Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca3-14-03876/USCOURTS-ca3-14-03876-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Attorney General Pennsylvania
Not Party
District Attorney Monroe County
Appellant
Han Tak Lee
Appellee
Superintendent Houtzdale SCI
Appellant

Document Text:

PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

________________

No. 14-3876

________________

HAN TAK LEE

v.

SUPERINTENDENT HOUTZDALE SCI;

DISTRICT ATTORNEY MONROE COUNTY;

ATTORNEY GENERAL PENNSYLVANIA

Superintendent Houtzdale SCI;

District Attorney Monroe County,

Appellants

________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. Civil Action No. 4-08-cv-01972)

District Judge: Honorable Martin C. Carlson

________________

Argued on June 18, 2015

Before: AMBRO, FUENTES, 

and GREENBERG, Circuit Judges

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 1 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
2

(Filed: August 19, 2015)

Mark S. Matthews, Esq.

Matthew J. Bernal, Esq. (Argued)

Monroe County District Attorney’s Office

Monroe County Courthouse

610 Monroe Street, Suite 126

Stroudsburg, PA 18360

Counsel for Appellants

Peter Goldberger, Esq. (Argued)

Pamela A. Wilk, Esq.

50 Rittenhouse Place

Ardmore, PA 19003-2276

Counsel for Appellee

________________

OPINION

________________

AMBRO, Circuit Judge

Appellee Han Tak Lee was convicted of murdering his 

daughter based primarily on scientific evidence that, as the 

Commonwealth now concedes, is discredited by subsequent 

scientific developments. Lee thus filed a § 2254 habeas 

petition claiming his conviction violated due process. The 

District Court granted habeas relief, and we affirm.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 2 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
3

I. Background1

Mr. Lee’s daughter, Ji Yun Lee, suffered from severe 

mental illness throughout her life, experiencing both suicidal 

and homicidal ideation. She lived with her family in New 

York during the summer of 1989. In the early morning of 

July 28, police officers found Lee retrieving personal items 

from the street that his daughter had thrown out the window. 

The officers entered the house and found Ji Yun in a manic 

state, arguing with family members who were urging her to 

take her medications. The officers observed no evidence of 

violence against her.

At the suggestion of his pastor, Lee took his daughter 

the same day to Camp Hebron, a religious retreat in Monroe 

County, Pennsylvania. Her erratic behavior continued. Soon 

after arriving, Ji Yun went for a walk and returned several 

hours later soaking wet, having jumped into a body of water. 

Later that day, she became agitated and had to be physically 

restrained. A few hours after midnight, a fire began in the 

Lees’ cabin. Han Tak Lee escaped, but his daughter died. 

The Commonwealth charged Lee with arson and 

murder. During an eight-day trial, it relied heavily on firescience and gas-chromatography evidence to argue that Lee 

intentionally set the fire to kill his daughter. The defense 

countered that she set the fire as a suicidal act. Lee was 

convicted on both charges and sentenced to life imprisonment 

without the possibility of parole. 

On direct appeal, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania 

remanded for an evidentiary hearing on ineffective-

 

1 We discussed the background of this case in greater detail in 

our prior opinion. See Lee v. Glunt, 667 F.3d 397, 400–03 

(3d Cir. 2012).

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 3 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
4

assistance-of-counsel claims. During that hearing, the Court 

also received evidence about developments in the field of fire 

science that, according to a prior panel of our Court, 

“provided ample reason to question the reliability of the arson 

investigation.” Lee v. Glunt, 667 F.3d 397, 401 (3d Cir. 

2012). The trial court nonetheless denied Lee’s claims, the 

Superior Court affirmed, and the Pennsylvania Supreme 

Court denied appeal.

In 1995 Lee filed a pro se post-conviction petition in 

state court. The Commonwealth did not comply with the 

court’s order to respond, and the petition remained pending 

until 2001 when the attorney who is now representing Lee 

filed leave to amend the petition. He submitted an amended 

petition in 2005, arguing that (1) Lee was entitled to a new 

trial because of newly discovered and exculpatory scientific 

evidence, and (2) appellate counsel was ineffective on direct 

appeal by failing to raise a claim of after-discovered 

exculpatory evidence. The Court of Common Pleas denied 

the petition for post-conviction relief, the Superior Court 

affirmed, and the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania denied 

appeal.

Lee filed a § 2254 habeas petition in the District Court 

for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, claiming that (1) his 

conviction violated due process because it was based on 

inaccurate and unreliable evidence and (2) his continued 

incarceration also lacked the due process due him because 

newly developed scientific evidence showed he was probably 

innocent.2 The District Court denied Lee’s petition and 

request for an evidentiary hearing because “claims of actual 

innocence based on newly discovered evidence are never 

grounds for federal habeas relief absent an independent 

 

2 The Commonwealth conceded that Lee exhausted state 

court remedies. See Lee, 667 F.3d at 402.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 4 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
5

constitutional violation.” Lee v. Tennis, No. 08-1972, 2010 

WL 3812160, *5 (M.D. Pa. Sept. 22, 2010). 

A panel of our court reversed on appeal. Explaining 

that Lee’s petition raised a due-process claim rather than a 

free-standing innocence claim, Lee, 667 F.3d at 403 n.5, we 

ordered the District Court to grant discovery and then 

reconsider whether to hold an evidentiary hearing. Id. at 

404–07 & n.7. We instructed that Lee “must show that the 

admission of the fire expert testimony undermined the 

fundamental fairness of the entire trial because the probative 

value of [the fire expert] evidence, though relevant, is greatly 

outweighed by the prejudice to the accused from its 

admission.” Id. at 403 (citation and internal quotation marks 

omitted, alteration in original). We also implied that habeas

relief should be denied if there is “ample other evidence of 

guilt.” Id. at 407 n.13 (quoting Albrecht v. Horn, 485 F.3d 

103, 126 (3d Cir. 2007)).

On remand, Magistrate Judge Carlson held an 

evidentiary hearing and issued a Report & Recommendation 

(R&R) finding that “the admission of the fire expert 

testimony undermined the fundamental fairness of the entire 

trial” because the “verdict . . . rest[ed] almost entirely upon 

scientific pillars which have now eroded.” Lee v. Tennis, No. 

08-1972, 2014 WL 3894306, at *15–16 (June 13, 2014) 

[hereinafter R&R]. It also found that the Commonwealth 

failed to show other “‘ample evidence’ of guilt upon which 

the jury could have relied.” Id. at *18 (quoting Albrecht, 485 

F.3d at 126).

Along with a two-page memorandum, the 

Commonwealth filed three objections to the R&R before the 

District Court: 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 5 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
6

1. [It] underplayed the strength of 

the Commonwealth’s case in general.

2. [It] overstated the importance of 

the differences between the 

spectrographs for Lee’s pants and shirt, 

and the jug and the glove found at the 

fire scene.

3. []Lee has not been exonerated by 

the new fire science evidence.

App. E. at 1–3.

The District Court rejected the third objection because, 

as explained in our prior opinion in this case, Lee’s dueprocess claim does not require a showing of innocence. Lee 

v. Tennis, No. 08-1972, 2014 WL 3900230, *5 (M.D. Pa.

Aug. 8, 2014) (citing Lee, 667 F.3d at 403 n.5). In addition, 

the Court rejected the first and second objections because the 

Commonwealth failed to identify with specificity any legal or 

factual errors in the R&R. Id. In the absence of any proper 

objections, the District Court reviewed the R&R for clear 

error and adopted it without changes. Id. at *4–5. It then 

issued an order granting habeas relief unless the 

Commonwealth “retr[ied] . . . or release[d]” Lee within 120 

days. Id. at *7.

The Local Rules in the Middle District of 

Pennsylvania require filing a notice of appeal electronically. 

The District’s electronic filing system requires that the 

moving party simultaneously pay a $505 filing fee. As the 

credit account for the County of Monroe limits payments to 

$500, the Commonwealth was unable to pay the fee by credit 

card. Instead, it mailed a notice of appeal along with a check 

on September 5, 2014. The District Court Clerk’s Office 

received the package on September 8, exactly 30 days after 

entry of judgment. The docket initially indicated that the 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 6 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
7

notice was filed the next day, September 9, but a few weeks 

later the Clerk’s Office noted on the docket that the “[f]iled 

date for the notice of appeal has been corrected to reflect the 

date of 9/8/2014, the date it was received by the Court.”

II. Jurisdiction

A “certificate of appealabilty is not required when a 

state . . . appeals” a grant of habeas relief. Fed. R. App. P. 

22(b)(3); see also Lambert v. Blackwell, 387 F.3d 210, 230 

n.16 (3d Cir. 2004). We thus have appellate jurisdiction 

under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253(a) if the Commonwealth 

“filed” a notice of appeal “within 30 days after the entry 

of . . . judgment.” 28 U.S.C. § 2107.

Lee first argues that the notice of appeal was untimely 

because the Clerk’s Office did not file it until 31 days after 

entry of judgment. This is a non-starter. Under Federal Rule 

of Civil Procedure 5(d)(2), a notice of appeal is “filed by 

delivering it . . . to the clerk,” id., and is delivered when 

received by the clerk, Parissi v. Telechron, Inc., 349 U.S. 46, 

47 (1955) (per curiam) (“[T]he Clerk’s receipt of the notice 

of appeal within the 30-day period satisfied the requirements 

of § 2107.”); United States v. Solly, 545 F.2d 874, 876 (3d 

Cir. 1976) (“The date of receipt by the clerk’s office controls, 

rather than the date it is filed by the clerk’s personnel.”). The 

parties and the Clerk’s Office all agree that the notice was 

received on the 30th day. That it was not filed officially until 

the day after is irrelevant to our jurisdiction.

Lee next argues that the notice of appeal cannot confer 

appellate jurisdiction because its format did not comply with 

local rules. As he points out, under Federal Rule of Civil 

Procedure 5(d)(3) a “court may . . . allow papers to be 

filed . . . by electronic means” and “may require electronic 

filing . . . if reasonable exceptions are allowed.” Id.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 7 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
8

(emphasis added). Local Rule 5.6 in the Middle District of 

Pennsylvania states that “[a]ny document required or 

permitted to be filed shall be filed electronically.” M.D. Pa. 

R. 5.6. According to Lee, the Commonwealth’s notice of 

appeal is invalid because it was submitted on paper in 

violation of the local rules.

Once more we disagree. The Federal Rules require 

that a notice of appeal “(A) specify the party . . . taking the 

appeal . . . ; (B) designate the judgment . . . being appealed; 

and (C) name the court to which the appeal is taken.” Fed. R. 

App. P. 3(c)(1). Courts employ “a commonsense, purposive 

approach to determine whether a notice of appeal complies 

with the rules.” Gov’t of the Virgin Islands v. Mills, 634 F.3d 

746, 751 (3d Cir. 2011). Indeed, “imperfections in noticing 

an appeal should not be fatal where no genuine doubt exists 

about who is appealing, from what judgment, to which 

appellate court.” Becker v. Montgomery, 532 U.S. 757, 767 

(2001); Mills, 634 F.3d at 751; see also id. at 752 (“[A]s long 

as the judgment the party intends to appeal is fairly 

discernible, a notice of appeal will be deemed sufficient even 

though it references the wrong case number . . . or the wrong 

judgment date.” (citations omitted)). Lee does not argue that 

the notice of appeal failed to answer any of these three critical 

questions. Following the Ninth Circuit, we thus reject the 

argument that the notice of appeal was invalid simply because 

it violated a local electronic filing requirement.3 See Klemm 

v. Astrue, 543 F.3d 1139, 1143 (9th Cir. 2008) (“[A] notice of 

appeal is filed when it is received by the clerk, 

notwithstanding deficiencies in form that violate local rules 

 

3 That the notice of appeal confers appellate jurisdiction does 

not leave the district court “without other sanctions” for 

violations of local filing requirements. Parissi, 349 U.S. at 

47; see also Gould, 555 F.2d at 341.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 8 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
9

. . . [, including] failure to comply with the local electronic 

filing rules.”). 

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 5(d)(4) supports our 

conclusion. It states that the “clerk must not refuse to file a 

paper solely because it is not in the form prescribed by these 

rules or by a local rule or practice.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 5(d)(4). 

In addition, Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 3(c)(4) 

provides that an “appeal must not be dismissed for 

informality of form . . . of the notice of appeal.” Our 

conclusion is further supported by Lee’s failure to argue that 

the paper submission prejudiced him in any way. Mills, 634 

F.3d at 752 (“While a lack of prejudice will not save a notice 

that totally fails to comply with the rules, courts 

understandably are more willing to overlook a notice’s flaws 

in the absence of prejudice to the opposing party.” (citations 

omitted)); Sanabria v. United States, 437 U.S. 54, 67 n.21 

(1978) (“A mistake in designating the judgment appealed 

from is not always fatal, so long as the intent to appeal from a 

specific ruling can fairly be inferred by probing the notice and 

the other party was not misled or prejudiced.”).

Lee’s jurisdictional challenge is unpersuasive for 

another reason as well. In Parissi, the Supreme Court held 

that a clerk’s office cannot reject a notice of appeal simply 

because the filing fee has not been paid.4 349 U.S. at 47 

 

4 We note there is some ambiguity about the status of Parissi

because the Supreme Court Reporter, which is published by 

West, appears to label the opinion as a Memorandum 

Decision. Parissi v. Telechron, Inc., 75 S. Ct. 577, 577 

(1955). But the United States Reports, the official reporter 

for the Supreme Court, 28 U.S.C. § 411, treats the case as an 

opinion of the Court. Compare 349 U.S. LIII (1954) (“Cases 

reported before page 901 are those decided with opinions of 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 9 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
10

(“[U]ntimely payment of the . . . fee did not vitiate the 

validity of petitioner’s notice of appeal.”). We have similarly 

instructed the clerk’s offices in the Third Circuit to “accept 

and retain every notice of appeal tendered whether or not 

accompanied by the filing fee.” Gould v. Members of the N.J. 

Div. of Water Pol’y and Supply, 555 F.2d 340, 342 (3d Cir.

1977). This rule applies whether a human clerk or an 

electronic filing system receives the notice. See Farzana K. 

v. Ind. Dep’t of Educ., 473 F.3d 703, 707 (7th Cir. 2007) 

(“The software that operates an e-filing system acts for ‘the 

clerk’ as far as Rule 5 is concerned; a step forbidden to a 

person standing at a counter is equally forbidden to an 

automated agent that acts on the court’s behalf.”); Royall v. 

Nat’l Ass’n of Letter Carriers, 548 F.3d 137, 143 (D.C. Cir. 

2008) (“[T]he electronic case filing system’s failure to docket 

 

the Court. Those reported on pages 901 et seq. are 

memorandum decisions and orders.”), with Parissi, 349 U.S. 

46. The Supreme Court has cited Parissi as legal authority 

without questioning its status. See Houston v. Lack, 487 U.S. 

266, 273 (1988). And in a dissenting opinion, Justice Harlan, 

joined by Justices Frankfurter and Burton, described Parissi

as an “intervening and controlling decision” with respect to 

another case not before the Supreme Court at the time. 

United States v. Ohio Power Co., 353 U.S. 98, 105 n.16 

(1957). We have cited Parissi as legal authority at least three 

times, Wisniewski v. Dir., Office of Workers’ Comp. 

Programs, 929 F.2d 952, 955 (3d Cir. 1991); Gould v. 

Members of N.J. Div. of Water Pol’y and Supply, 555 F.2d 

340, 341 (3d Cir. 1977); Rothman v. United States, 508 F.2d 

648, 651–52 & n.17 (3d Cir. 1975), and on one of those 

occasions it “mandated” our “result,” Gould, 555 F.2d at 341. 

We therefore have little trouble concluding that Parissi is 

binding Supreme Court precedent.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 10 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
11

Royall’s timely submitted notice of appeal cannot be treated 

as a failure on his part to file timely. His situation is akin to 

one in which the clerk’s office misplaces a filing and then 

later makes the docket entry when the filing is found.”).

The parties agree that the Middle District’s electronic 

filing system rejects notices of appeal that lack a 

simultaneous fee payment. Appellant Br. at 29–30; Appellee 

Br. at 24. If Lee were correct that under Local Rule 5.6 

parties cannot establish appellate jurisdiction by submitting a 

paper notice of appeal, then the Commonwealth could not 

have submitted a notice of appeal without simultaneously 

paying the required filing fees. This arrangement would 

clearly violate Parissi. If so, Local Rule 5.6 would violate 

the Federal Rules by failing to provide a “reasonable 

exception[]” to the local electronic filing requirement, Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 5(d)(3), and the Commonwealth could not be held 

responsible for its violation. 

As we have appellate jurisdiction, we proceed to the 

merits.

III. Standard of Review

A. AEDPA Deference

28 U.S.C. § 2254(e) of the Antiterrorism and Effective 

Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) requires federal habeas courts to 

“afford considerable deference to state courts’ legal and 

factual determinations.” Palmer v. Hendricks, 592 F.3d 386, 

391–92 (3d Cir. 2010). A panel of our Court previously held, 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 11 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
12

however, that deference does not apply here. Lee, 667 F.3d at 

403.5 We therefore review the case without deference.

B. Plain Error

The District Court rejected the Commonwealth’s first 

and second objections to the R&R because they failed to 

identify with specificity any factual or legal errors. It thus 

reviewed the R&R for clear error rather than conducting a de 

novo review. On appeal, the Commonwealth does not 

challenge this legal conclusion. “[W]here a party fails to file 

timely objections to a magistrate judge’s R&R in a habeas 

proceeding, and the district court then adopts the R&R, 

we . . . only review the R&R for plain error.” Nara v. Frank, 

 

5 Our opinion, issued in 2012, explained that Lee’s habeas

petition merits de novo review because the state courts “relied 

on only state law to deny [Lee’s] PCRA petition, and there 

[was] no indication that the state courts analyzed Lee’s 

federal claims.” Lee, 667 F.3d at 403. Since this decision, 

the Supreme Court has held that when a state court “rejects a 

federal claim without expressly addressing that claim, a 

federal habeas court must presume that the federal claim was 

adjudicated on the merits—but that presumption can in some 

limited circumstances be rebutted.” Johnson v. Williams, 133 

S. Ct. 1088, 1096 (2013). Had we applied this rule in 2012, 

we may have held that AEDPA deference applies. We 

nonetheless review Lee’s current case without AEDPA 

deference under law of the case. See Council of Alternative 

Political Parties v. Hooks, 179 F.3d 64, 69 (3d Cir. 1999). 

While this doctrine has an exception for intervening changes 

in the law, id., the Commonwealth has not asked us to revisit 

the issue here.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 12 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
13

488 F.3d 187, 194 (3d Cir. 2007). Lee argues that plain error 

thus applies because the District Court, in effect, decided that 

the Commonwealth failed to file any proper objections at all. 

As the Commonwealth concedes, its briefing does not dispute 

that plain error review applies. Oral Argument Tr. at 5:18.6 

At oral argument we asked why plain error review is 

inappropriate, and the only response was that the 

Commonwealth had “provide[d] some citations to [the R&R] 

when [it] raised [its] objection with regard to Magistrate 

Judge Carlson’s characterization of the evidence.” Id. 5:40. 

In our own review of the objections, we find no such citations 

to the R&R. Furthermore, a few citations would not have 

addressed the District Court’s more fundamental concern that 

the Commonwealth’s objections had “no basis in . . . law or 

fact contained in the R&R to be called into question.” Lee, 

2014 WL 3900230, at *5. As the Commonwealth fails to 

challenge this determination on appeal and fails to give any 

meaningful reason why plain error review is inappropriate, 

that is the review we undertake. 

We therefore reverse only if there is (1) an error, 

(2) that is plain, (3) that “affects substantial rights,” and (4) 

that “seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public 

reputation of judicial proceedings.” Nara, 488 F.3d at 197 

(internal quotation marks omitted).

IV. Merits

A panel of our court previously held that “Lee must 

show that the admission of the fire expert testimony 

undermined the fundamental fairness of the entire trial 

because the probative value of [that] evidence, though 

 

6

Id. (“Court: Why should we not review this particular appeal 

for plain error? . . . Commonwealth: I agree it was not raised 

in appellant’s brief in this matter . . . .”).

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 13 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
14

relevant, [was] greatly outweighed by the prejudice to the 

accused from its admission.” Lee, 667 F.3d at 403 (alteration 

in original) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). 

The District Court accepted Magistrate Judge Carlson’s 

conclusion that the admission of fire-science and gaschromatography evidence at Lee’s trial met this standard and 

the Commonwealth does not challenge this determination on 

appeal. Instead, it merely argues that the District Court erred 

by accepting Magistrate Judge Carlson’s conclusion that the 

trial lacked “ample other evidence of guilt.” Id. at 407 n.13 

(citing Albrecht, 485 F.3d at 126). We now turn to the 

evidence presented at trial, including for the sake of 

completeness the now discredited evidence.

A. Unreliable Evidence at Trial

1. Fire-Science Evidence

The Commonwealth does not object to Magistrate 

Judge Carlson’s assessment of the fire-science evidence 

presented at trial. He described it as follows. State Police 

Fire Marshal Thomas Jones testified that the fire was caused 

by arson based on two sources of evidence. First, he found 

patterns of deep charring, alligator charring (charring shaped 

like alligator skin), and crazed glass (finely fractured glass), 

all of which were consistent with a fire deliberately started 

with accelerant fluids. R&R at *5. Second, he found at least 

eight separate points of origin located throughout the cabin. 

According to the R&R, this was powerful evidence that 

someone intentionally started eight different fires in the cabin 

in rapid succession. Id. That one of the points was located at 

the cabin’s door “suggested that the arsonist had acted in a 

particularly calculated fashion, setting fire to the escape path 

in the cabin, and effectively entombing Ji Yun Lee within a 

wall of flames.” Id. at *6. Jones cited no other independent 

scientific evidence that arson caused the fire. Id.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 14 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
15

Fire protection specialist Daniel Aston also testified on 

behalf of the Commonwealth. Relying on the same evidence 

discussed by Jones, Aston opined that the fire was set 

deliberately and with an accelerant. Id. He stated that the last 

fire was set at the front door of the cabin and that the arsonist 

“left the structure[] and probably lit [the cabin] from the 

outside at that point.” Id. Based on the then-dominant 

scientific theory that arson fires burn at higher levels of heat 

and intensity, Aston compared the estimated heat and energy 

of the actual fire with the heat and energy that would have 

been produced by a “normal” fire. Id. at *7. He claimed his 

calculations could “determine with precision both the 

amounts and types of accelerants” used to light the fire: “62 

gallons of home heating fuel, mixed with 12.2 pounds . . . of 

gasoline or Coleman fuel.” Id.

According to Magistrate Judge Carlson, Jones’s and 

Aston’s testimony “constituted the principal pillar of proof 

tying Lee to th[e] arson fire and the death of his daughter.” 

Id. Their testimony “was not directly supported by any other 

independent chemical testing[, as] the chemical analysis of 

the [eight] suspected fire origin sites did not reveal any sign 

of the more than 60 gallons of gas and fuel oil” that Aston 

estimated were used to set the fire. Id.

The Commonwealth concedes that, due to scientific 

developments since Lee’s trial in 1990, the basis for all of this 

evidence is now invalid.

2. Chromatography Evidence

The Commonwealth also does not challenge 

Magistrate Judge Carlson’s assessment of the 

chromatography evidence presented at trial. According to the 

R&R, the fire-science evidence described above was 

bolstered by the testimony of State Police Chemist Thomas 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 15 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
16

Pacewicz, who conducted a gas chromatography of the shirt 

and pants worn by Lee on the night of the fire and of a burned 

jug and latex glove recovered from the wreckage. Id. 

Pacewicz found no evidence of accelerants at the eight origin 

sites identified by Jones and Aston, but testified that the 

chromatography analysis of the shirt, pants, and jug all

revealed hydrocarbons that “ranged from C-7 to C-22.” Id. 

He also testified that these results were consistent with a 

mixture of gasoline, kerosene, Coleman fuel and fuel oils. Id. 

Pacewicz thus corroborated Aston’s testimony that this mix 

of chemicals was used to burn the cabin. Id. In its closing 

argument, the Commonwealth emphasized the mutually 

reinforcing link between the fire-science and chromatography 

evidence, which together showed that the fire was set by 

someone who intended to kill an occupant of the cabin and 

matched the mix of chemicals allegedly used to start it with 

the mix found on Lee’s clothes. Id. at *8.

Magistrate Judge Carlson found, and the 

Commonwealth concedes, that subsequent scientific 

developments and retesting of surviving materials from the 

crime scene have undermined the reliability of Pacewicz’s 

testimony. Id. at *17–18. On appeal, the Commonwealth 

does not rely on his testimony to show “ample evidence of 

guilt.”

B. What Evidence Remains?

The Commonwealth argues that three remaining 

sources of evidence provide the “ample” evidence needed. 

First, Monroe County Coroner Robert Allen and Forensic 

Pathologist Isidore Mihalikis concluded, based on the autopsy 

of Ji Yun’s body, that the cause and manner of death were 

conflagration and homicide, respectively. Allen testified that 

the body was found on the floor of the cabin a few feet from 

the bathroom door “in a fetal position,” App. I at 133, under 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 16 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
17

“a bunch of insulation . . . and other debris” that had fallen 

from the roof, id. at 116–17. Allen and Mihalikis testified 

that there were “minimal” or “tiny” “hemorrhages in the 

upper portion of [Ji Yun’s] neck,” id. at 138, 405, 408, 420, 

that suggested “strangulation, . . . suffocation, or any pressure 

in the neck,” id. at 408. They also found “minimal smoke 

deposits in the [victim’s] windpipe and . . . lungs” and a 

“slight elevation of [her] carbon monoxide levels.” Id. at 120, 

405. They concluded that the hemorrhage, smoke deposits 

and elevated carbon monoxide were all consistent with Ji Yun 

being strangled before the fire was started.

As Magistrate Judge Carlson noted, this inference was 

weak. R&R at *9. Allen and Mihalikis both acknowledged 

that the autopsy results were consistent with Ji Yun dying by 

a flashover7rather than strangulation. App. I at 132–33, 406–

407. Mihalikis found no evidence of petechiae—tiny ruptures 

of the capillaries caused by increased blood pressure—that 

are present in “most strangulation cases.” Id. at 423. And 

Allen and Mihalikis’s determination that Ji Yun died by 

homicide was almost certainly colored by the now-debunked 

fire-science evidence.

Second, the Commonwealth introduced testimony that 

in the hours and days after the fire Lee’s demeanor showed 

little sign of grief. Police Officer Leigh-Manuell, one of the 

first individuals on the scene, found Lee sitting across from 

 

7 A flashover is a phenomenon that causes “a fire within a 

room to suddenly, spontaneously, and catastrophically engulf 

all flammable surfaces in th[e] room.” R&R at *2. At the 

time of the trial, fire scientists incorrectly believed that 

flashovers were rare and that they left a “signature at a fire 

scene which could be distinguished from the tell-tale signs of 

arson.” Id.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 17 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
18

the fire on a bench with his luggage, appearing “nonchalant.” 

Id. at 20–21, 27. Volunteer firefighter David Farry said Lee 

looked “very depressed, as if he was probably mad at 

himself.” Id. at 56. High school senior David Pack described 

Lee as “calm.” Id. at 162. Fire Marshall Jones testified that 

the day after the fire Lee was “very attentive” to questions 

asked of him, and “at times he even joked and laughed during 

the questioning.” Id. at 256. Detective Bortz similarly 

described Lee as “calm.” Id. at 621. And when Lee’s wife 

arrived at the scene of the fire, she became visibly upset, and 

yet, according to Fire Marshall Jones, Lee “walked right by 

[her] like nothing happened.” Id. at 257. 

Third, the Commonwealth argues that there was 

evidence attacking the veracity of Lee’s account of what 

happened the night of the fire. Two firefighters on the scene 

testified that the fire started in the front of the cabin and then 

traveled to the back, id. at 40–41, 57–58, which conflicts with 

Lee’s testimony that when he walked out the front door the 

fire was in the back of the house.

The Commonwealth also points to inconsistencies in 

six different accounts Lee gave of what happened the night of 

the fire. Commonwealth Br. at 36–37. The basic outlines 

remain the same across each account: Lee woke up in the 

middle of the night, smelled smoke, walked through the cabin 

looking for his daughter, went outside, came back in and left 

again. Id. Most of the “inconsistencies” identified by the 

Commonwealth are better characterized as minor details 

mentioned on some occasions and omitted on others. For 

example, Lee only sometimes identified specific rooms he 

checked when he reentered the house; only sometimes 

mentioned grabbing his luggage before leaving the cabin the 

second time; and only sometimes said that he slipped and fell 

on liquid after reentering the cabin. Id. Only two 

discrepancies could bear any significance at all. In at least 

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 18 Date Filed: 08/19/2015
19

one account, Lee reentered the house twice; in others he 

reentered only once. And in at least one account, Lee saw 

flames before he left the house the first time; in four others, 

he saw flames only when he reentered the cabin. Id. The 

District Court characterized these discrepancies as “minor,” 

noting that they could be explained by errors in translation 

from Korean to English. R&R at *8.

* * * * *

Based on the evidence identified by the 

Commonwealth, we cannot conclude that the District Court 

committed an error that was plain by adopting the R&R. As 

Magistrate Judge Carlson explained,

[t]he Commonwealth [is] left to argue that its 

case . . . may be proven beyond a reasonable 

doubt based upon alleged inconsistencies in the 

Korean-to[-]English interpretation of statements 

made by Lee in the hours following his 

daughter’s death; a cultural stoicism which was 

construed as nonchalance; . . . and autopsy 

results which agreed that Ji Yun Lee died from 

conflagration, but posited two alternate theories 

of this cause of death, one of which was wholly 

consistent with death in an accidental fire, and 

the other of which was supported by very little 

forensic evidence. 

Id. at *18. Because the Commonwealth has not 

pointed to “ample evidence” sufficient to prove guilt 

beyond reasonable doubt, we affirm the District 

Court’s grant of habeas relief.

Case: 14-3876 Document: 003112049652 Page: 19 Date Filed: 08/19/2015