Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-cand-4_12-cv-00810/USCOURTS-cand-4_12-cv-00810-2/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Demora A. Henderson
Petitioner
G. Swarthout
Respondent

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United States District Court 

Northern District of Californi

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

DEMORA A. HENDERSON, 

Petitioner, 

v. 

G. SWARTHOUT, 

Respondent. 

Case No. 12-cv-00810-CW (PR) 

ORDER DENYING PETITION FOR 

WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS; DENYING 

CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY 

Petitioner Demora A. Henderson, a California prisoner 

proceeding pro se, filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, challenging the validity of his 

state conviction. He contends that the trial court violated his 

due process rights by denying his motions to: (1) exclude a 

witness’s tainted identifications; (2) exclude cell phone 

evidence; and (3) compel production of exculpatory evidence. 

Respondent filed an answer and a memorandum of points and 

authorities in support thereof and Petitioner has filed a 

traverse. For the reasons stated below, the Court DENIES the 

petition. 

BACKGROUND 

I. Procedural History 

 On January 19, 2007, the San Francisco District Attorney 

filed an information charging Petitioner with murder with the 

allegation that he personally and intentionally discharged a 

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firearm that caused great bodily injury or death. Clerk’s 

Transcript (CT) 28-29. On February 21, 2008, a jury found 

Petitioner guilty as charged. CT 2387, 2398; Reporter’s 

Transcript (RT) 2759. On June 2, 2008, the trial court sentenced 

Petitioner to fifty years to life in prison. CT 2648-50. 

 On January 31, 2011, the California Court of Appeal affirmed 

the judgment. Exh. F, People v. Henderson, 2011 WL 287889 (Cal. 

Ct. App.) (unpublished). On April 13, 2011, the California 

Supreme Court summarily denied review. Exh. H. 

 On February 21, 2012, Petitioner filed this federal petition 

for a writ of habeas corpus. 

II. Statement of Facts 

 The following is a summary of the key facts taken from the 

written opinion of the California Court of Appeal. 

Rufino Gutierrez was murdered when he was 

shot in the back of his head while sitting in 

the front passenger seat of his car, next to 

his girlfriend, Christina Medina. She was 

driving. His assailant was in the back seat, 

and had arranged to meet Gutierrez in order 

to buy a .380 caliber handgun from him. 

Instead of paying Gutierrez for the gun, the 

perpetrator shot him with it. 

 

The purchase of the gun was arranged through 

a series of calls to Gutierrez’s cell phone 

earlier the day of the murder. The calls 

were from phone numbers associated with 

friends and acquaintances of defendant Demora 

Henderson who did not have a cell phone and 

often borrowed one from others. One of the 

phone numbers that appeared repeatedly in the 

call records for Gutierrez’s phone belonged 

to the aunt of Henderson’s friend Dimitri 

Braud. Braud told police that he and 

Henderson were together at his aunt’s house 

during the afternoon and evening before 

Gutierrez was killed. Braud testified in 

this case as part of an agreement he reached 

with prosecutors. . . . 

 

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. . . 

 

Henderson was identified as Gutierrez’s 

killer by Medina in a videotape of a live 

lineup and in court. 

Henderson, 2011 WL 287889, *1 (footnote omitted). 

LEGAL STANDARD 

 A federal court may entertain a habeas petition from a state 

prisoner “only on the ground that he is in custody in violation 

of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States.” 

28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death 

Penalty Act (AEDPA) of 1996, a district court may not grant 

habeas relief unless the state court’s adjudication of the claim: 

“(1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an 

unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as 

determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or 

(2) resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable 

determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in 

the State court proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d); Williams v. 

Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412 (2000). 

 A state court decision is “contrary to” Supreme Court 

authority, that is, falls under the first clause of § 2254(d)(1), 

only if “the state court arrives at a conclusion opposite to that 

reached by [the Supreme] Court on a question of law or if the 

state court decides a case differently than [the Supreme] Court 

has on a set of materially indistinguishable facts.” Id. at 412-

13. A state court decision is an “unreasonable application of” 

Supreme Court authority, under the second clause of § 2254(d)(1), 

if it correctly identifies the governing legal principle from the 

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Supreme Court’s decisions but “unreasonably applies that 

principle to the facts of the prisoner’s case.” Id. at 413. 

 A federal court on habeas review may not issue a writ 

“simply because that court concludes in its independent judgment 

that the relevant state-court decision applied clearly 

established federal law erroneously or incorrectly.” Id. at 411. 

"A state court must be granted a deference and latitude that are 

not in operation when the case involves review" under the 

constitutional standard itself. Harrington v. Richter, 131 S. 

Ct. 770, 785 (2011). "A state court's determination that a claim 

lacks merit precludes federal habeas relief so long as 

"'fairminded jurists could disagree' on the correctness of the 

state court's decision." Id. at 786. The factual determinations 

by state courts are presumed correct unless there is "clear and 

convincing evidence to the contrary.” Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 

U.S. 322, 340 (2003). 

 When there is no reasoned opinion from the highest state 

court to consider the petitioner’s claims, the court looks to the 

last reasoned opinion of the highest court to analyze whether the 

state judgment was erroneous under the standard of § 2254(d). 

Ylst v. Nunnemaker, 501 U.S. 797, 801-06 (1991). In the present 

case, the California Court of Appeal is the highest court that 

addressed Petitioner’s claims in a reasoned opinion. 

DISCUSSION 

I. Suggestive Photo Lineup 

 Petitioner argues that the trial court violated his right to 

due process by denying his motion to exclude Christina Medina’s 

identification of him at the videotaped lineup and later in court 

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on the ground that her previous viewing of a photo lineup tainted 

her two later identifications. 

 A. Background 

 The state appellate court summarized the facts relevant to 

this claim as follows: 

The night of the murder Medina described 

Gutierrez’s assailant to police as about 25 

years old with a very dark complexion, 

wearing dark clothes with a “hoodie” that was 

raised to cover his head. She also said the 

shooter was skinny, with a long face, acne 

scars on his cheeks and pimples on his 

forehead. She thought she would recognize 

him if she saw him again. 

 

A few days later, Medina was shown a photo 

lineup that contained Henderson’s photo, and 

the procedure was recorded on audiotape. 

Before Medina viewed the photos, the officer 

admonished her that the person who committed 

the crime might not be in the group of 

photos. She was told that she was “in no way 

obligated to identify anybody,” and people’s 

appearances could change over time and “based 

on the photographic process, they can be 

lighter or darker.” Medina was unable to 

identify the killer when she viewed the photo 

lineup, even though she thought Henderson’s 

skin color and the shape of his face were 

similar to the shooter’s. When Medina 

remarked that the shooter was “maybe a little 

darker” than Henderson’s photo, and all the 

photos appeared “lighter” than the shooter, 

the officer reminded her that the lighting 

when a photo is taken can influence the 

appearance of a person’s skin color. 

 

Several weeks later, Medina met with a police 

artist and helped develop a sketch of the 

shooter based on her memory of his 

appearance. Approximately a week after that, 

she was shown a videotape of a live lineup. 

She gasped audibly when she saw Henderson and 

she identified him as the killer. A 

videotape was made of Medina’s viewing of the 

videotaped lineup and was shown to the jury. 

Medina explained that the videotaped lineup 

was “more real” than the photo lineup because 

she could see the people walk and talk. FN2 

Medina also later identified Henderson as the 

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shooter at the preliminary hearing and at 

trial. 

 

FN2 The participants in the videotaped 

lineup wore dark hooded sweatshirts 

similar to the shooter, walked across 

the stage, and spoke certain phrases the 

shooter used on the night Gutierrez was 

killed. Medina said Henderson’s voice 

during the videotaped lineup was “a 

little off,” “like . . . he was holding 

back,” but she positively identified him 

as the shooter, commenting that “it 

wasn’t the other ones.” 

Henderson, 2011 WL 287889, at *3. 

 The state trial and appellate courts reviewed the first 

photo lineup, from which Medina did not identify Petitioner’s 

photo, and found the array of photos was reasonably balanced and 

no single photo unfairly stood out. Id. The appellate court 

also reviewed the videotaped lineup, found nothing suggestive 

about it and concluded that Medina’s identifications were not the 

result of impermissibly suggestive procedures. Id. at *4-5. 

 B. Federal Authority 

 Due process may require suppression of eyewitness 

identification evidence where the identification procedure used 

was suggestive and unnecessary. Perry v. New Hampshire, 132 S. 

Ct. 716, 718 (2012); Manson v. Brathwaite, 432 U.S. 98, 107-09 

(1977); Neil v. Biggers, 409 U.S. 188, 196-98 (1972). However, 

improper state conduct in arranging unnecessarily suggestive 

pretrial identification procedures alone does not require 

exclusion of in-court identification testimony; the reliability 

of eyewitness testimony is the “linchpin” in determining its 

admissibility. Manson, 432 U.S. at 107-14; United States v. 

Drake, 543 F.3d 1080, 1089 (9th Cir. 2008). Identification 

testimony is inadmissible as a violation of due process only if 

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(1) a pretrial encounter is so impermissibly suggestive as to 

give rise to a substantial likelihood of irreparable 

misidentification, and (2) the identification is not sufficiently 

reliable to outweigh the corrupting effects of the suggestive 

procedure. Van Pilon v. Reed, 799 F.2d 1332, 1338 (9th Cir. 

1986). 

 In determining whether in-court identification testimony is 

sufficiently reliable, courts consider five factors: (1) the 

witness’s opportunity to view the defendant at the time of the 

incident; (2) the witness’s degree of attention; (3) the accuracy 

of the witness’s prior description; (4) the level of certainty 

demonstrated by the witness at the time of the identification 

procedure; and (5) the length of time between the incident and 

the identification. Manson, 432 U.S. at 114-16; see also, United 

States v. Cook, 608 F.2d 1175, 1178 (9th Cir. 1979) (finding 

nothing unusual about a lineup being conducted after a photo 

spread) (overruled on other grounds by Luce v. United States, 469 

U.S. 38, 40, n.3 (1984)). 

 In Cook, a witness could not identify the defendant in a 

photo lineup, but later identified him in a physical lineup. The 

petitioner claimed his picture in the photo lineup was 

impermissibly suggestive and tainted the identifications in the 

physical lineup and in court. Id. In rejecting the defendant’s 

claim, the court explained that “the suggestion, if any, was not 

so great as to create a substantial likelihood of 

misidentification,” because the witness had a second look at the 

perpetrator, gave police a description of the perpetrator shortly 

after the offense that “reasonably fit” the defendant, 

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immediately recognized the defendant upon seeing him in person at 

the physical lineup, and stated that, although he recognized the 

defendant from the photo lineup, his identification was based on 

his observations at the time of the crime. Id. at 1179. 

 C. Analysis 

 Both the trial and appellate courts viewed the photographic 

lineup that was shown to Medina and found nothing suggestive 

about the photographs included. The trial court also found that 

Petitioner looked very different in the photographic lineup and 

the video lineup. The state court’s factual findings must be 

presumed correct. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1); RT 531-45; Henderson, 

2011 WL 287889, at *3-4 & n.5.1 

 Although Medina did not identify Petitioner in the 

photographic lineup, she indicated his photograph most closely 

resembled the shooter. RT 957-59; 1064. Several weeks later, 

when viewing a videotape of a live lineup, Medina immediately 

recognized Petitioner and gave an audible gasp. RT 978-81. She 

stated the live lineup was “more real” than the photographic 

lineup. RT 1066. These facts are similar to those in Cook, 

where the court found nothing unusual in the witness first being 

shown a photographic lineup and later being shown a physical 

lineup where he identified the defendant 

 Most importantly, the evidence shows that Medina’s 

identification of Petitioner was reliable. Medina testified that 

she was “paying attention” to the man who approached the car on 

 

1

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administrative record is not legible, the Court requested and 

received a legible copy. The state courts’ finding——that the 

lineup was not suggestive——was not unreasonable. 

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the night of Gutierrez’s murder because she was concerned about 

Gutierrez’s gun sale to a stranger. RT 1062. There was good 

lighting and Medina was able to see the man’s face and body type. 

RT 932-34. Soon after Gutierrez was shot, Medina gave the police 

a description of the shooter which matched Petitioner and which 

did not vary from her first report at the hospital to her 

testimony at trial. Shortly after the shooting, she helped 

compose a sketch of the shooter that closely resembled 

Petitioner. Medina also was certain of her identification of 

Petitioner at the videotaped lineup, at the preliminary hearing 

and at trial. RT 1069-71. Although she did not identify 

Petitioner in the photographic lineup, the trial court found that 

Petitioner looked different in the photographic lineup than he 

looked in the videotaped lineup. Finally, Medina positively 

identified Petitioner less than two months after the shooting, 

when her memory of the shooter was still strong. 

 Under the totality of the circumstances, Petitioner has not 

shown that the photographic lineup was suggestive or that 

Medina’s later identification of him was unreliable. 

II. Cell Phone Records 

 Petitioner argues that the trial court violated his due 

process rights by denying his motion to exclude the prosecution’s 

evidence of records of telephone numbers of incoming and outgoing 

calls on Gutierrez’s cell phone, as a sanction for the failure of 

the police to obtain and preserve additional cell phone records 

that were allegedly exculpatory. 

 A. State Court Opinion 

 The state appellate court rejected this claim, as follows: 

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 1. Bonner’s Cell Phone Records 

Gutierrez received several calls on the day 

he was killed from a phone number registered 

to “Easy Smith,” and that phone number was 

the last one dialed from Gutierrez’s cell 

phone about an hour before he was shot. 

Approximately a year after the shooting, the 

investigating officer, Lieutenant Balma, 

learned that the “Easy Smith” phone number 

was associated with Henderson’s friend 

Michael Bonner. The records for the “Easy 

Smith” phone had already been purged by the 

phone company. FN6 

 

 FN6 The cell phone company purged its 

 call records after six months. 

Henderson contends that it could have been 

Bonner and not he who arranged to meet 

Gutierrez, and he was prejudiced by the 

inability to obtain the “Easy Smith” phone 

records. But the investigating officer 

testified that Bonner did not match 

Henderson’s description. He had a 

“completely different body build,” and was 

“much bigger, much heavier than [Henderson], 

who is very thin.” Thus, there is no basis 

to conclude Bonner would have been identified 

as the shooter by Medina. . . . Moreover, as 

the trial court noted, the call records for 

Bonner’s phone would not have shown who 

placed the calls, and there is no reason to 

conclude the records would have been 

exculpatory. Substantial evidence supports 

the trial court’s findings. Henderson failed 

to show the missing call records for Bonner’s 

phone would have been exculpatory, or that 

police acted in bad faith by failing to 

obtain and preserve them. . . . 

2. Suspect Number 2’s Phone Records 

A few days after Gutierrez was killed, Balma 

received information regarding a potential 

suspect named “Shaun” or “Shawn,” who had 

reportedly claimed he “killed some Mexican in 

the Mission.” Balma prepared a search 

warrant for a cell phone number said to 

belong to “Shaun,” but the phone company 

inadvertently transposed the last two digits 

when it retrieved the records. By the time 

Balma realized he had the wrong records, the 

phone company had purged the correct ones. 

 

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The subscriber name for the phone number that 

reportedly belonged to “Shaun” was Lauren 

Arendt, who was not able to assist police in 

identifying “Shaun,” and Balma was never able 

to otherwise identify who “Shaun” was. In 

any event, the phone number alleged to be 

Shaun’s did not appear on the list of calls 

received on Gutierrez’s phone, and Balma did 

not consider the location where Gutierrez was 

killed to be in the Mission. Under the 

circumstances, Henderson has not shown 

Shaun’s cell phone records would have been 

exculpatory, or that police acted in bad 

faith by failing to notice earlier that the 

cell phone company provided the wrong 

records. 

 

3. Call Records for Medina’s and Gutierrez’s 

Second Cell Phone 

Based on information provided by Medina, 

Balma obtained call records for a cell phone 

with the subscriber name “Eternal Bliss” that 

Gutierrez used to arrange the sale of his 

handgun on the day he was shot. Since Medina 

identified the “Eternal Bliss” phone as the 

one Gutierrez used in the sale of the gun, 

Balma did not seek call records for a second 

phone used by Medina and Gutierrez which they 

had with them at the time of the murder. 

 

Henderson argues the records from the second 

cell phone could have been used to impeach 

Medina’s statement to police that it was not 

functional. But Medina testified that both 

phones were working the day Gutierrez was 

killed. So, there is no apparent 

significance of the records for impeachment. 

The call records of Eternal Bliss showed that 

it received multiple calls from the second 

phone on the day of the murder, and Balma 

testified he believed both phones were 

operational on the night Gutierrez was 

killed. Henderson’s claim is that police 

should have obtained the call records for the 

second phone because the shooter could have 

used that number to contact Gutierrez. His 

speculation is insufficient to establish that 

the records would have been exculpatory, or 

that Balma acted in bad faith when he 

determined it was not necessary to obtain 

them. 

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4. Voicemail Message Allegedly Left on 

Gutierrez’s Eternal Bliss Cell Phone 

The call records for the Eternal Bliss phone 

showed that a seven second call was received 

on the phone’s voicemail from Bonner’s phone 

several hours before Gutierrez was killed. 

Henderson claims police should have preserved 

any voicemail message. But Medina told 

police the phone’s voicemail feature was 

never activated, and the call records 

indicate that no one attempted to retrieve 

any voicemail messages from the Eternal Bliss 

phone. Inspector Balma also concluded that 

seven seconds would not have been enough time 

for a caller to listen to the phone company’s 

recorded greeting and leave a message. 

Moreover, the police inspector who examined 

the phone found no voicemail messages. 

Substantial evidence supports the trial 

court’s finding that it was speculative to 

conclude that any voicemail message was left 

on Gutierrez’s phone, much less that it was 

exculpatory, or that police efforts to 

retrieve such a message were in bad faith. 

 

Even if we assume for the sake of argument 

that police failed to properly preserve the 

cell phone records in question, Henderson’s 

argument that they would reveal exculpatory 

evidence is speculative at best, as are his 

allegations that police acted in bad faith in 

failing to successfully pursue and preserve 

them. His assertions are not sufficient to 

establish a due process violation. . . . 

Henderson, 2011 WL 287889, at *6-8 (two footnotes omitted). 

 A. Federal Authority 

 The government has a duty to preserve material evidence, 

i.e., evidence whose exculpatory value was apparent before it was 

destroyed and that is of such a nature that the defendant cannot 

obtain comparable evidence by other reasonably available means. 

California v. Trombetta, 467 U.S. 479, 489 (1984); Grisby v. 

Blodgett, 130 F.3d 365, 371 (9th Cir. 1997). However, the 

government's duty to preserve material evidence is limited to 

evidence it has gathered. Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 488-90. Unless 

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the petitioner shows bad faith by the police in the failure to 

preserve potentially useful evidence, there is no due process 

violation. Illinois v. Fisher, 540 U.S. 544, 547-48 (2004); 

Arizona v. Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51, 58 (1988); Cunningham v. 

Perez, 345 F.3d 802, 812 (9th Cir. 2003) (failure to gather 

physical evidence did not show bad faith; its value was 

speculative because it could have exonerated or incriminated the 

moving party). 

 C. Analysis 

 The trial court held an evidentiary hearing on Petitioner’s 

motion in limine to exclude the phone records from Gutierrez’s 

phone. Inspector Balma was questioned extensively regarding his 

investigation of Gutierrez’s murder to determine if his failure 

to collect other cell phone records was done in bad faith. RT 

109-371. 

 1. Records from Bonner’s Phone 

 Petitioner argues that Balma showed bad faith by overlooking 

the evidentiary value of the last phone number called by 

Gutierrez before his murder, which was to Bonner’s phone, because 

when Balma attempted to obtain the records, they had been purged. 

 Balma gave the following testimony pertaining to this claim: 

(1) the phone records for Gutierrez’s phone only provided the 

numbers of the phones from which calls were made or received, 

Balma had to separately request names and addresses pertaining to 

the subscriber of each number; (2) many of the subscribers gave 

the phone company fictitious names and addresses; (3) the 

telephone number of the last call Gutierrez made before his 

murder was registered to a person named “Easy Smith;” (4) Balma 

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went to the address given for the “Easy Smith” number, mistakenly 

determined that it did not exist and concluded that the address 

was fictitious; (5) months later, when talking with an assistant 

district attorney familiar with the case, Balma realized that the 

“Easy Smith” number belonged to Bonner; (6) Balma then requested 

the phone records from Bonner’s phone but, by that time, the 

phone company had purged the records in accordance with its 

policy of purging records every six months; and (7) the records 

from Bonner’s phone would only have provided numbers called from 

or to the phone; they would not have indicated the name of the 

caller or the receiver. RT 183; 201-09; 292-94. 

 The test to determine Balma’s bad faith is whether he was 

aware of any potential exculpatory value of the records for the 

“Easy Smith” number at the time he decided not to issue a warrant 

for them. The evidence shows that, as a result of Balma’s 

warrant for the records from Gutierrez’s phone, he received a 

long list of telephone numbers, many of which were registered to 

fictitious names at fictitious addresses. Balma obtained the 

subscriber information for what turned out to be Bonner’s phone, 

but it was registered to “Easy Smith.” Therefore, the actual 

subscriber of that number was not apparent to him. Balma also 

went to the address given for the phone number, but he 

inadvertently looked for a house number that did not exist. This 

oversight may have been negligent, but it does demonstrate bad 

faith. Balma concluded the subscriber name and address were 

fictitious and, thus, of no value to his investigation. Because 

it was not apparent to Balma that the phone records had any 

evidentiary value, let alone exculpatory value, his decision not 

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to pursue them further does not constitute bad faith. 

Furthermore, as soon as Balma realized that Bonner was the 

subscriber, he obtained a warrant for the phone records. At the 

time, Balma was not aware of the phone company’s policy to purge 

records every six months. Although the destruction of the 

records made them unobtainable by Petitioner, the fact that they 

were destroyed by a third party does not show bad faith by Balma. 

Furthermore, as noted by the appellate court, trial testimony 

that Bonner’s description did not fit Medina’s description of the 

shooter eliminated Bonner as a possible suspect. RT 1973. Given 

this evidence, Petitioner’s argument that Bonner’s phone records 

would have shown that Bonner or someone else was the murderer is 

purely speculative and does not meet the standard of 

constitutional materiality explicated in Trombetta. 

 2. Phone Records for “Suspect Number Two” 

 At the evidentiary hearing, Balma testified to the following 

regarding “Suspect Number Two.” He received a “tip” from someone 

that a person named “Shaun” or “Shawn” had claimed to have 

“killed a Mexican in the Mission.” Balma obtained the phone 

records for the number allegedly belonging to the suspect, but 

the phone company transposed two digits and sent him the wrong 

records. By the time Balma realized the records were incorrect, 

the phone company had purged the correct ones. Balma questioned 

the subscriber associated with the telephone number given for 

suspect number two, a woman named Lauren Arendt, who did not know 

anyone by the name of “Shaun” or “Shawn.” RT 226-27. Although 

Balma investigated many other leads, he was not able to identify 

a person named “Shaun” or “Shawn” and concluded that the suspect 

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did not exist. RT 227-28. The telephone number given for 

suspect number two did not appear in the phone records for 

Gutierrez’s phone. RT 228. 

 Given this evidence, Petitioner’s argument that the phone 

records for suspect number two were exculpatory is based on pure 

speculation. First, no evidence shows that suspect number two 

exists. Second, the fact that the phone number given for suspect 

number two was not listed in Gutierrez’s phone records shows that 

he did not call Gutierrez’s phone to arrange the gun transaction, 

indicating he most likely was not the shooter. Furthermore, 

Balma thoroughly investigated the leads about suspect number two, 

including obtaining a warrant for the records of his alleged 

phone number. That the phone company transposed two digits of 

the phone number and purged its records after six months does not 

show bad faith by Balma. 

 3. Records for Gutierrez’s Second Cell Phone 

 Petitioner’s argument that phone records for Gutierrez’s 

second cell phone would have revealed the real murderer is also 

speculative. Balma did not collect those records because, 

according to Medina, all the conversations for the gun sale were 

conducted on the phone for which the records were obtained. RT 

189-90; 209; 219; 245. Balma had no reason to doubt Medina’s 

credibility and, thus, he did not believe that records from the 

second phone would provide information that would be relevant to 

the murder investigation or exculpatory to Petitioner. RT 234; 

294. Because the records could have contained inculpatory as 

well as exculpatory information, their value to Petitioner’s 

defense is purely speculative. Petitioner has not shown Balma 

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acted in bad faith. 

 4. Voicemail Message 

 Petitioner’s argument that exculpatory evidence would have 

been found in a voicemail message left on Gutierrez’s phone on 

the night of the murder is refuted by the fact that no evidence 

of a voicemail message exists. RT 338. Medina told Balma that 

the voicemail feature on the phone had not been activated. RT 

232-33. Her information was corroborated by evidence that no one 

had attempted to retrieve a message, that the seven-second call 

would not have been long enough for a caller to both listen to a 

recorded message and to leave a message and that the police 

inspector who examined the phone for messages failed to find any. 

RT 229-34; 315-16; 321-24. Again, Petitioner has not shown bad 

faith by Balma. To the contrary, Balma persisted in tracking 

down a voicemail message, but could not find one. 

 Petitioner’s arguments based on Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 

83 (1963), Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972), and 

United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 674, 676 (1985), are misplaced. 

Brady and its progeny addressed the suppression of exculpatory 

evidence in the possession of or known to the prosecution or the 

police, in which case the good or bad faith of the police is not 

relevant. Brady, 373 U.S. at 87. Petitioner claims that the 

police failed to collect or preserve potentially exculpatory 

evidence. For these allegations to establish a due process 

violation, he must show that Balma acted in bad faith, which he 

has failed to do. 

III. Exclusion of Evidence of Another Homicide Investigation 

 Petitioner contends he was denied the right to present a 

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third party culpability defense because the trial court denied 

his motion to compel discovery of police records of the 

investigation of the murder of an individual named Mario Monge. 

 A. Federal Authority 

 “The Constitution guarantees criminal defendants ‘a 

meaningful opportunity to present a complete defense.’” Holmes 

v. South Carolina, 547 U.S. 319, 324 (2006); Trombetta, 467 U.S. 

at 485. The constitutional right to present a complete defense 

includes the right to present evidence. Washington v. Texas, 388 

U.S. 14, 19 (1967). However, “well-established rules of evidence 

permit trial judges to exclude evidence if its probative value is 

outweighed by certain other factors such as unfair prejudice, 

confusion of the issues, or potential to mislead the jury.” 

Holmes, 547 U.S. at 326. The right to present a defense is only 

implicated when the evidence the defendant seeks to admit is 

“relevant and material, and . . . vital to the defense.” 

Washington v. Texas, 388 U.S. at 16. The Supreme Court rarely 

has held that the right to present a complete defense was 

violated by the exclusion of defense evidence under a state rule 

of evidence. Nevada v. Jackson, 133 S. Ct. 1990, 1992 (2013). 

Evidence of third party culpability “may be excluded where it 

does not sufficiently connect the other person to the crime, as 

for example, where the evidence is speculative or remote, or does 

not tend to prove or disprove a material fact in issue at the 

defendants’ trial.” Holmes, 547 U.S. at 327 (citations omitted). 

B. Analysis 

Before trial, the defense sought discovery of police reports 

of the shooting of Mario Monge, which occurred in November 2005, 

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a few months before Gutierrez’s murder in February 2006. CT 137-

38. The prosecution opposed the motion under California Evidence 

Code section 1040, arguing that disclosure would jeopardize an 

ongoing police investigation.2 CT 162-68. The trial court 

conducted an in camera review of the report which was followed by 

an open adversarial hearing. RT 555-56; 557-65. The trial court 

found that Petitioner’s argument that the person who killed Monge 

might also have killed Gutierrez was purely speculative, 

especially in light of the fact that the Monge killing was 

unsolved after two years of police investigation. RT 561. The 

trial court noted that, in order for Petitioner to establish a 

third party culpability defense, the defense would first have to 

solve the Monge homicide because, without evidence of Monge’s 

killer, the argument that the unknown person who killed Monge 

also killed Gutierrez was the essence of speculation and could 

not be presented to a jury. RT 561-62. The trial court 

concluded that the speculative benefit of the police report to 

Petitioner could not overcome the government’s substantial 

interests in the need for confidentiality in an ongoing criminal 

investigation and the privacy rights of Monge’s family and the 

witnesses to the crime. RT 562-64. 

 

2

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A public entity has a privilege to refuse to disclose 

official information, and to prevent another from disclosing 

official information, if the privilege is claimed by a 

person authorized by the public entity to do so and . . . 

disclosure of the information is against the public interest 

because there is a necessity for preserving the 

confidentiality of the information that outweighs the 

necessity for disclosure in the interest of justice. 

 

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The state appellate court performed an in camera review of 

the sealed records of the trial court’s in camera review, found 

“no factual connection between the killings of Monge and 

Gutierrez” and affirmed the trial court’s decision to deny 

Petitioner’s motion to disclose the police report of Monge’s 

killing. Henderson, 2011 WL 287889, at *8. 

Petitioner argues that the state appellate court’s ruling 

was unreasonable because it addressed only his discovery request 

for the police reports pertaining to the Monge murder; he argues 

he asserted the broader claim of the denial of evidence regarding 

a third-party culpability defense which included evidence that 

“suspect #2” had “confessed to the killing of Gutierrez or a 

Mexican in the Mission (noting, Gutierrez was killed in the 

Mission and is Hispanic).” Traverse at 32. This argument is 

unavailing. As discussed above, Balma attempted to ascertain the 

identity of “suspect #2,” who was identified as “Shaun” or 

“Shawn,” and his investigation did not disclose any such 

individual. RT 172-81; 226-29. Balma also testified that 

Gutierrez’s murder did not occur in the Mission district but in 

the Excelsior-Balboa Park area, so the alleged confession most 

likely did not apply to Gutierrez’s murder. RT 229. 

Petitioner also relies on a statement Medina made to Balma 

that someone named Mario had recently been killed and she had 

heard rumors that the killer meant to shoot Gutierrez because he 

was thought to be in the car with Mario. CT 144-46. However, 

Medina also stated that the rumors did not “sound right” to her 

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because she knew that “Fino3 doesn’t even kick it with him,” 

meaning that Gutierrez did not associate with Mario. CT 149. 

Thus, Medina’s statements cast doubt on any rumors that the 

unidentified person who shot Monge also shot Gutierrez. 

Furthermore, as the trial court found, the only similarities 

between the two murders were that both victims were Hispanic, 

both died from gunshot wounds and both were alleged to have been 

associated with gang activity. The dissimilarities included the 

location and circumstances of the two shootings, in that 

Gutierrez was shot by a person who entered the backseat of his 

car after arranging a sham gun transaction and Monge was killed 

by a person shooting into his car as he drove by. The cases were 

also distinguished by the fact that there was no arrest for 

Monge’s murder whereas there was an arrest for the murder of 

Gutierrez. RT 558. These dissimilarities show the low probative 

value any evidence of the Monge case would provide to 

Petitioner’s defense. 

Petitioner fails to show that the state court’s denial of 

this claim “was so lacking in justification that there was an 

error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any 

possibility for fairminded disagreement.” See Harrington, 131 S. 

Ct. at 786-87. 

IV. Cumulative Error 

 Petitioner contends that, even if no single error warrants 

habeas relief, the cumulative effect of all the errors does 

warrant relief. In some cases, although no single trial error is 

 

3

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sufficiently prejudicial to warrant reversal, the cumulative 

effect of several errors may still prejudice a defendant so much 

that his conviction must be overturned. Alcala v. Woodford, 334 

F.3d 862, 893–95 (9th Cir. 2003). Where there is no single 

constitutional error, nothing can accumulate to the level of a 

constitutional violation. Hayes v. Ayers, 632 F.3d 500, 524 (9th 

Cir. 2011); Mancuso v. Olivarez, 292 F.3d 939, 957 (9th Cir. 

2002). Because Petitioner fails to show any constitutional 

error, there is no error to cumulate. 

V. Certificate of Appealability 

 The federal rules governing habeas cases brought by state 

prisoners require a district court that denies a habeas petition 

to grant or deny a certificate of appealability in the ruling. 

Rule 11(a), Rules Governing § 2254 Cases, 28 U.S.C. foll. § 2254. 

 A petitioner may not appeal a final order in a federal 

habeas corpus proceeding without first obtaining a certificate of 

appealability. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c); Fed. R. App. P. 22(b). A 

judge shall grant a certificate of appealability "only if the 

applicant has made a substantial showing of the denial of a 

constitutional right." 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). The certificate 

must indicate which issues satisfy this standard. 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2253(c)(3). “Where a district court has rejected the 

constitutional claims on the merits, the showing required to 

satisfy § 2253(c) is straightforward: The petitioner must 

demonstrate that reasonable jurists would find the district 

court’s assessment of the constitutional claims debatable or 

wrong.” Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000). 

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 The Court finds that reasonable jurists would not find its 

ruling on any of Petitioner’s claims debatable or wrong. 

Therefore, a certificate of appealability is denied. 

 Petitioner may not appeal the denial of a certificate of 

appealability in this Court but may seek a certificate from the 

Court of Appeals under Rule 22 of the Federal Rules of Appellate 

Procedure. See Rule 11(a) of the Rules Governing Section 2254 

Cases. 

CONCLUSION 

 Based upon the foregoing, the Court orders as follows: 

 1. The petition for a writ of habeas corpus is denied. 

 2. The Clerk of the Court shall enter a separate judgment, 

terminate all pending motions and close the file. 

 3. A certificate of appealability is denied. 

IT IS SO ORDERED. 

Dated: March 23, 2015 

__________________________________ 

CLAUDIA WILKEN 

United States District Judge 

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