Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca9-08-56218/USCOURTS-ca9-08-56218-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 530
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Habeas Corpus
Cause of Action: 

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FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

LUIS PHILLIP PONCE,  No. 08-56218

Petitioner-Appellant, D.C. No.

v.  CV-07-02705-

ODW-RZ T. FELKER, Warden,

Respondent-Appellee. OPINION 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Central District of California

Otis D. Wright, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted

February 2, 2010—Pasadena, California

Filed May 24, 2010

Before: Betty B. Fletcher, Harry Pregerson, and

Susan P. Graber, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Graber

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COUNSEL

Zandra L. Lopez, Law Office of Zandra L. Lopez, San Diego,

California, for the petitioner-appellant.

Stephanie C. Brenan, Deputy Attorney General, Office of the

Attorney General of California, Los Angeles, California, for

the respondent-appellee.

OPINION

GRABER, Circuit Judge: 

Petitioner Luis Phillip Ponce was convicted in California

state court of burglary and murder. In this appeal, he challenges the district court’s denial of his habeas petition, arguing that the admission of certain testimony violated his rights

under the Confrontation Clause. The California Court of

Appeal affirmed the convictions, reasoning that the testimony

fell within the “forfeiture by wrongdoing” exception to a

defendant’s right to confront the witnesses against him. The

Supreme Court later ruled, in Giles v. California, 128 S. Ct.

2678, 2693 (2008), that the forfeiture exception applies only

if a defendant specifically intended to prevent the witness

from testifying. Thus, Giles would have controlled Petitioner’s case had Giles been decided while his convictions were

on direct appeal. However, in holding that forfeiture requires

proof of a defendant’s intent to prevent testimony, Giles

established a new rule that does not apply retroactively. At the

time of Petitioner’s appeal, it was neither contrary to, nor an

unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law

the California appellate courts to rule that the forfeiture

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n did not require proof of an intent to make the witness

unavailable. Accordingly, we affirm.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In September 1998, Petitioner broke up with his girlfriend,

Eva Gooch, and got back together with a former girlfriend,

Christina Valencia. After Petitioner dumped Gooch, she

threatened to tell the police about Petitioner’s drug-dealing

activities. She also threatened to report Valencia to the welfare authorities for living with a drug dealer, told Valencia

that Petitioner had declared that he did not love Valencia, and

told Valencia that Gooch had a video of herself and Petitioner

having sex. Gooch’s threats and taunts angered Petitioner. 

At about 2 a.m. on December 6, 1998, Petitioner and a

companion, Alex Carballo, encountered a former friend of

Petitioner’s at a gas station. Petitioner told his former friend

that he had to “go kill some bitch.” Gooch was bartending

during the early morning hours of December 6, but her

employer sent her home at about 2:30 a.m. because she complained of feeling ill. The following morning, Gooch failed to

show up at her sister’s house, as planned, to bake cookies

with her niece. Gooch’s sister called her repeatedly, but

Gooch did not answer her phone. 

Later that day, Petitioner and Carballo were in a car accident. A bystander who witnessed the accident testified that

Petitioner had an injured hand wrapped in a white cloth covered in stains that looked like blood stains. The bystander

asked Petitioner if he had hurt himself in the accident; Petitioner responded that he had injured his hand before the car

accident. The bystander also noticed that Petitioner was wearing jeans that bore stains similar to those on the bandage on

his hand. 

On December 9, 1998, Gooch’s body was discovered in her

apartment. She had been stabbed approximately 30 times, and

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a broken knife blade was embedded in her throat. An uncapped bleach bottle lay next to her body. DNA testing of blood

found on the bleach bottle and on the kitchen counter of the

apartment showed that the blood contained a mixture of

Gooch’s and Petitioner’s blood. DNA testing also showed that

saliva on two cigarette butts in the apartment had come from

Carballo. 

The State of California tried Petitioner for first-degree burglary and first-degree murder. His first trial resulted in a mistrial on the burglary count, and the California Court of Appeal

reversed his murder conviction because of an erroneous jury

instruction. At Petitioner’s second trial, the prosecution introduced the evidence summarized above, and the court also permitted two witnesses to testify regarding Gooch’s statements

to them.1

Vikki Gibson, a private security guard in Gooch’s apartment building, testified that she went to Gooch’s apartment

about two weeks before the murder because she heard loud

banging noises. Gooch came to the door with a hammer in her

hand and explained to Gibson that she was nailing boards

over her balcony window to keep “Louie” out. 

In addition, Bruce Richards, the apartment leasing agent,

testified that Gooch called him on December 5 and asked him

to arrange for the security guards to patrol her floor more frequently. Richards testified that Gooch said that she had

received a phone call from Petitioner and that Petitioner had

threatened, “I’m gonna kill you, bitch.” 

The jury convicted Petitioner of both burglary and murder.

The court sentenced Petitioner to 25 years to life with the possibility of parole for the murder and four years for burglary.

The California Court of Appeal affirmed Petitioner’s convic1The trial court found that those two statements were not “testimonial”

for Confrontation Clause purposes. 

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tions on January 25, 2006. The court held that the testimony

by Gibson and Richards regarding Gooch’s fears was proper

because Petitioner had forfeited his Confrontation Clause

rights by killing Gooch. The court also held that admission of

the testimony, if erroneous, was harmless error because there

was substantial evidence against Petitioner aside from the

challenged testimony. The California Supreme Court summarily denied Petitioner’s petition for review on April 12, 2006.

Petitioner filed a petition in federal court for a writ of

habeas corpus, arguing, among other things, that the admission of the testimony regarding Gooch’s statements violated

his rights under the Confrontation Clause. On June 18, 2008,

the district court denied the petition, concluding that the state

court’s decision to affirm Petitioner’s conviction was neither

contrary to, nor an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law. The district court also ruled that the disputed statements were not testimonial, an issue not reached by

the California Court of Appeal. On June 25, 2008, the

Supreme Court decided Giles, 128 S. Ct. at 2688, in which the

Court held that the forfeiture by wrongdoing exception

applies only to those cases in which a defendant secured the

unavailability of a witness with the intent to prevent the testimony. Contending that the record does not show that he had

such an intent, Petitioner now appeals the district court’s

denial of his habeas petition.

STANDARDS OF REVIEW

We review de novo the district court’s denial of a petition

for a writ of habeas corpus. Lambert v. Blodgett, 393 F.3d

943, 964 (9th Cir. 2004). Because Petitioner filed his habeas

petition after the effective date of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”), we apply

AEDPA’s standards. Accordingly, habeas relief is warranted

only if the state court’s decision was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law as

determined by the Supreme Court, or rested on an unreasonPONCE v. FELKER 7379

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able determination of facts in light of the evidence presented

in the state court proceeding. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).

“ ‘[C]learly established Federal law’ . . . refers to the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of [the Supreme Court]’s decisions as of the time of the relevant state-court decision.”

Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412 (2000).

DISCUSSION

[1] The Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to

the United States Constitution provides that, “[i]n all criminal

prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to be confronted with the witnesses against him.” The “witnesses” to

which the Confrontation Clause refers include not only the

witnesses testifying in court, but also certain out-of-court

declarants. Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 50-51

(2004). For many years, the Supreme Court approved of the

admission of unconfronted out-of-court statements if they

bore adequate “ ‘indicia of reliability,’ ” and such indicia

were presumed if “a firmly rooted hearsay exception” applied.

Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56, 66 (1980). However, in Crawford, the Court rejected the Ohio v. Roberts approach. “The

Roberts test . . . replaces the constitutionally prescribed

method of assessing reliability with a wholly foreign one.”

Crawford, 541 U.S. at 62. Accordingly, hearsay exception or

not, the Confrontation Clause generally requires an opportunity for confrontation. But this right may be forfeited by a

defendant’s wrongdoing. Id.

Here, Gibson and Richards testified against Petitioner by

recounting Gooch’s statements about her fear of Petitioner

and his threat to her. We assume, without deciding, that the

statements were testimonial.2 Gooch, the dead victim, was not

2Not all out-of-court statements are “testimonial,” and the Confrontation

Clause does not apply to non-testimonial statements. Whorton v. Bockting,

549 U.S. 406, 420 (2007). The Supreme Court has yet to define precisely

what are “testimonial” and “non-testimonial” statements. See Davis v.

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available for cross-examination. The California Court of

Appeal held that Petitioner had forfeited his right to confront

Gooch by murdering her. 

[2] The Supreme Court had previously recognized the doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing, but the Court had not

defined the precise parameters of the doctrine before the California Court of Appeal affirmed Petitioner’s convictions and

the California Supreme Court denied his petition for review

in 2006. Approximately two years later, in Giles, the Supreme

Court held that the forfeiture exception did not apply to every

instance in which a defendant’s wrongdoing prevented a witness from testifying. Rather, a defendant forfeits the right to

confront a witness only when the defendant’s conduct was

“designed” to prevent testimony. Giles, 128 S. Ct. at 2688.

The state courts here made no such finding. The crux of Petitioner’s habeas petition, then, is that his convictions violated

clearly established federal law and that Giles proves it. 

I. Retroactivity

The State of California argues that Petitioner seeks to apply

Giles retroactively to his convictions, in violation of Teague

v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989). “When a State raises the issue

Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 822 (2006) (“Without attempting to produce

an exhaustive classification of all conceivable statements—or even all

conceivable statements in response to police interrogation—as either testimonial or nontestimonial, it suffices to decide the present cases to hold as

follows . . . .”); Crawford, 541 U.S. at 68 (“We leave for another day any

effort to spell out a comprehensive definition of ‘testimonial.’ ”). The

Supreme Court is currently considering Michigan v. Bryant, No. 09-150,

in which it may provide us more guidance on this issue. The admission of

the disputed testimony here could not have violated Petitioner’s rights

under the Confrontation Clause unless the statements were testimonial.

However, we need not resolve whether the statements were actually testimonial, because we affirm the district court’s denial of the habeas petition

on other grounds. Accordingly, we assume for the sake of argument that

the statements were testimonial. 

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of retroactivity, federal habeas courts must apply Teague

before considering the merits of a claim.” Butler v. Curry, 528

F.3d 624, 633 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 129 S. Ct. 767 (2008)

(internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, we turn first to the

Teague question. 

[3] For purposes of analyzing a habeas claim, Teague

divided constitutional criminal procedure decisions into two

categories: new rules and old rules. “[A]n old rule applies

both on direct and collateral review, but a new rule is generally applicable only to cases that are still on direct review.”

Whorton v. Bockting, 549 U.S. 406, 416 (2007). “[A] case

announces a new rule when it breaks new ground or imposes

a new obligation on the States or the Federal Government,”

or “if the result was not dictated by precedent existing at the

time the defendant’s conviction became final.” Teague, 489

U.S. at 301 (plurality opinion). “The explicit overruling of an

earlier holding no doubt creates a new rule; it is more difficult, however, to determine whether [the Supreme Court]

announce[s] a new rule when a decision extends the reasoning

of [the Court’s] prior cases.” Saffle v. Parks, 494 U.S. 484,

488 (1990). In such circumstances, a court is to “determine

whether a state court considering [the petitioner’s] claim at

the time his conviction became final would have felt compelled by existing precedent to conclude that the rule [the

petitioner] seeks was required by the Constitution.” Id. Thus,

our task here is to determine whether the holding of Giles,

which did not overrule any earlier Supreme Court case, was

actually compelled by existing precedent. 

[4] Petitioner contends that Giles restated an old rule

because Giles relied on the Supreme Court’s earlier opinions

in Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (1879); Crawford,

541 U.S. 36; and Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813 (2006),

as well as on founding-era common law. As we explain

below, Petitioner is incorrect. Reynolds, 98 U.S. at 158, held

that a defendant could forfeit the protections of the Confrontation Clause if the defendant wrongfully procured the unavaila7382 PONCE v. FELKER

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bility of a witness. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 54, 62, held that the

right of confrontation is subject to the exceptions to that right

recognized at the time of the founding and confirmed that forfeiture by wrongdoing is a viable exception. Davis, 547 U.S.

at 833, discussed the reason for the forfeiture exception and

stated that the exception was codified in the Federal Rules of

Evidence. None of those cases held that the exception

required proof of a specific intent to prevent testimony, and

none compelled that holding in Giles. Thus, we reject Petitioner’s argument and hold that, under the Teague analysis,

Giles promulgated a new rule.

The Supreme Court first addressed the forfeiture exception

in Reynolds, 98 U.S. at 158. Reynolds involved a defendant,

on trial for bigamy, who kept his second wife away from a

deputy marshal seeking to serve a subpoena on her. Id. at 160.

Because the second wife did not appear to testify, the trial

court allowed the prosecution to read to the jury her testimony

from another trial. Id. at 160-61. The Supreme Court held that

the admission of this evidence did not violate the defendant’s

rights under the Confrontation Clause. Id. at 160. The Court

stated:

The Constitution gives the accused the right to a

trial at which he should be confronted with the witnesses against him; but if a witness is absent by his

own wrongful procurement, he cannot complain if

competent evidence is admitted to supply the place

of that which he has kept away. The Constitution

does not guarantee an accused person against the

legitimate consequences of his own wrongful acts. It

grants him the privilege of being confronted with the

witnesses against him; but if he voluntarily keeps the

witnesses away, he cannot insist on his privilege. If,

therefore, when absent by his procurement, their evidence is supplied in some lawful way, he is in no

condition to assert that his constitutional rights have

been violated.

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Id. at 158 (emphases added). 

The Supreme Court next referred to forfeiture by wrongdoing in Crawford, 541 U.S. at 62. Crawford did not involve the

forfeiture exception directly. But the Court in Crawford stated

that “the rule of forfeiture by wrongdoing (which we accept)

extinguishes confrontation claims on essentially equitable

grounds; it does not purport to be an alternative means of

determining reliability.” Id. Crawford also instructed the

courts that the Confrontation Clause “is most naturally read as

a reference to the right of confrontation at common law,

admitting only those exceptions established at the time of the

founding.” Id. at 54. 

Finally, in Davis,

3

 the Supreme Court again discussed the

forfeiture exception. The Court explained the underlying

rationale for the exception, stating:

[W]hen defendants seek to undermine the judicial

process by procuring or coercing silence from witnesses and victims, the Sixth Amendment does not

require courts to acquiesce. While defendants have

no duty to assist the State in proving their guilt, they

do have the duty to refrain from acting in ways that

destroy the integrity of the criminal-trial system. We

reiterate what we said in Crawford: that “the rule of

forfeiture by wrongdoing . . . extinguishes confrontation claims on essentially equitable grounds.” That

3The Teague inquiry looks to the state of the law at the time that a petitioner’s conviction became final. Saffle, 494 U.S. at 488. Here, Petitioner’s

conviction became final on July 11, 2006, when “a judgment of conviction

ha[d] been rendered, the availability of appeal exhausted, and the time for

a petition for certiorari elapsed.” Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314, 321

n.6 (1987). The Supreme Court decided Davis after the California

Supreme Court denied review of the state appellate decision, but approximately three weeks before Petitioner’s convictions became final. Thus, we

consider Davis to determine whether, for purposes of Petitioner’s case,

Giles established a new rule. 

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is, one who obtains the absence of a witness by

wrongdoing forfeits the constitutional right to confrontation.

547 U.S. at 833 (emphases added) (citations and emphasis

omitted). Furthermore, the Court suggested that the Federal

Rules of Evidence might describe the contours of the exception. It stated:

We take no position on the standards necessary to

demonstrate such forfeiture, but federal courts using

Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(6), which codifies

the forfeiture doctrine, have generally held the Government to the preponderance-of-the-evidence standard.

Id. (emphasis added). Federal Rule of Evidence 804(b)(6)

provides a hearsay exception for “[a] statement offered

against a party that has engaged or acquiesced in wrongdoing

that was intended to, and did, procure the unavailability of

the declarant as a witness.” (Emphasis added.)

In Giles, the Supreme Court examined whether the forfeiture exception applies to cases in which there is no showing

that a defendant’s wrongdoing was intended specifically to

secure the unavailability of a witness. The Court determined

that the terms used to define the rule at common law “suggest

that the exception applied only when the defendant engaged

in conduct designed to prevent the witness from testifying.”

Giles, 128 S. Ct. at 2683. Furthermore, in early cases, “[t]he

manner in which the rule was applied makes plain” this limitation. Id. at 2684. During the founding era, courts uniformly

excluded testimony in cases—such as many murder

prosecutions—in which the defendant had apparently caused

a person to be absent, but without the specific intent to prevent testimony. Id. at 2684-86. Finally, the Court noted that

“American courts never—prior to 1985—invoked forfeiture

outside the context of deliberate witness tampering.” Id. at

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2687. Accordingly, despite the more recent cases in lower

courts, the Supreme Court “decline[d] to approve an exception to the Confrontation Clause unheard of at the time of the

founding or for 200 years thereafter.” Id. at 2693.

Reynolds and Crawford are insufficient to dictate the rule

that a defendant forfeits Confrontation Clause rights only if

the intent of the wrongdoing was specifically to prevent testimony. Those cases describe the exception in general terms

and establish merely that a defendant’s deliberate wrongdoing

may forfeit the right to confrontation. They do not themselves

impose an intent requirement. 

Nor does the Court’s reference in Crawford to founding-era

exceptions to the right of confrontation compel the rule

announced in Giles. Although Giles relied heavily on common law cases, 128 S. Ct. at 2683-86, 2688, both Justice Souter’s concurrence in Giles and Justice Breyer’s dissent show

that the common law cases and treatises can be read in different ways. See id. at 2694 (Souter, J. concurring) (concluding

that “the early cases on the exception were not calibrated

finely enough to answer the narrow question here”); id. at

2696-97, 2700-07 (Breyer, J., dissenting) (analyzing common

law sources). Thus, Reynolds and Crawford are consistent

with Giles but do not compel it.

Davis edges closer to the rule in Giles by discussing defendants who “seek to undermine the judicial process” and by

describing Federal Rule of Evidence 804, which contains the

intent requirement, as “codif[ying] the forfeiture doctrine.”

547 U.S. at 833. But even Davis does not impose an intent

requirement, and it still fails to compel the rule in Giles. 

A new rule is one “over which reasonable jurists could disagree.” Caspari v. Bohlen, 510 U.S. 383, 395 (1994) (brackets

and internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, the existence of

conflicting decisions among other courts before the Supreme

Court’s articulation of a rule, or of a dissent accompanying

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that articulation, weighs against a conclusion that precedent

compelled a decision. See id. (noting a conflict among federal

and state courts); Sawyer v. Smith, 497 U.S. 227, 236-37

(1990) (noting the dissent accompanying a decision promulgating a rule). Here, both of those circumstances combine to

demonstrate that Giles represented more than just the restatement of an old rule. There was a seven-to-three split among

lower courts after Davis and before Giles, with the predominant view being that the forfeiture exception did not require

an intent to prevent testimony. Compare United States v.

Garcia-Meza, 403 F.3d 364, 370-71 (6th Cir. 2005) (holding

that forfeiture does not require proof of intent); People v.

Giles, 152 P.3d 433, 443 (Cal. 2007) (same), vacated, 128 S.

Ct. at 2693; State v. Moua Her, 750 N.W.2d 258, 270-74

(Minn. 2008) (same), vacated, 129 S. Ct. 929 (2009); State v.

Sanchez, 177 P.3d 444, 456 (Mont. 2008) (same); State v.

Mason, 162 P.3d 396, 404 (Wash. 2007) (same); State v.

Mechling, 633 S.E.2d 311, 326 (W.Va. 2006) (same); and

State v. Jensen, 727 N.W.2d 518, 535 (Wis. 2007) (same),

with People v. Moreno, 160 P.3d 242, 247 (Colo. 2007) (holding that forfeiture requires proof of intent); People v. Stechly,

870 N.E.2d 333, 353 (Ill. 2007) (same); and State v. Romero,

156 P.3d 694, 703 (N.M. 2007) (same). Furthermore, Justices

Breyer, Stevens, and Kennedy dissented from the Court’s

opinion in Giles. 128 S. Ct. at 2695. Looking to the judgments

of “reasonable jurists,” Caspari, 510 U.S. at 395, and to our

own assessment of what a state court would have understood

Davis to require, we conclude that Davis did not compel the

result in Giles. 

Moreover, although Giles itself traced the intent requirement back to common law, it also acknowledged that post1985 forfeiture cases and state evidence codes do not all

require proof of intent. 128 S. Ct. at 2687-88 & n.2. Giles thus

represented a departure from this more modern trend regarding the forfeiture exception. The holding of Giles is a new

rule for Teague purposes. 

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[5] Even a new rule may be applied retroactively if the rule

is substantive or if it is a watershed rule. Teague, 489 U.S. at

311. Neither exception applies here. Giles promulgated a rule

of criminal procedure, not a substantive rule. Furthermore,

Giles did not announce a watershed rule. The Supreme Court

determined in Whorton, 549 U.S. at 421, that Crawford did

not announce a watershed rule. Crawford represented a dramatic shift in Confrontation Clause law, overturning the “indicia of reliability” test that had been in use for decades.

Giles, by contrast, clarified a subsidiary aspect of the rule

announced by Crawford. If Crawford was not a watershed

rule, then Giles cannot have been one either. We hold that

Giles does not apply retroactively to state court convictions

that became final before the Supreme Court issued Giles.

II. Clearly Established Federal Law

Petitioner argues that the state court’s admission of Gibson

and Richards’ testimony regarding Gooch’s statements was

contrary to or an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law because it was clearly established that the

forfeiture exception applied only if it could be shown that his

purpose in killing Gooch was to prevent her from testifying.

We are not persuaded.

[6] The “clearly established” inquiry is related to our

examination of whether Giles constituted a new rule or an old

rule under Teague. An “old rule” under Teague generally constitutes clearly established law for purposes of AEDPA. Williams, 529 U.S. at 412. But, because we determined that Giles

announced a new rule, we must consider whether Reynolds

and Crawford clearly established that the forfeiture exception

requires proof of a defendant’s intent to prevent testimony.

We do not consider Davis here because the Supreme Court

did not decide Davis until after the California Court of Appeal

affirmed Petitioner’s convictions and the California Supreme

Court denied review of his appeal. See Stokes v. Schriro, 465

F.3d 397, 401-02 (9th Cir. 2006) (holding that we assess

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clearly established law as of the date of the last reasoned state

court decision). 

[7] If Supreme Court cases “give no clear answer to the

question presented,” the state court’s decision cannot be an

unreasonable application of clearly established federal law.

Wright v. Van Patten, 552 U.S. 120, 126 (2008) (per curiam);

accord Carey v. Musladin, 549 U.S. 70, 77 (2006). On the

other hand, “ignoring the fundamental principles established

by [the Supreme Court’s] most relevant precedents” may be

contrary to or an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law. Abdul-Kabir v. Quarterman, 550 U.S. 233,

258 (2007). Here, neither Reynolds nor Crawford clearly

established the crucial principle such that the state court’s

decision was contrary to or an unreasonable application of

federal law at the time. 

The fundamental principle of Reynolds seems to be that a

defendant forfeits the right to confrontation if a witness is

“absent by his procurement.” 98 U.S. at 158. This holding

does not resolve the question of what constitutes “procurement.” Even in Giles, the Supreme Court acknowledged that

there are conflicting definitions of that term. 128 S. Ct. at

2683. Thus, Reynolds “give[s] no clear answer,” Wright, 552

U.S. at 126, to the question presented in Giles. 

Petitioner claims, however, that Crawford indirectly established the necessary rule. Crawford established the fundamental principle that the Confrontation Clause incorporates those

exceptions recognized by founding-era common law. 541

U.S. at 54. Giles then held that the founding-era forfeiture

exception contained the intent requirement and, indeed, that

“[t]he manner in which the rule was applied makes plain” this

limitation. 128 S. Ct. at 2684. But that statement falls short of

proving that the scope of the forfeiture requirement at common law was clear enough—before Giles—to constitute

“clearly established” federal law in 2006. See id. at 2694

(Souter, J., concurring) (concluding that “the early cases on

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the exception were not calibrated finely enough to answer the

narrow question here”). Indeed, the dissent in Giles, id. at

2696-97, 2700-07 (Breyer, J., dissenting), demonstrates that

the common law cases and treatises can be read another way.

Giles teaches that this alternative reading is wrong, but this

does not mean that, before Giles, the alternative reading was

an unreasonable application of clearly established law. 

[8] Our conclusion that the scope of the forfeiture exception was “an open question in [Supreme Court] jurisprudence,” Carey, 549 U.S. at 76, is also confirmed by the

pronounced split among other courts on the scope of the

exception after Crawford and before Giles. See Boyd v. Newland, 467 F.3d 1139, 1152 (9th Cir. 2006) (“[I]n the face of

authority [from one state and three federal circuits] that is

directly contrary to Tighe, and in the absence of explicit direction from the Supreme Court, we cannot hold that the California courts’ use of Petitioner’s juvenile adjudication as a

sentencing enhancement was contrary to, or involved an

unreasonable application of, Supreme Court precedent.”); see

also Holland v. Anderson, 583 F.3d 267, 282 (5th Cir. 2009)

(“This clear split among federal—and state—courts . . . indicates that the Mississippi Supreme Court’s denial of [the petitioner’s] claim that he had such a right cannot possibly be

‘contrary to or involve[ ] an unreasonable application of,

clearly established Federal law.’ ”), cert. denied, 2010 WL

545503 (U.S. Apr. 19, 2010) (No. 09-9002); Evenstad v. Carlson, 470 F.3d 777, 783 (8th Cir. 2006) (“When the federal

circuits disagree as to a point of law, the law cannot be considered ‘clearly established’ under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1).”).

There was an eight-to-four split among courts after Crawford on whether forfeiture required proof of intent.4 Compare

4The conflicting cases include two pre-Davis cases in addition to the

post-Davis ones listed in the Teague analysis above. In the Teague analysis, the pre-Davis cases were not relevant to the question whether Davis

would have compelled a state court to hold that the forfeiture by wrongdoing exception requires proof of a defendant’s intent to prevent testimony.

Here, by contrast, the cases after Crawford and before Davis—as well as

the cases after Davis—confirm that the scope of the exception was an

open question at the time of Petitioner’s appeal and, indeed, until Giles.

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Garcia-Meza, 403 F.3d at 370-71 (holding that forfeiture does

not require proof of intent); Giles, 152 P.3d at 443 (same);

State v. Meeks, 88 P.3d 789, 794 (Kan. 2004) (same), overruled in part on another ground by State v. Davis, 158 P.3d

317, 322 (Kan. 2006); Moua Her, 750 N.W.2d at 270-74

(same); Sanchez, 177 P.3d at 456 (same); Mason, 162 P.3d at

404 (same); Mechling, 633 S.E.2d at 326 (same); and Jensen,

727 N.W.2d at 535 (same), with Moreno, 160 P.3d at 247

(holding that forfeiture requires proof of intent); Stechly, 870

N.E.2d at 353 (same); Commonwealth v. Edwards, 830

N.E.2d 158, 170 (Mass. 2005) (same); and Romero, 156 P.3d

at 703 (same). Those conflicting cases weigh very strongly

against a conclusion that the intent requirement was clearly

established before Giles. 

[9] Before Giles, no holding from the Supreme Court

required state courts to restrict the forfeiture exception to

those cases in which a defendant intended to prevent a witness

from testifying. Cf. Carey, 549 U.S. at 77 (“No holding of this

Court required the California Court of Appeal to apply the test

of Williams and Flynn to the spectator’s conduct here.”).

Therefore, the state court’s decision in Petitioner’s case was

neither contrary to, nor an unreasonable application of, clearly

established federal law. 

[10] Furthermore, even if the admission of the testimony

was contrary to or an unreasonable application of clearly

established federal law, the state court’s decision that the error

would have been harmless was not an unreasonable determination. See Fry v. Pliler, 551 U.S. 112, 119 (2007) (“[A] federal court may not award habeas relief under § 2254 unless

the harmlessness determination itself was unreasonable.”).

There was weighty evidence against Petitioner independent of

the unconfronted statements, including testimony by Petitioner’s former friend that Petitioner said he was going to “go kill

some bitch”; testimony that, on the day of the murder, Petitioner’s hand was injured other than in the car accident; and

DNA evidence of Petitioner’s blood in Gooch’s kitchen and

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on the bleach bottle next to her body. In light of this evidence,

it was not unreasonable for the state courts to determine that

the additional testimony about Gooch’s fear of Petitioner and

his threat did not have a “substantial and injurious effect or

influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” Brecht v.

Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 631 (1993) (internal quotation

marks omitted).

For the foregoing reasons, the district court properly denied

the habeas petition.

AFFIRMED.

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