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

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In the 

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 15‐1592

DUANE E. TURNER,

Petitioner‐Appellant,

v.

RICHARD BROWN,

Respondent‐Appellee.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Southern District of Indiana, Terre Haute Division.

No. 2:14‐cv‐00020‐WTL‐DKL — William T. Lawrence, Judge.

____________________

ARGUED OCTOBER 26, 2016 — DECIDED JANUARY 3, 2017

____________________

Before FLAUM, EASTERBROOK, and WILLIAMS, Circuit

Judges.

FLAUM, Circuit Judge. Duane E. Turner has filed a petition

for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court raising claims of

ineffective assistance of counsel in challenging his sentence

for murder. The district court denied his petition as untimely,

concluding that the last day on which Turner could have filed

his federal habeas petition was September 23, 1998, one year

after his murder conviction and sentence became final. We

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granted a certificate of appealability, asking the parties to ad‐

dress whether Turner’s petition was timely filed under

Jimenez v. Quarterman, 555 U.S. 113 (2009). For the reasons that

follow, we affirm the district court’s denial of the petition as

untimely.

I. Background

In 1995, a jury found Turner guilty of murder, criminal

confinement, and class A felony attempted robbery resulting

in serious bodily injury. Turner was sentenced on those counts

to life imprisonment without parole, twenty years’ imprison‐

ment, and forty‐five years’ imprisonment, respectively.

Turner appealed to the Indiana Supreme Court, which af‐

firmed his convictions. He did not seek a writ of certiorari to

the United States Supreme Court, and his opportunity to do

so expired ninety days later, on September 22, 1997.  

In 2000, Turner filed a pro se petition for post‐conviction

relief in state trial court. In 2011, the trial court dismissed all

of Turner’s claims forrelief, and Turner appealed. The Indiana

Court of Appeals affirmed in part and reversed in part, find‐

ing that Turner’s counsel had been ineffective in failing to

raise on appeal the double jeopardy issue of a single victim’s

death forming the basis of both the murder and attempted

robbery with serious bodily injury convictions. The Court of

Appeals remanded the case with instructions to reduce

Turner’s Class A felony robbery conviction to a Class B felony

robbery conviction. On July 1, 2013, the trial court did so, and

resentenced Turner on this count from forty‐five years’ to ten

years’imprisonment. The 2013 order did not reference or alter

Turner’s other convictions or sentences for murder and crim‐

inal confinement.  

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No. 15‐1592 3

On January 31, 2014, Turner filed a pro se petition for ha‐

beas relief in the Southern District of Indiana seeking resen‐

tencing on his murder conviction. Turner asserted two sepa‐

rate grounds for relief: (1) that his life sentence for murder

was unconstitutional under Apprendi; and (2) that Turner had

been denied effective assistance of counsel because his coun‐

sel during trial and appeal had made multiple errors that had

prejudiced Turner’s case. On February 4, 2014, the district

court issued a sua sponte order requiring Turner to show that

his petition for writ of habeas corpus was timely under 28

U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1)(A). In response, Turner argued, among

other things, that he had not had access to a law library from

1997 to 2000, and that his case had been pending in state col‐

lateral review from 2000 to 2013. Respondent argued that the

petition was untimely and lacked merit, and submitted an af‐

fidavit from a prison official challenging Turner’s claim that

he had lacked library access.  

On February 18, 2014, the district court ruled that the

deadline for Turner to file his habeas petition had expired on

September 23, 1998, one year after the last day on which he

could have filed a petition for writ of certiorari. The district

court held that the state post‐conviction relief process could

not toll the federal deadline because Turner’s time under The

Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996

(AEDPA) had expired before he had filed for post‐conviction

relief. As a result, the court denied the petition and dismissed

it with prejudice as untimely, and without considering the

merit of Turner’s claims.  

In March 2015, Turner filed a notice of appeal, and the dis‐

trict court denied Turner’s request for a certificate of appeala‐

bility on the ground that the appeal was not taken in good

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faith. In April 2015, Turner attempted to appeal that decision

but incorrectly filed his motion in the district court, which de‐

nied the motion and instructed him to re‐file it in this Court if

that was his intent. In May 2015, we issued a final order dis‐

missing the appeal. In July 2015, Turner filed a pro se motion

to recall the mandate, which we granted, vacating our earlier

final order, and reinstating Turner’s appeal. On December 3,

2015, we entered an order finding that Turner “has made a

substantial showing of the denial of his right to effective as‐

sistance of counsel” pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c), and in‐

structing the parties to also address whether Turner’s petition

was timely filed under Jimenez v. Quarterman, 555 U.S. 113

(2009). We granted Turner a certificate of appealability and

the right to proceed in forma pauperis, and appointed counsel

to assist with the appeal.

II. Discussion

AEDPA establishes a one‐year time limitation for a state

prisoner to file an application for a writ of habeas corpus.

28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1). That year runs from the latest of four

specified dates, only one of which is relevant to this case: “the

date on which the judgment became final by the conclusion of

direct review or the expiration of the time for seeking such

review.” § 2244(d)(1)(A).  

Turner contends that in his case, “the date on which the

judgment became final” was altered by the state court’s grant

of relief and resentencing on the robbery count during collat‐

eral review. He argues that because the judgment that “be‐

came final in 1997 was ... changed in 2013, ... the date for cal‐

culating the timeliness of Turner’s habeas petition changed

with it.” He relies on Burton v. Stewart, 549 U.S. 147 (2007), as

confirming that the new judgment renders his petition timely.

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No. 15‐1592 5

There, the Supreme Court explained that AEDPA’s one‐year

statute of limitations period does not begin until a petitioner’s

conviction and sentence become final “by the conclusion of di‐

rect review or the expiration of the time for seeking such re‐

view.” Id. at 156–57.  

At oral argument, Turner also relied on the Supreme

Court’s decision in Magwood v. Patterson, 561 U.S. 320 (2010).

The petitionerin Magwood was sentenced to death for murder;

and after the Alabama courts denied relief on direct appeal

and in post‐conviction proceedings, he filed a federal habeas

petition challenging his conviction and death sentence. Id. at

323–26. The district court conditionally granted the writ as to

the sentence, mandating that the petitioner either be released

or resentenced. Id. at 326. The state trial court then conducted

a resentencing hearing and again imposed a death sentence.

Id. The petitioner filed another habeas petition challenging

the new death sentence, and the district court again condition‐

ally granted the writ, finding the new sentence constitution‐

ally defective. Id. at 327–29. The Eleventh Circuit reversed,

holding in relevant part that the second‐in‐time habeas peti‐

tion was an unreviewable “second or successive” challenge to

the death sentence under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b), because the pe‐

titioner could have mounted the same challenge to his origi‐

nal death sentence. Id. at 329. The Supreme Court reversed,

holding that because the petitioner’s habeas application chal‐

lenged his new death sentence—an intervening judgment—

for the first time, it was not “second or successive.” Id. at 331,

342. The Court declined to address whether a petitioner who

obtained a conditional writ as to his sentence could then file a

subsequent application challenging not only his new sentence

but also his original, undisturbed conviction. Id. at 342.

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Just as the intervening sentence in Magwood reset the ha‐

beas counter for purposes of counting the number of peti‐

tions, Turner contends that his 2013 resentencing reset the

clock for calculating AEDPA’s statute of limitations. The prob‐

lem with Turner’s position, however, is that the relief he was

granted in 2013 was limited to his robbery conviction, whereas

his habeas petition challenges his conviction and life sentence

for murder. Thus, the judgment that is relevant for purposes

of his present petition is the one from 1995, and the clock has

long since run out on this habeas petition.

When confronted with this issue at oral argument, Turner

pointed to Pace v. DiGuglielmo, 544 U.S. 408, 416 (2005), and

claimed that because AEDPA speaks of only one judgment,

his resentencing on his robbery conviction ought to have re‐

started the clock on his judgment as a whole. In Pace, the Su‐

preme Court observed in a footnote that § 2244(d)(1) “pro‐

vides one means of calculating the limitation with regard to

the application as a whole, § 2244(d)(1)(A) (date of final judg‐

ment), but three others that require claim‐by‐claim consider‐

ation, § 2244(d)(1)(B) (governmental interference);

§ 2244(d)(1)(C) (new right made retroactive); § 2244(d)(1)(D)

(new factual predicate).” 544 U.S. at 416 n.6 (internal quota‐

tion marks omitted). Turner presumably interpreted the

Court’s explanation of § 2244(d)(1)(A) to mean that there

could only be one judgment from which AEDPA’s statute of

limitations could be calculated. Pace, however, referred only

to one whole “application,” not to one whole judgment. See

id. As Turner’s case evidences, the state may pursue convic‐

tions on as many crimes as it likes, and it may then seek as

many judgments as it likes. AEDPA’s one‐year time limit will

then run from each judgment. Turner’s 2013 resentencing led

the state to enter another judgment, but the timeliness of his

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No. 15‐1592 7

habeas petition is calculated based on the date of the final

judgment that his petition challenges—that is, his 1995 judg‐

ment for murder. To hold otherwise would allow appellate re‐

view of each and every one of Turner’s convictions and sen‐

tences when the state only resentenced him on robbery, and

would clearly undermine the finality of the state court’s 1995

decision. Cf. Fielder v. Varner, 379 F.3d 113, 119–20 (3d Cir.

2004) (Alito, J.) (concluding that Congress could not have

wanted to “permit[] a late‐accruing federal habeas claim [e.g.,

under subsections (C) or (D) of § 2244(d)(1)] to open the door

for the assertion of other claims that had become time‐barred

years earlier”); Davis v. United States, 817 F.3d 319, 328 (7th Cir.

2016) (“The simple fact that Davis might have one timely

claim to make ... based on a Supreme Court precedent issued

years after his conviction otherwise became final does not al‐

low him to tack on additional, otherwise untimely claims to

that one timely claim.”).* While Turner is correct that the state

court disturbed the finality of its own judgment through re‐

sentencing, it only did so with respect to his robbery convic‐

tion. Turner’s murder conviction and sentence were entered

two decades ago and were never altered or amended.

Indeed, the Magwood Court noted that several federal ap‐

pellate courts, ours included, have held that “a petitioner who

succeeds on a first habeas application and is resentenced may

                                                  * This concern is especially apt in the case at hand, because Indiana

does not set a time limit for filing a petition for post‐conviction relief after

direct appeal is concluded. See Ind. R. P.C. Rem. § 1(b). Under Turner’s

proposed outcome, petitioners in Indiana—or other states without time

limits for post‐conviction petitions—could challenge one of their sen‐

tences or convictions decades after the fact, and if they obtained any relief

or resentencing, they would be able to retroactively revive previously

time‐barred federal habeas claims.

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challenge only the portion of a judgment that arose as a result

of a previous successful action.’” 561 U.S. at 342 n.16 (citations

omitted). For example, in Walker v. Roth, 133 F.3d 454 (7th Cir.

1997), we held that a habeas petition attacking for the first

time the constitutionality of a newly imposed sentence was

not “second or successive,” id. at 455, but also noted that “had

Walker sought to challenge aspects of his conviction [as op‐

posed to his new sentence,] the district court would have been

correct in dismissing his petition as successive.” Id. at 455 n.1

(citation omitted);see also Esposito v. United States, 135 F.3d 111,

113 (2d Cir. 1997) (holding that petitioner’s § 2255 petition was

a “second” petition even though his first petition successfully

amended his terms of supervised release, “because the later

petition raised no challenge to the new supervised release

term and concerned instead the conviction and the compo‐

nents of his sentence that were not amended”); Lang v. United

States, 474 F.3d 348, 351–52 (6th Cir. 2007) (holding that later

petition challenging “a judgment or portion of a judgment that

arose as a result of a previous successful action” was not sec‐

ond or successive) (emphasis added). Further, in Dahler v.

United States, 259 F.3d 763 (7th Cir. 2001), we adopted our

dicta from Walker in holding that the petitioner was barred

from challenging in a second habeas petition an alleged con‐

stitutional error that had not been introduced by his resen‐

tencing and could have been raised before resentencing. Id. at

764–65. This remains the law of the Circuit post‐Magwood. In

Suggs v. United States, 705 F.3d 279 (7th Cir. 2013), we again

confronted the issue of whether a second‐in‐time habeas peti‐

tion is barred as “second or successive” when the petitioner

has been resentenced pursuant to a successful first motion,

and the new motion challenges only the underlying convic‐

tion and not the resentencing. We acknowledged that the

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Magwood Court had left this question open, and then con‐

cluded that under our Circuit’s precedent, see, e.g., Dahler, 259

F.3d at 765, such a second motion was barred as “second or

successive.” Id. at 284.

Under the same reasoning, although a challenge to

Turner’s robbery conviction may be timely, the challenge to

his sentence for murder is not. His murder conviction and life

sentence were unaffected by the 2013 resentencing and thus

remained final. Turner’s argument under Jimenez is of no

avail, as the Supreme Court explicitly limited its decision in

that case to situations where state courts grant a defendant the

right to file an out‐of‐time direct appeal, which is not the case

for Turner. See Jimenez, 555 U.S. at 121 (“Our decision today is

a narrow one. We hold that, where a state court grants a crim‐

inal defendant the right to file an out‐of‐time direct appeal

during state collateral review, but before the defendant has

first sought federal habeas relief, his judgment is not yet ‘final’

for purposes of § 2244(d)(1)(A).”). Moreover, the petitioner in

Jimenez had been convicted and sentenced only for burglary;

thus, the out‐of‐time direct appeal was not limited to a certain

count or conviction. See id. at 115. Turner’s reliance on Ferreira

v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Corr., 494 F.3d 1286 (11th Cir. 2007), a pre‐Mag‐

wood case, and the dissent from our decision to deny rehear‐

ing en banc in Griffith v. Rednour, 623 F.3d 1166 (7th Cir. 2010)

(Hamilton, J., dissenting), is misplaced for the same reason.

As the petition is time‐barred, we need not address the

merits of Turner’s ineffective‐assistance claims.

III. Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the district court’s

denial of the petition for a writ of habeas corpus.  

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