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Parties Involved:
Ray W. Hughes
Appellant
Dareld Kerby
Appellee

Document Text:

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UNITED STATES COORT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

P ILBD 

United Statft C'.Qurc of Appeals 

Tenth Ci:cuit 

RAY W. HUGHES, 

Petitioner-Appellant, 

v. 

DARELD KERBY, 

Respondent-Appellee. 

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FEB 2 21991 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

No. 90-2203 

(D. C. No. CIV 89-195-SC) 

(D. N.M.) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Before ANDERSON, TACBA, and BRORBY, Circuit Judges. 

After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel 

has determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 

34(a): 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. 

submitted without oral argument. 

The cause is therefore ordered 

Mr. Hughes, a state inmate, appeals the denial of habeas 

relief. 

* This order and judgment has no precedential value and shall not 

be cited, or used by any court within the Tenth Circuit, except 

for purposes of establishing the doctrines of the law of the case, 

res judicata, or collateral estoppel. 10th Cir. R. 36.3. 

Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 1 
Mr. Hughes was convicted of six felonies under New Mexico law 

and sentenced to nineteen years of imprisonment. Mr. Hughes' 

convictions were affirmed by the New Mexico Court of Appeals and 

the New Mexico Supreme Court. Mr. Hughes unsuccessfully pursued 

post-conviction relief in the New Mexico courts. 

Mr. Hughes then sought federal habeas relief arguing that he 

was denied his due process right to a fair preliminary hearing and 

Sixth Amendment right to confrontation at the same preliminary 

hearing. The district court referred the matter to a magistrate 

who recommended the district court deny relief based upon the 

record, and this the district court did. 

Mr. Hughes appeals asserting: 

The alleged denial of rights is based upon the 

combined effect of the prosecutor's knowing use of 

perjured testimony of the state's immunized complaining 

witness, the use of testimony given by another key 

complaining witness who later confessed to having been 

under the influence of amphetamine during the 

preliminary hearing, and the testimony of these two 

witnesses as to the events which formed the basis of the 

probable cause determination derived from observations 

they made while both were under the influence of heavy 

amphetamine usage. 

(Appellant's Brief at 1-2.) 

that: 

The magistrate, after examining the trial record, determined 

(1) the testimony was not perjured; (2) the prosecutor did 

not knowingly present false evidence; and (3) the drug use of the 

witnesses could have been raised at the preliminary hearing by 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 2 
defendant and was not. There is ample evidence in the record to 

support these conclusions. 

We have carefully considered the arguments raised by Mr. 

Hughes and we are unpersuaded. This case is largely fact bound 

and it will serve no purpose to detail these facts. It is 

sufficient to state that the record supports the magistrate's 

proposed findings. 

We therefore AFFIRM the judgment of the district court for 

substantially the same reasons set forth in the document entitled 

"Magistrate's Second Proposed Findings and Recommended 

Disposition," entered July 19, 1991, a copy thereof being attached 

hereto. 

The mandate shall issue forthwith. 

Entered for the Court: 

WADE BRORBY 

Circuit Judge 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 3 
2/ 

. - ~ - .. ! • IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT .· '• .... : ,· - ~· . 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW MEXICO 

RAY W. HUGHES, 

r- !••t I~ r • • I • .• .-. 

Petitioner, 

vs. 

DARELD KERBY, 

Respondent. 

-.. '"' .. - . ,.,, 

• '. ·_: :.--: .•• ·.• . ; :· : i , . : 

Civ. No. 89-0195 SC 

MAGISTRATE'S SECOND PROPOSED FINDINGS 

AND 

RECOMMENDED DISPOSITION 

Proposed Findings 

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l. Petitioner, currently confined in the Central New Mexico : 

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Correctional Facility at Los Lunas, New Mexico, brings this action 

pursuant to 28 u.s.c. §2254 challenging the constitutional validit/J 

of the judgment and sentence of the District Court of Chaves ; 

County, New Mexico, entered in State v. Hughes, No. CR-86-295. 

Dareld Kerby, Warden of the Central New Mexico Correctional 

Facility, is petitioner's custodian. 

2. Respondent's assertion that this petition should not be 

considered because of petitioner's failure to raise the matter in 

state court has been addressed in the Magistrate's Proposed 

Findings and Recommended Disposition filed June 13, 1989, which are 

incorporated herein by reference. 

J. Petitioner was charged with various offenses in a criminal 

information filed in the District Court for Chaves county, and 

certain of the counts dealing with the manufacture of or 

trafficking in controlled substances between February, 1986, and 

ATTACHMENT "A" 

Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 4 
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September 16, 1986. Criminal Information, Record Proper 1, 2. 

4. Following a jury trial, petitioner was convicted of 

trafficking in Schedule II controlled substance by manufacturing, 

racketeering, conspiracy to commit trafficking by manufacturing of 

P-2-P and/or methamphetamine, conspiracy to commit racketeering, 

receiving stolen property, and possession of drug paraphernalia. 

Verdicts, Record Proper 106-111. 

5. Following the filing of a supplemental criminal 

information charging petitioner as an habitual criminal offender 

(Record Proper 116), on October 19, 1987, petitioner was sentenced 

to two ·consecutive nine year terms in prison together with certain 

shorter concurrent sentences. Answer, Exhibit A. 

6. Petitioner's conviction was affirmed by the New Mexico 

Court of Appeals (Answer, Exhibit P), and a petition for writ of 

certiorari filed in the Supreme Court of New Mexico was denied ' 

(Answer, Exhibits Q and R). Petitioner sought a writ of habeas 

corpus in Chaves County (Answer, Exhibit BB), which was denied 

(Answer, Exhibit EE) • Consistent with the previous proposed 

findings, the "cause" and "prejudice" test of Francis v. Henderson, 

425 U.S. 536 (1976), in instances of procedural default does not 

properly apply to this petition. 

remedies in state court. 

Petitioner has exhausted his 

7. The issues presented in this petition as set out in 

petitioner's memorandum brief are as follows: 

Further, the petitioner was denied his due 

process right to a fair preliminary hearing by 

[l] the prosecutor's knowing use of perjured 

testimony, [ 2) testimony given by a witness 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 5 
under the influence of drugs and [3) testimony 

pertaining to events observed while the 

witnesses were under the influence of drugs 

when such testimony was the basis for a finding 

of probable cause. 

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Petitioner's Memorandum Brief, p. 1. 

8. At petitioner's preliminary hearing, the witness Israel 

DeLaRosa testified. 

9. At petitioner's trial, Israel DeLaRosa testified that he 

had seen petitioner manufacture methamphetamine. 1 Trial Tape (TT) 

7, 31.30-32.00: TT 7, 33.58-34.06: TT 7, 35.20-35.29. When asked 

on cross examination whether he had testified at the preliminary 

hearing that he had not seen Hughes manufacture the drug, DeLaRosa, 

apparently believing that he had so testified at the preliminary 

hearing, admitted "lying" at the preliminary hearing. TT 8, 10.35-

11.31. 

10. Notwithstanding Israel DeLaRosa•s statement that he had 

lied at petitioner's preliminary hearing, the record of that 

hearing does not indicate that DeLaRosa testified falsely, that the 

alleged "false testimony" was material to the case, or that the 

prosecutor knowingly presented false evidence through DeLaRosa; 

consequently, there was no due process violation. See, Talamante 

v. Romero, 620 F.2d 784, 790 (10th Cir. 1980), cert. denied, 449 

U.S. 877 (1980). 

1 Portions of the testimony are attached as an Appendix to 

these Proposed Findings. Tape references in the Appendix and below 

are to the numbers, which are measured in minutes and seconds, on 

a Sony BM-80 dictator/transcriber. 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 6 
• 

. \ 11 • Laura and Israel DeLaRosa were admitted users of 

amphetamines. Any question as to their impaired ability to observe 

matters about which they testified, or their impaired ability to 

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testify caused by drug use were matters which could be raised by 

cross-examination at the time of the preliminary hearing or at 

trial. The Magistrate at the preliminary hearing had adequate 

opportunity to observe the witnesses when they testified. The fact 

that a witness is an addict goes to credibility and weight, not 

competency. United states v. Taylor, 536 F.2d 1343, 1345 (10th 

Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 962 (1976). 

12. Petitioner was not deprived of a fair preliminary 

examination by reason of Israel or Laura DeLaRosa 's testifying 

while he or she was under the influence of amphetamines: nor was 

Petitioner deprived of a fair preliminary hearing by reason of the 

State's knowing use of perjured testimony from Israel DeLaRosa. 

13. The conflict in the trial testimony between police 

officer Fred Hill and Israel DeLaRosa as to when DeLa.Rosa became 

a police informant does not show that either witness was committing 

perjury. Each witness had some difficulty ascertaining the time 

of the onset of the informant relationship, and there is no 

reasonable likelihood that the allegedly false testimony by 

DeLaRosa could have affected the jury's verdict: accordingly, this 

immaterial testimony, even if mistaken, does not violate due 

process. Talamante v. Romero, 620 F.2d 784, 790 (10th Cir. 1980), 

cert. denied, 449 U.S. 877 (1980) 

14. Petitioner does not show that any exculpatory evidence 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 7 
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was withheld so as to raise any question under Brady v. Maryland, ) 

373 U.S. 83 (1963). Any failure to disclose was insignificant and 

was not reversible error. 

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677-678 (1985). \ 

United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 

Recommended Disposition 

The petition should be dismissed with prejudice. 

}wL/4.~ 

William w. Deaton 

United States Magistrate 

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Appellate Case: 90-2203 Document: 010110103843 Date Filed: 02/22/1991 Page: 8