’s claims for habeas relief. Defendant was found guilty for the murder of the mother of a five-month-old daughter. The jury found that the murder was committed intentionally and knowingly, along with aggravating factors of rape and kidnapping. In this application for habeas relief, defendant has not shown that trial counsel’s actions in investigating, compiling and presenting motivation and mitigating evidence fell below an objective standard of reasonableness. Other requests based on ineffective assistance in counsel’s presentation of testimony are meritless. Affirmed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Per curiam, Filed On: August 31, 2023, Case #: 12-70035, Categories: habeas, murder, Kidnapping
J. Gregory finds the lower court improperly dismissed the murderer's motion to review his 2013 federal habeas petition, which was denied for being untimely, on the grounds that his multiple mental health disabilities had prevented him from effectively petitioning the court. Following his arrest for the murders of his ex-wife and her boyfriend, he was twice found incompetent to stand trial and was twice admitted to a hospital for treatment to restore his competency. His motion was filed within a reasonable time, given the extensive evidence documenting his severe mental disabilities. Reversed.
Court: 4th Circuit, Judge: Gregory , Filed On: August 15, 2023, Case #: 20-6351, Categories: Competence, habeas, murder
J. Kethledge finds the lower court properly dismissed the death row inmate's second habeas petition. Even if the informant's testimony had been excluded in its entirety because of credibility concerns, a jury would have had more than enough evidence to convict him. Affirmed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Kethledge, Filed On: August 15, 2023, Case #: 21-3948, Categories: Evidence, habeas, murder
J. Du grants the death row inmate’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus on grounds of ineffective assistance. The court finds that supplemental mitigation evidence about his childhood upbringing, which was readily available had trial counsel investigated, portrayed defendant’s background as being filled with abuse, sexual abuse, encouraged drug use and neglect. This ground for granting the petition is substantial, and defendant has demonstrated cause and prejudice. A certificate of appealability is granted as to other grounds and defendant’s death sentence is vacated.
Court: USDC Nevada, Judge: Du, Filed On: August 11, 2023, Case #: 2:99cv360, NOS: Death Penalty - Habeas Corpus, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Nalbandian finds that the lower court was not required to consider alternatives to dismissal when the inmate sought to reinstate his habeas petition - based on both exhausted and unexhausted claims - because not only did he fail to request alternatives, but the court is also not required to inform a pro se litigant about the abeyance procedures outlined in the Supreme Court's decision in Pliler v. Ford. Affirmed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Nalbandian, Filed On: August 4, 2023, Case #: 21-1042, Categories: Criminal Procedure, habeas, murder
J. Wilson finds the lower court properly dismissed defendant’s petition for writ of habeas corpus. Defendant was found guilty of two counts of attempted first-degree murder and received an effective 47-year sentence. Defendant argues the trial court lacked subject matter jurisdiction, and that his convictions were void under the State’s improper notice of enhanced punishment. But the instant court finds defendant’s claims are without merit as his assertions would not void the judgments even if found to be true. The lower court did not abuse its discretion and defendant is not entitled to relief. Affirmed.
Court: Tennessee Court of Criminal Appeals, Judge: Wilson, Filed On: August 3, 2023, Case #: M2022-00857-CCA-R3-HC, Categories: habeas, murder, Sentencing
J. Ikuta finds that the district court improperly dismissed defendant's third and fourth federal habeas corpus petitions, and remanded. Defendant was convicted in California state court of one count of conspiracy to commit murder and one count of attempted murder on an aiding and abetting theory, and sentenced to 56 years to life. His conviction and sentence were affirmed on appeal. Defendant could not previously raise resentencing question under his petition, therefore the panel concluded that the third and fourth habeas petitions were not second or successive.
Court: 9th Circuit, Judge: Ikuta, Filed On: August 3, 2023, Case #: 20-16290, Categories: habeas, murder
J. Graves denies defendant’s request for a certificate of appealability to appeal the district court’s denial of his federal habeas corpus challenge to his capital murder conviction. The record shows that defendant concedes the court properly applied the “interest of justice” standard regarding indigent petitioners seeking substitute counsel in habeas proceedings. The court looked to the Fifth Circuit’s precedent in applying the standard for substitution of counsel to identify common circumstances in which good cause might exist, and there has been no abuse of discretion. The appeal is dismissed. The district court’s denial of substitute counsel is affirmed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Graves, Filed On: July 31, 2023, Case #: 22-70002, Categories: habeas, murder, Due Process
J. Wilson finds that the district court properly granted defendant's petition for habeas relief from his death sentence for murder. The district court correctly found that defendant's trial attorneys were ineffective during the penalty phase of the trial for failing to adequately investigate defendant's background and present mitigating evidence. Defendant's attorneys did not use court-awarded funds to retain a mitigation investigator and unreasonably delayed the start of their mitigation investigation. The investigation that was conducted was minimal and failed to uncover or present the jury with evidence of defendant's troubled upbringing and childhood sexual abuse. The trial outcome may have been different if the jury had been presented with all of the mitigating evidence. Affirmed.
Court: 11th Circuit, Judge: Wilson, Filed On: July 11, 2023, Case #: 21-13734, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Schostok finds that the lower court properly denied defendant's request to file a successive post-conviction petition challenging his sentence to life without parole for a murder committed at age 18. The legislature later made it illegal to deny any chance of parole to offenders under the age of 22, but the law does not apply retroactively. Affirmed.
Court: Illinois Appellate Court, Judge: Schostok, Filed On: July 7, 2023, Case #: 210312, Categories: habeas, murder
J. Larsen finds the lower court properly dismissed the inmate's habeas claim without reaching the merits. Even if he was to prevail on his claim that his murder conspiracy conviction no longer qualifies as a predicate crime of violence for sentencing purposes, he would still be serving two life sentences for other, unchallenged convictions and, therefore, is not arguing for the right to be released, as required under the habeas statute. Affirmed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Larsen, Filed On: June 23, 2023, Case #: 21-1781, Categories: habeas, murder, Sentencing
J. Smith, by certificate of appealability, finds the district court properly dismissed the capital murder death row inmate’s habeas petition. Though he says his late filing is excusable due to the Office of Capital Writs failure to fully investigate his mental health, his counsel did investigate by requesting a medical evaluation, at which point they were meaning to determine whether or not to allow the inmate to dismiss them and proceed pro se. Counsel was not ineffective in this. Affirmed.
Court: 5th Circuit, Judge: Smith, Filed On: June 19, 2023, Case #: 21-70008, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Miller-Lerman finds the district court properly denied the inmate’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Defendant, who was 17 at the time of his conviction, was convicted for other felonies while in prison and was also granted postconviction relief on his murder sentence from then-recent case law holding that mandatory life sentences without parole for juveniles are unconstitutional. He filed for the habeas writ, asserting that he had reached his mandatory discharge date in 2022. With all sentences aggregated, and applying the good time law in effect when the first of the sentences became final, the court correctly found that the claim failed to show entitlement to immediate discharge. Affirmed.
Court: Nebraska Supreme Court, Judge: Miller-Lerman, Filed On: June 16, 2023, Case #: S-22-605, Categories: habeas, Juvenile Law, murder
J. Gibbons finds the trial court erroneously granted the inmate's motion for compassionate release. Even if an error in his jury instructions during his trial on murder-for-hire charges rendered his sentence erroneous, he cannot use that error, in conjunction with his serious health issues, as an end run around the proper avenue for his postconviction claim. Therefore, because he had already filed a habeas petition and been denied relief, the sentencing error cannot serve as the type of extraordinary and compelling reason for his early release. Reversed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Gibbons, Filed On: June 9, 2023, Case #: 22-2037, Categories: habeas, murder, Sentencing
J. Tallman finds that the district court properly denied defendant's federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus in a case in which defendant was sentenced to death for a murder in 1979. Defendant claimed that he is intellectually disabled and therefore cannot constitutionally be executed. Under a three prong test, defendant did not establish that he suffered from significantly sub-average intellectual functioning. Affirmed.
Court: 9th Circuit, Judge: Tallman, Filed On: June 9, 2023, Case #: 20-99012, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
[Modified.] J. Ramirez modifies the first paragraph in a prisoner rights opinion with no change in judgment. The trial court properly rejected a habeas challenge to defendant's conditions of confinement as time-barred. His petition raises the same issues regarding the treatment of a medical condition called porphyria that he raised in an earlier action related to the conditions of his pretrial confinement.
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Ramirez, Filed On: June 7, 2023, Case #: E080436, Categories: habeas, murder, Prisoners' Rights
J. Thapar finds the district court properly denied the death row inmate's petition for a writ of habeas corpus related to his convictions for the kidnapping, rape and murder of a 9-year-old girl. Defendant's ineffective assistance of counsel claim related to DNA evidence found on the shorts of the victim was not only adjudicated on the merits by a state court, but the inmate failed to show the decision was unreasonable. Furthermore, several of the inmate's other ineffective assistance claims, including the lack of mitigating evidence about his childhood, were defaulted when he failed to raise them before the lower court and failed to present any significant evidence from the state court record. Affirmed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Thapar, Filed On: June 5, 2023, Case #: 19-5427, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Pryor finds that the district court properly denied defendant's petition for habeas relief from his death sentence for murder, armed robbery, burglary and other offenses. Defendant failed to show that the circumstances surrounding his challenges to allegedly racially-motivated jury strikes were not properly considered or adjudicated by the Georgia Supreme Court. Although inappropriate, the prosecutor's rants are not decisive evidence that he would discriminate against Black jurors if the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Batson v. Kentucky did not stop him. Correct standards were applied in finding that defendant's counsel adequately presented evidence at trial and sentencing of defendant's intellectual disability, mental illness and mitigating circumstances. The district court correctly found that defendant forfeited any direct challenge to his conviction based on his intellectual disability. Affirmed.
Court: 11th Circuit, Judge: Pryor, Filed On: June 2, 2023, Case #: 20-12804, Categories: Death Penalty, habeas, murder
J. Brennan upholds a district court ruling denying a request for a hearing of new eyewitness testimony by a defendant serving 28 years for the shootings of three men, one fatally, in 2009. After first holding that Wisconsin state courts properly ruled that the defendant’s ineffective assistance of counsel claims was procedurally defaulted, the appellate decision then affirms the lower court ruling. The introduction of new eyewitness testimony does not amount to a showing of actual innocence when strong and credible testimony to the contrary remains. Affirmed.
Court: 7th Circuit, Judge: Brennan, Filed On: June 1, 2023, Case #: 21-1402, Categories: Evidence, habeas, murder
J. Ramirez finds that the trial court properly rejected a habeas challenge to defendant's conditions of confinement as time-barred. His petition raises the same issues regarding the treatment of a medical condition called porphyria that he raised in an earlier action related to the conditions of his pretrial confinement.
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Ramirez, Filed On: May 30, 2023, Case #: E080436, Categories: habeas, murder, Prisoners' Rights
J. Bendix grants Leslie Van Houten's habeas petition and reinstates a 2020 decision by the parole board granting her parole. Governor Newsom reversed the board's decision to grant parole to Van Houten, who is serving life sentences for the Charles Manson-inspired murders of Rosemary and Leno La Bianca in 1969. Newsom's reversal was based on "unsupported intuition" and an unfounded conclusion that hidden factors make her a current danger who is unsuitable for parole.
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Bendix, Filed On: May 30, 2023, Case #: B320098, Categories: habeas, murder