Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-2_15-cv-00912/USCOURTS-caed-2_15-cv-00912-1/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Timothy Lowder
Petitioner
Raymond Madden
Respondent

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

TIMOTHY LOWDER, 

Petitioner, 

v. 

RAYMOND MADDEN, 

Respondent. 

No. 2:15-cv-0912 AC P 

ORDER 

 Petitioner, a state prisoner proceeding pro se, has filed an application for a writ of habeas 

corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 together with a request to proceed in forma pauperis 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915. Petitioner has submitted a declaration that makes the showing 

required by § 1915(a). ECF No. 2. Accordingly, the request to proceed in forma pauperis will be 

granted. 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a). Petitioner has also consented to the jurisdiction of the undersigned 

magistrate judge for all purposes pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(c) and Local Rule 305(a). ECF No. 

5. 

 In the petition, petitioner challenges his conviction on two grounds. ECF No. 1 at 4. In 

Ground 1 he alleges that his due process rights were violated when the trial court improperly 

admitted prejudicial evidence. Id. In Ground 2 he contends that defense counsel was ineffective 

by failing to object to the prejudicial evidence. Id. However, petitioner indicates that he has not 

exhausted Ground 2 in state court. Id. at 5. 

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The exhaustion of state court remedies is a prerequisite to the granting of a petition for 

writ of habeas corpus. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1). If exhaustion is to be waived, it must be waived 

explicitly by respondent’s counsel. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(3).1 A waiver of exhaustion, thus, may 

not be implied or inferred. A petitioner satisfies the exhaustion requirement by providing the 

highest state court with a full and fair opportunity to consider all claims before presenting them to 

the federal court. Picard v. Connor, 404 U.S. 270, 276 (1971); Middleton v. Cupp, 768 F.2d 

1083, 1086 (9th Cir. 1985), cert. denied, 478 U.S. 1021 (1986). In light of petitioner’s failure to 

exhaust his state court remedies on Ground 2, his options are to (1) voluntarily dismiss his 

unexhausted Ground 2 and proceed on the exhausted Ground 1 only or (2) seek a stay of the 

instant action pending exhaustion of the unexhausted claim. 

If petitioner wishes the petition to be maintained as a mixed petition containing both 

exhausted and unexhausted claims, he may seek a stay pursuant to Rhines v. Weber, 544 U.S. 269 

(2005). In Rhines, the United States Supreme Court found that a stay and abeyance of a mixed 

federal petition should be available only in the limited circumstance that (1) good cause is shown 

for a failure to have first exhausted the claims in state court, (2) the claim or claims at issue 

potentially have merit, and (3) there has been no indication that petitioner has been intentionally 

dilatory in pursuing the litigation. Id., at 277-78. 

Alternatively, petitioner may seek to stay an exhausted-claims-only petition pursuant to 

Kelly v. Small, 315 F.3d 1063 (9th Cir. 2003). See King v. Ryan, 564 F.3d 1133, 1135 (9th Cir. 

2009) (citing three-step procedure of Kelly). Pursuant to the Kelly procedure, the court may stay 

a petition containing only exhausted claims while allowing the petitioner to proceed to state court 

to exhaust additional claims. Id. (citing Kelly, 315 F.3d at 1070-71). The procedure under a 

Kelly stay is as follows: (1) the 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 federal petition to reincorporate the newly exhausted claims. Kelly, 

 

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 A petition may be denied on the merits without exhaustion of state court remedies. 28 U.S.C. § 

2254(b)(2). 

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315 F.3d at 1070-71. The Kelly stay-and-abeyance procedure has no requirement of a good cause 

showing or that the claims are potentially meritorious. However, using the Kelly procedure 

means that any newly-exhausted claims later added to the federal petition by amendment must 

relate back to the claims in the stayed petition; in other words, “the Kelly procedure, unlike the 

Rhines procedure, does nothing to protect a petitioner’s unexhausted claims from untimeliness in 

the interim.” King, 564 F.3d at 1141. 

Petitioner must file a notice within twenty-eight days stating how he wishes to proceed. If 

petitioner wishes to proceed on an exhausted-claims-only petition without a stay, he is cautioned 

that any future attempt to amend the petition to add newly-exhausted claims might face 

challenges based on timeliness, the limitations applicable to second or successive petitions, and/or 

other procedural hurdles, depending on the circumstances. If petitioner wants to stay this case 

while exhausting Ground 2 in state court, he must specify whether he seeks a stay under Rhines 

or under Kelly. If he wishes to proceed in this court on a mixed petition, he must file a motion for 

a stay addressing the Rhines factors, showing good cause for his failure to have first exhausted 

Ground 2 in state court, that each of these claims potentially have merit, and that there is no 

evidence he has been intentionally dilatory in pursuing the litigation. In the alternative, petitioner 

may request a Kelly stay as outlined in King v.Ryan, supra. As previously noted, a Kelly stay 

does not guarantee the timeliness of claims exhausted in the future and then re-presented to this 

court. 

Accordingly, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that: 

1. Petitioner’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis (ECF No. 2) is granted. 

2. Within twenty-eight days of the filing of this order, petitioner shall file a notice 

addressing how he wishes to proceed as to his unexhausted claim. 

3. If petitioner seeks a stay, within twenty-eight days of the filing of this order, he shall 

file a motion for a stay in accordance with this order. 

DATED: October 26, 2015 

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