Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-89-06394/USCOURTS-ca10-89-06394-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Jack Cowley
Appellee
Gilbert Dean Davis
Appellant

Document Text:

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

GILBERT DEAN DAVIS, 

Petitioner-Appellant, 

) 

) 

) 

) 

Uoi lt' i:, 

id Stit,g OJt.irc of Ap1'ffJs 

Tenth Circuit 

AP 3 O 79. 

.ROBERT L. HOECK.ER 

Clerk 

v. ) No. 89-6394 

JACK COWLEY, Warden 

Respondent-Appellee. 

) (W.D. Okla. CIV-89-1135-W) 

) 

) 

) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Before MOORE, BRORBY and EBEL, 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. Therefore, the case is ordered 

submitted without oral argument. 

Petitioner appeals from the denial of his Petition for a Writ 

of Habeas Corpus. Because there is a rational argument on the law 

and facts in support of the issues raised on appeal, petitioner's 

motion for leave to proceed on appeal without prepayment of costs 

is granted. See Coppedge v. United States, 369 U.S. 438 (1962). 

Moreover, because petitioner has sufficiently demonstrated that 

* 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: 89-6394 Document: 01019967217 Date Filed: 04/30/1990 Page: 1 
there is a possible denial of an important federal right, his 

application for a certificate of probable cause is granted. See 

Barefoot v. Estelle, 463 U.S. 880 (1983). 

Pursuant to a plea bargain agreement, petitioner pled guilty 

to first degree murder and was sentenced under Oklahoma law to 

life imprisonment. He failed to take a direct appeal from the 

original sentence. On February 23, 1989, plaintiff sought postconviction relief in the state courts from the sentence. In his 

application for relief, petitioner argued that he was denied 

effective assistance of counsel at his plea hearing because his 

attorney had failed to subject the prosecution's case to 

meaningful adversarial testing and that his guilty plea was not 

entered knowingly and intelligently. Plaintiff specifically 

states neither his attorney nor the judge inquired into whether 

there was malice on the part of plaintiff in committing the crime 

nor was he advised that malice was an element of the crime to 

which he was pleading guilty. The state trial court denied the 

application because "the defendant previously sought postconviction relief January 16, 1987, and August 31, 1988. . All 

grounds for relief must be raised in the original application. No 

grounds exist for relief requested." Order Denying Application 

For Post-conviction Relief, No. CFR-85-4165 (Okla. State District 

Court filed March 22, 1989). The Oklahoma Court of Criminal 

Appeals affirmed the trial court decision because petition had 

failed to file a direct appeal from his guilty plea. 

Subsequently, petitioner filed a Petition for Writ of Habeas 

Corpus in the District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma 

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Appellate Case: 89-6394 Document: 01019967217 Date Filed: 04/30/1990 Page: 2 
alleging the denial of effective assistance of counsel. The 

district court dismissed the petition because petitioner had 

failed to comply with the state procedural rule requiring that 

issues raised in seeking post-conviction relief be first raised on 

direct appeal. In the alternative, the district court held that 

plaintiff had failed to establish that he was denied effective 

counsel under the test set forth in Strickland v. Washington, 466 

U.S. 668 (1984). 

A defendant who does not take a direct appeal of his state 

conviction is barred from federal habeas corpus review only if his 

decision was an "intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a 

known right or privilege." Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391, 439 (1963); 

see Worthen v. Meachum, 842 F.2d 1179, 1181 (10th Cir. 1988). If 

defendant did not know that malice was an element of the crime he 

could not have known that he had grounds for appeal and therefore 

he did not intentionally relinquish or abandon a known right. 

Petitioner is not procedurally barred from seeking relief in the 

federal courts. 1 

However, because we find that petitioner has failed to 

establish that he was prejudiced by his attorney's alleged failure 

1 In his petition before the district court, petitioner states 

that he did not take a direct appeal because he was not provided a 

transcript of the plea hearing. Petitioner requested a listing of 

prices for purchasing a transcript in November, 1986, well past 

the time when petitioner could have commenced an appeal of his 

June, 1986 sentence. There is no response found in the record 

from the state to that request. Petitioner has not raised the 

failure to provide a transcript as grounds for habeas corpus 

relief. Moreover, because under Fay petitioner is not 

procedurally barred from bringing suit, we do not need to address 

whether the state improperly denied petitioner a transcript of the 

plea hearing. 

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Appellate Case: 89-6394 Document: 01019967217 Date Filed: 04/30/1990 Page: 3 
to tell him that malice was an element of the crime, we affirm the 

district court's order. The Court in Strickland v. Washington, 

466 U.S. 668 (1984), required that a person claiming ineffective 

counsel show that his attorney's performance fell below the 

standard of reasonable assistance and that he was prejudiced by 

his attorney's inadequacies. In his petition for relief at the 

district court, petitioner claimed that there was no malice in his 

actions, suggesting that he would not have pled guilty had he 

known that malice was an element of the charged crime. However, 

petitioner fails to cite any fact that would support this 

conclusory statement. In addressing the effectiveness of counsel, 

the state district court, in one of petitioner's early 

applications for post-conviction relief, found that: 

The facts of the case at bar indicate that the 

petitioner approached his ex-girlfriend while she was 

sitting in a car with a male friend. The petitioner 

then began shooting into the car with a .25 caliber 

automatic pistol, which inflicted mortal wounds on the 

male occupant. In Petitioner's Affidavit filed with the 

Summary of Facts, petitioner states, 'I shot Gregory 

Sutton on the 10th day of August, at 1412 Kelly." This 

statement, along with the facts of the case, clearly 

show malice and justifies the petitioner's plea, the 

reasonable advice of his attorney and proper review by 

the Court accepting his plea. 

Order Denying Application For Post-Conviction Relief, No. CRF-85-

4165 (Okla. State District Court filed March 3, 1987). This 

ruling was not appealed. 2 

2 In his habeas corpus petition before the district court, 

petitioner states that he did not appeal from the March 3, 1987, 

decision because he was denied a transcript. However, petitioner 

formally requested a transcript March 8, 1988 and was denied the 

request because the time to appeal had passed. 

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Appellate Case: 89-6394 Document: 01019967217 Date Filed: 04/30/1990 Page: 4 
Under Strickland, petitioner's failure to show any prejudice 

from his attorney's alleged failure to make clear that malice was 

an element of the crime is fatal to petitioner's habeas corpus 

action. 3 Therefore, we AFFIRM the district court's dismissal of 

the petition for writ of habeas corpus. The mandate shall issue 

forthwith. 

Entered for the Court 

David M. Ebel 

Circuit Judge 

3 In petitioner's application to this court for a certificate of 

probable cause he raises issues concerning whether he was entitled 

to a post-examination competency hearing under Oklahoma law. 

Because this issue was not raised at the district court level, it 

is not properly before us. 

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