Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-3_14-cv-00101/USCOURTS-cand-3_14-cv-00101-2/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 530
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Habeas Corpus
Cause of Action: 28:2254 Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus (State)

---

United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

WILLIE WILLIAMS, JR., 

Petitioner,

v.

DAVEY, Warden,

Respondent.

___________________________________/

No. C-14-0101 EMC (pr)

ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO

DISMISS AND REQUIRING ELECTION

BY PETITIONER 

I. INTRODUCTION

Willie Williams, Jr., a prisoner at Corcoran State Prison, filed this action pursuant to 28

U.S.C. § 2254 to challenge his conviction from the Alameda County Superior Court. Warden Davey

has moved to dismiss on the ground that state court remedies have not been exhausted for one of the

claims. Mr. Williams has not opposed the motion, and the deadline by which to do so has long

passed. For the reasons discussed below, the Court finds that state court remedies were not

exhausted for the first claim in the petition and requires Mr. Williams to choose how to deal with

this problem.

II. BACKGROUND

Following a jury trial in Alameda County Superior Court, Mr. Williams was convicted of

first degree murder with special circumstances and was sentenced to life in prison without the

possibility of parole. He appealed. The California Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment of

conviction and the California Supreme Court denied Mr. Williams’ petition for review. Mr.

Case 3:14-cv-00101-EMC Document 14 Filed 04/30/15 Page 1 of 5
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

1

 Warden Davey also asserts ignorance about a fact alleged in Claim 1. Warden Davey states

that he “does not know who ‘Sawyer’ is, nor which witnesses petitioner believes Sawyer should

have contacted.” Docket # 13 at 3 n.1. Given the context – Mr. Williams used the word in his

description of the facts in support of his ineffective assistance of counsel claim – it is fairly obvious

to the Court that the word Warden Davey read as “Sawyer” is in fact “Lawyer.” Warden Davey’s

professed ignorance is doubly perplexing because the Court earlier described Claim 1 as being that

Mr. Williams “received ineffective assistance of counsel in that his lawyer did not contact

witnesses...” Docket # 12 at 2 (emphasis added). 

2

Williams also apparently filed unsuccessful habeas petitions in the state superior court, but does not

indicate that he filed any habeas petition in the California Supreme Court. See Docket # 10 at 4.

III. DISCUSSION

Prisoners in state custody who wish to challenge collaterally in federal habeas proceedings

either the fact or length of their confinement are required first to exhaust state judicial remedies,

either on direct appeal or through collateral proceedings, by presenting the highest state court

available with a fair opportunity to rule on the merits of each and every claim they seek to raise in

federal court. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b), (c). 

Mr. Williams’ amended federal petition for writ of habeas corpus alleges the following

claims: (1) Mr. Williams received ineffective assistance of counsel in that his lawyer did not contact

witnesses to ask them about coming in contact with Mr. Campbell, see Docket # 10 at 5, and failed

to request an instruction on voluntary intoxication as applied to the special circumstance, see Docket

# 10-1 at 36; (2) the failure to instruct on manslaughter and imperfect defense of others violated Mr.

Williams’ Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process; (3) the trial court’s failure to

provide correct instructions on the special circumstance violated Mr. Williams’ Fifth and Fourteenth

Amendment due process rights, see Docket # 10-1 at 36; (4) the admission of the co-defendant’s

hearsay statements violated Mr. Williams’ Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment right to confront

witnesses; and (5) Mr. Williams’ right to due process was violated because the evidence was

insufficient to support a conviction under the felony murder rule. 

In his motion to dismiss, Warden Davey contends that Claim 1 is unexhausted because Mr.

Williams did not present it to the California Supreme Court.1

 Claim 1 is the claim that Mr. Williams

received ineffective assistance of counsel in that his lawyer did not contact witnesses to ask them

about coming in contact with Mr. Campbell and failed to request an instruction on voluntary

Case 3:14-cv-00101-EMC Document 14 Filed 04/30/15 Page 2 of 5
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

3

intoxication as applied to the special circumstance. The Court has compared the petition for review

filed in the California Supreme Court with the amended federal habeas petition to determine whether

all the claims in the latter were included in the former. They were not. Mr. Williams did not present

Claim 1 to the California Supreme Court. Claim 1 therefore is unexhausted.

Mr. Williams’ federal petition contains both exhausted and unexhausted claims and therefore

is a “mixed” petition. See Rhines v. Weber, 544 U.S. 269, 277 (2005). The Court cannot adjudicate

the merits of a habeas petition containing any claim as to which state remedies have not been

exhausted, such as a mixed petition. See Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509, 522 (1982); cf. 28 U.S.C. §

2254(b)(2) (petition may be denied (but not granted) notwithstanding failure to exhaust).

Due to a critical one-year statute of limitations on the filing of federal habeas petitions under

the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”), see 28 U.S.C. §2244(d), the

Court is reluctant to dismiss the mixed petition (and possibly cause a later-filed petition to be timebarred) without giving Mr. Williams the opportunity to elect whether to proceed with just his

exhausted claims, or to try to exhaust the unexhausted claim before having this Court consider all his

claims. Accordingly, instead of an outright dismissal of the action, this Court will allow Mr.

Williams to choose whether he wants to – 

(1) dismiss the unexhausted Claim 1 and go forward in this action with only the exhausted

claims, or 

(2) dismiss this action and return to state court to exhaust all claims before filing a new

federal petition presenting all of his claims, or 

(3) file a motion for a stay of these proceedings while he exhausts his unexhausted claim in

the California Supreme Court. 

Mr. Williams is cautioned that the options have risks which he should take into account in deciding

which option to choose. If he chooses option (1) and goes forward with only his exhausted claims,

he may face dismissal of any later-filed petition. See 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b). If he chooses option (2),

dismissing this action and returning to state court to exhaust all claims before filing a new federal

petition, his new federal petition might be rejected as time-barred. See 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d). If he

chooses option (3), he must file a motion in this Court to obtain a stay and (if the motion is granted)

Case 3:14-cv-00101-EMC Document 14 Filed 04/30/15 Page 3 of 5
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

2

 There is an alternate stay procedure for a petitioner who has some unexhausted claims he

wants to present in his federal habeas action, but it often is unhelpful because statute of limitations

problems may exist for claims that are not sufficiently related to the claims in the original petition. 

Under the procedure outlined in Kelly v. Small, 315 F.3d 1063 (9th Cir. 2003) overruled on other

grounds by Robbins v. Carey, 481 F.3d 1143 (9th Cir. 2007), “(1) a petitioner amends his petition to

delete any unexhausted claims; (2) the court stays and holds in abeyance the amended, fully

exhausted petition, allowing the petitioner the opportunity to proceed to state court to exhaust the

deleted claims; and (3) the petitioner later amends his petition and re-attaches the newly-exhausted

claims to the original petition.” King v. Ryan, 564 F.3d 1133, 1135 (9th Cir. 2009) (citing Kelly, 315

F.3d at 1070-71). A petitioner seeking to avail himself of the Kelly three-step procedure is not

required to show good cause as under Rhines, but rather must show that the amendment of any

newly exhausted claims back into the petition satisfies both Mayle v. Felix, 545 U.S. 644, 655

(2005), by sharing a “common core of operative facts” and Duncan v. Walker, 533 U.S. 167 (2001),

by complying with the statute of limitations. King, 564 F.3d at 1141-43. 

4

then must act diligently to file in the California Supreme Court, to obtain a decision from the

California Supreme Court on his unexhausted claims, and to return to this Court. And under option

(3), this action stalls: this Court will do nothing further to resolve the case while Mr. Williams is

diligently seeking relief in state court.

In Rhines, the U.S. Supreme Court discussed the stay-and-abeyance procedure for mixed

habeas petitions.2

 The Court cautioned district courts against being too liberal in allowing a stay

because a stay works against several of the purposes of the AEDPA in that it “frustrates AEDPA’s

objective of encouraging finality by allowing a petitioner to delay the resolution of the federal

proceeding” and “undermines AEDPA’s goal of streamlining federal habeas proceedings by

decreasing a petitioner’s incentive to exhaust all his claims in state court prior to filing his federal

petition.” Rhines, 544 U.S. at 277. A stay and abeyance “is only appropriate when the district court

determines there was good cause for the petitioner’s failure to exhaust his claims first in state court,”

the claims are not meritless, and there are no intentionally dilatory litigation tactics by the petitioner. 

Id. at 277-78. Any stay must be limited in time to avoid indefinite delay. Id. Reasonable time

limits would be 30 days to get to state court, as long as necessary in state court, and 30 days to get

back to federal court after the final rejection of the claims by the state court. See id. at 278; Kelly v.

Small, 315 F.3d at 1071. If Mr. Williams moves for a stay, he must show that he satisfies the Rhines

criteria or must comply with the King/Kelly requirements. 

Case 3:14-cv-00101-EMC Document 14 Filed 04/30/15 Page 4 of 5
United States District Court

For the Northern District of California

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

5

IV. CONCLUSION

Warden Davey’s motion to dismiss is GRANTED. (Docket # 13.) 

Mr. Williams must file no later than June 12, 2015, a notice in which he states whether he

elects to (1) dismiss the unexhausted claim and go forward in this action with only the remaining

claims, or (2) dismiss this action and return to state court to exhaust all of his claims before returning

to federal court to present all of his claims in a new petition, or (3) moves for a stay of these

proceedings while he exhausts his state court remedies for the unexhausted claims. If he chooses

Option (1) or Option (2), his filing need not be a long document; it is sufficient if he files a one-page

document entitled “Election By Petitioner” and states simply: “Petitioner elects to proceed under

option ___ provided in the Order Granting Motion To Dismiss And Requiring Election By

Petitioner.” Mr. Williams would have to insert a number in place of the blank space to indicate

which of the first two options he chooses. If he chooses Option (3), no later than June 12, 2015, Mr.

Williams must file a motion for a stay in which he explains why he failed to exhaust his unexhausted

claims in state court before presenting them to this Court, that his claims are not meritless, and that

he is not intentionally delaying resolution of his constitutional claims. If he wants to file a motion

under King/Kelly to amend his petition (to delete the unexhausted claims) and to stay this action

while he exhausts state court remedies for the unexhausted claims, he may do so no later than June

12, 2015. If Mr. Williams does not choose one of the three options or file a motion by the deadline,

the Court will dismiss the unexhausted claim and adjudicate the remaining claims. 

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: April 30, 2015

_________________________

EDWARD M. CHEN

United States District Judge

Case 3:14-cv-00101-EMC Document 14 Filed 04/30/15 Page 5 of 5