Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-09-02269/USCOURTS-ca8-09-02269-0/pdf.json

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

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The Honorable Paul A. Magnuson, United States District Judge for the District

of Minnesota, adopting the report and recommendation of the Honorable Jeffrey J.

Keyes, United States Magistrate Judge for the District of Minnesota. 

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

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No. 09-2269

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Lennell M. Martin,

Appellant,

v.

Robert Fanies, Warden of Rush

City Minnesota Correctional

Facility,

Appellee.

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Appeal from the United States

District Court for the

District of Minnesota.

[UNPUBLISHED]

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 Submitted: February 8, 2010

 Filed: February 19, 2010

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Before WOLLMAN, HANSEN, and MELLOY, Circuit Judges. 

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PER CURIAM.

Lennell M. Martin appeals from the district court's1

 denial of his application for

a writ of habeas corpus. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254. He claims that the state court violated

his clearly established rights under the Sixth Amendment's Confrontation Clause when

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it admitted evidence of a dying declaration, and that it violated his clearly established

Fourteenth Amendment Due Process right to be present at every critical stage of the

criminal proceedings when the trial judge answered four jury questions outside of his

presence. We affirm.

I.

Martin was convicted in Minnesota state court of first degree murder following

the shooting death of Curtis Anthony, for which he is serving a life sentence.

Relevant to Martin's Confrontation Clause claim, the state trial court allowed

Anthony's girlfriend to testify that immediately after Anthony was shot he said to her,

"Call the Police. Jeff and Lenair." (Appellant's Br. at 9.) Martin did not object to the

testimony during trial, but he challenged the testimony on direct appeal to the

Minnesota Supreme Court as violating his Sixth Amendment Confrontation Clause

rights. Reviewing the claim for plain error, the Minnesota Supreme Court avoided the

issue of whether the statement was testimonial or nontestimonial for purposes of

Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004), and concluded that there was no

constitutional violation because a dying declaration is an exception to the Crawford

rule. 

Martin's second issue on appeal relates to four questions presented by the jury

to the judge during deliberations. Prior to sending the case to the jury, the trial judge,

the prosecutor, and Martin's defense counsel all agreed that the judge would not

summon the attorneys for jury questions unless the question was "of real substance."

The trial judge told the prosecutor and Martin's defense counsel that she would deny

any jury requests for definitions, unless the question presented was complicated, in

which case she would summon the attorneys and Martin. Martin was present during

this discussion of how to handle the jury questions, his counsel agreed to the proposed

procedure, and Martin did not object.

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The jury subsequently asked the trial judge four questions, two related to what

time they would return to the hotel, one requesting a dictionary, and one asking,

"[d]oes [the] rule of law define rash impulse? What is it?" (Appellant's Br. at 34.)

The judge denied the request for the dictionary, and she responded to the question

about defining rash impulse with a note stating, "[y]ou have the law the Judge has

given you. That is the only law that applies to this case." (Id.) On direct appeal,

Martin argued that the judge's interactions with the jury outside of his presence

violated his right under the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause to be present

at all critical stages of his criminal trial. The Minnesota Supreme Court rejected the

claim, concluding that the jury questions all fell within the agreement with the trial

court that the parties need not be summoned for non-substantive questions, and that

Martin, through his attorney, had waived any right he had to be present for the jury

questions.

In Martin's habeas action, the district court concluded that the Minnesota

Supreme Court did not unreasonably apply any clearly established federal law. The

court concluded that the relevant Supreme Court precedents supported the Minnesota

Supreme Court's conclusion that the admission of a dying declaration is an exception

to the Confrontation Clause as discussed in Crawford, and that no Supreme Court

precedent required that a criminal defendant personally waive the right to be present

during non-substantive jury questions. Martin appeals.

II.

As relevant to Martin's claims, a state prisoner is entitled to habeas relief only

if his state court proceedings "(1) resulted in a decision that 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). On

appeal, "we review the district court's findings of fact for clear error and its

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conclusions of law de novo." Garcia v. Bertsch, 470 F.3d 748, 752 (8th Cir. 2006)

(internal marks omitted).

The Supreme Court held in Crawford that the Confrontation Clause bars the

"admission of testimonial statements of a witness who did not appear at trial unless

he was unavailable to testify, and the defendant had had a prior opportunity for

cross-examination." Crawford, 541 U.S. at 53-54. The Supreme Court drew these

limitations (unavailability and prior opportunity for cross-examination) from the

common law established at the time of the Constitution's framing. Id. at 54. The

Court concluded that the "right . . . to be confronted with the witnesses against him"

as guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment was "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. In rejecting the dissent's argument that there were

exceptions for hearsay evidence that were also well established in 1791, the majority

distinguished between testimonial and nontestimonial statements, responding that

there was "scant evidence that exceptions were invoked to admit testimonial

statements against the accused in a criminal case." Id. at 56. The Supreme Court

noted however, that "[t]he one deviation we have found involves dying declarations."

Id. at 56 n.6. The Supreme Court noted this historic exception to the exclusion of

testimonial statements again in Giles v. California, 128 S. Ct. 2678, 2682-83 (2008)

("We have previously acknowledged that two forms of testimonial statements were

admitted at common law even though they were unconfronted. The first of these were

declarations made by a speaker who was both on the brink of death and aware that he

was dying." (internal citation omitted)).

"To obtain habeas relief, [Martin] must . . . be able to point to a Supreme Court

precedent that he thinks the [Minnesota] state courts acted contrary to or unreasonably

applied." See Buchheit v. Norris, 459 F.3d 849, 853 (8th Cir. 2006) (internal marks

omitted). The state court's application of federal law "must be shown to be not only

erroneous, but objectively unreasonable." Middleton v. McNeil, 541 U.S. 433, 436

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The Minnesota Supreme Court concluded that the four questions posed by the

jury were non-substantive and fell within the agreement that the trial court would

handle all non-substantive jury questions without summoning the attorneys or Martin.

This is a factual determination we take as true absent clear and convincing evidence

to the contrary. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). Martin offers no such evidence, and we

presume that this fact finding is correct.

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(2004) (per curiam) (internal marks omitted). Martin relies on Crawford, arguing that

the "express reasoning of Crawford indicates" that the Confrontation Clause does not

provide an exception for testimonial dying declarations (Appellant's Br. at 26),

making the Minnesota Supreme Court's holding that there was such an exception

unreasonable. Crawford did not involve a dying declaration, and Martin recognizes

that there is no clear Supreme Court precedent on point. In fact, Martin offers no

federal authority to support his position beyond the general holding of Crawford,

which itself noted the likely exception for dying declarations. "[A] state court does

not act contrary to or unreasonably apply clearly established federal law if there is no

controlling Supreme Court holding on the point." Losh v. Fabian, No. 09-1394, 2010

WL 6100, at * 2 (8th Cir. Jan. 4, 2010). Given the state of the federal law, the

Minnesota Supreme Court's decision to apply the United States Supreme Court's dicta

as stated in Crawford itself and repeated in Giles was not objectively unreasonable.

Cf. Jones v. St. Paul Cos., 495 F.3d 888, 893 (8th Cir. 2007) ("[F]ederal courts are

bound by the Supreme Court's considered dicta almost as firmly as by the Court's

outright holdings, particularly when the dicta is of recent vintage and not enfeebled

by any later statement." (internal marks omitted)).

We also reject Martin's argument that the Minnesota courts' conclusion that his

attorney could waive whatever right he had to be present for the jury questions was

objectively unreasonable. Martin relies on the general rule that the Due Process

Clause guarantees a criminal defendant the right to be present "at any stage of the

criminal proceeding that is critical to its outcome if his presence would contribute to

the fairness of the procedure." Kentucky v. Stincer, 482 U.S. 730, 745 (1987). Yet,

no Supreme Court case holds that a judge's receipt of and response to non-substantive

jury questions2

 during deliberation is one of those critical stages. Further, with the

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exception of certain fundamental rights that may only be waived by the defendant

personally, see New York v. Hill, 528 U.S. 110, 114 (2000) (listing as examples of

those fundamental rights the right to counsel and the right to plead not guilty), a

defendant's constitutional rights "may be effected by action of counsel." Id. Again,

Martin concedes that there is no Supreme Court case directly on point that holds that

the right to be present during the discussion of jury questions is one of the

fundamental rights that cannot be waived by defense counsel. The Minnesota

Supreme Court's decision was not an objectively unreasonable application of clearly

established Supreme Court precedent. See Losh, 2010 WL 6100, at * 2. 

III.

The district court's denial of Martin's application for habeas relief is affirmed.

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