UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN 

NORTHERN DIVISION 

MILTON LEWIS, #830791, 

 Petitioner, Case No. 15-cv-12261 

v. Honorable Thomas L. Ludington 

CARMEN PALMER, 

 Respondent. 

__________________________________________/ 

OPINION AND ORDER DENYING AND DISMISSING WITH PREJUDICE PETITION 

FOR A WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS, DENYING CERTIFICATE OF 

APPEALABILITY, AND DENYING LEAVE TO PROCEED IN FORMA PAUPERIS ON 

APPEAL 

 Petitioner Milton Lewis filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 

U.S.C. § 2254 on June 19, 2015. Petitioner is serving a sentence of life imprisonment, as well as 

lesser terms, for his Wayne Circuit Court convictions of two counts of first-degree murder, Mich. 

Comp. Laws § 750.316; one count of assault with intent to commit murder, Mich. Comp. Laws § 

750.83; three counts of armed robbery, Mich. Comp. Laws § 750.529; and possession of a 

firearm during the commission of a felony, Mich. Comp. Laws § 750.224b. The petition raises a 

single claim: insufficient evidence was presented at trial to sustain Petitioner’s conviction for 

first-degree murder. The petition will be denied because Petitioner’s claims are without merit. A 

certificate of appealability and leave to proceed in forma pauperis on appeal will also be denied. 

I. 

 This Court recites verbatim the relevant facts relied upon by the Michigan Court of 

Appeals, which are presumed correct on habeas review pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). See 

Wagner v. Smith, 581 F.3d 410, 413 (6th Cir. 2009): 

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On April 25, 2011, defendant entered the St. John Eastwood Clinic Connor 

House, a drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility in Detroit, Michigan. Inside, 

defendant fatally shot Milford Reed, robbed and fatally shot Ricky Charles, 

robbed and assaulted Terence Ross, and robbed Gregory Walton. Several hours 

before the murders, defendant sent a series of text messages to Gus Mills, who 

lives adjacent to the Connor House, instructing Mills to leave town, that Mills 

would be “the last one standing,” and that defendant was going to “deal” with the 

residents of Connor House on their “own terms.” 

People v. Lewis, No. 310295, 2013 WL 5762994, at *1 (Mich. Ct. App. Oct. 24, 2013). 

 Following his conviction and sentence, Petitioner filed a claim of appeal in the Michigan 

Court of Appeals, which raised the following claim: 

I. The United States Constitution requires that Appellant’s convictions for first 

degree murder premeditated be vacated since there was legally insufficient 

evidence to support a guilty verdict. 

 The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed Petitioner’s conviction in an unpublished 

opinion. Lewis, 2013 WL 5762994, at *1, 3. Petitioner subsequently filed an application for 

leave to appeal in the Michigan Supreme Court, which raised the same claim as in the Michigan 

Court of Appeals. The Michigan Supreme Court denied the application because it was not 

persuaded that the questions presented should be reviewed by the court. People v. Lewis, 843 

N.W.2d 907 (Mich. 2014) (unpublished table decision). 

II. 

 Title 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) curtails a federal court’s review of constitutional claims 

raised by a state prisoner in a habeas action if the claims were adjudicated on the merits by the 

state courts. Relief is barred under this section unless the state court adjudication was “contrary 

to” or resulted in an “unreasonable application of” clearly established Supreme Court law. 

 “A state court’s decision is ‘contrary to’ . . . clearly established law if it ‘applies a rule 

that contradicts the governing law set forth in [Supreme Court cases]’ or if it ‘confronts a set of 

facts that are materially indistinguishable from a decision of [the Supreme] Court and 

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nevertheless arrives at a result different from [this] precedent.’” Mitchell v. Esparza, 540 U.S. 

12, 15-16 (2003) (per curiam), quoting Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 405-06 (2000). 

 “[T]he ‘unreasonable application’ prong of the statute permits a federal habeas court to 

‘grant the writ if the state court identifies the correct governing legal principle from [the 

Supreme] Court but unreasonably applies that principle to the facts’ of petitioner’s case.” 

Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 520 (2003) quoting Williams, 529 U.S. at 413. 

 “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.” 

Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S.86, 101 (2011), quoting Yarborough v. Alvarado, 541 U.S. 652, 

664 (2004). “Section 2254(d) reflects the view that habeas corpus is a guard against extreme 

malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems, not a substitute for ordinary error correction 

through appeal.” Harrington, 562 U.S. at 103 (internal quotation marks omitted). “As a condition 

for obtaining habeas corpus from a federal court, a state prisoner must show that the state court’s 

ruling on the claim being presented in federal court was so lacking in justification that there was 

an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for 

fairminded disagreement.” Id. 

III. 

 Petitioner claims that insufficient evidence was presented at his jury trial to sustain his 

conviction for first degree murder. Specifically, he argues that the prosecutor failed to prove that 

the murders were premeditated. This claim was presented to the Michigan Court of Appeals 

during Petitioner’s direct appeal, and the state court found that it lacked merit. Respondent 

argues that the state court reasonably rejected the claim on the merits, and therefore habeas relief 

is barred under § 2254(d). 

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 A “daunting, doubly deferential standard of review” applies to a sufficiency-of-theevidence inquiry on habeas review. Keys v. Booker, 798 F.3d 442, 450 (6th Cir. 2015). First, a 

reviewing court “must determine whether, viewing the trial testimony and exhibits in the light 

most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential 

elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” Brown v. Konteh, 567 F.3d 191, 205 (6th Cir. 

2009) (citing Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979)). Second, even if the reviewing court 

concludes that a rational trier of fact could not have found the petitioner guilty beyond a 

reasonable doubt, it “must still defer to the state appellate court’s sufficiency determination as 

long as it is not unreasonable.” Id. 

 The Jackson standard “must be applied with explicit reference to the substantive elements 

of the criminal offense as defined by state law.” Jackson, 443 U.S. at 324 n.16. “To establish 

first-degree premeditated murder [in Michigan], the prosecution must prove that the defendant 

intentionally killed the victim and the act of killing was deliberate and premeditated.” People v. 

Haywood, 530 N.W.2d 497, 503 (Mich. Ct. App. 1995). 

 The elements in dispute here are premeditation and deliberation. Under state law, “[t]o 

premeditate is to think about beforehand; to deliberate is to measure and evaluate the major 

facets of a choice or problem.” People v. Morrin, 187 N.W.2d 434, 449 (Mich. Ct. App. 1971) 

(footnote omitted). “Premeditation and deliberation require sufficient time to allow the defendant 

to take a second look at his actions. This time interval may be minimal.” People v. Gonzalez, 444 

N.W.2d 228, 230 (Mich. Ct. App. 1989) (internal citation omitted). “[P]remeditation and 

deliberation may be inferred from all the facts and circumstances surrounding the incident, 

including the parties’ prior relationship, the actions of the accused both before and after the 

crime, and the circumstances of the killing itself.” Haywood, 530 N.W.2d at 503 (internal 

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citations omitted). Premeditation may also be inferred from “the type of weapon used and the 

location of the wounds inflicted.” People v. Berry, 497 N.W.2d 202, 204 (Mich. Ct. App. 1993). 

 Review of the trial record supports the state court of appeals’ conclusion. Notably, one of 

the prosecution witnesses, Gus Mills, testified that hours before the murders, he received a text 

message from Petitioner indicating that he wanted Mills to leave the area of Conner House, leave 

a door unlocked, that Petitioner would deal with the residents at Conner House on their terms, 

and that Mills would be the last one standing. See Dkt. 9-7, pp. 86-89. If the text message was at 

all unclear about what Petitioner intended to do, he resolved any ambiguities by his actions the 

next day. 

 Terrence Ross testified that Petitioner arrived at Conner House on the day of the incident 

and seemed agitated and paranoid. Id. at 34. Petitioner said he was there to pick up a check from 

the program manager. Ross tried to convince Petitioner to reenter the program, but it seemed to 

Ross that Petitioner was not listening to anything he said. 

 Meanwhile, Gregory Walton and Ricky Charles were in the pool room in the basement, 

and Milford Reed was in the basement television room. Walton testified that he heard shots, and 

then he saw Petitioner enter the pool room wearing gloves and brandishing a handgun. Id. at 67. 

Petitioner demanded that Walton and Charles turn over their money. Id. at 68. Charles put less 

than a dollar’s worth of change on the pool table, and so Petitioner immediately shot Charles in 

the face, telling him “that ain’t shit.” Id. at 69. Walton had four twenty-dollar bills to give 

Petitioner. Petitioner took the money and told Walton to “keep his mouth shut, and get out of 

town.” Id. at 70. Walton fled the building and called for help. Id. at 71. The shots Walton initially 

heard most likely came from the television room, where the other murder victim, Reed, was 

found. Reed was shot at close range directly into his left eye. Id. at 122. 

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 At some point during the incident, Petitioner went upstairs and approached Ross in his 

bedroom and demanded money. Ross scrambled around his room but could not locate his money. 

As he scrambled, Petitioner shot him multiple times in the hand, arm, and head. Id. at 39. 

Eventually, Petitioner took Ross’s pack of cigarettes and left. Ross then went outside where he 

and Charles, bleeding from their wounds, tried to wave motorists down for help. 

 Given this record evidence, even on direct review Petitioner’s claim bordered on 

frivolous. Viewed most favorably to the prosecution, as the Jackson standard requires, 

Petitioner’s texts the night before the shooting indicated that he planned to return to Conner 

House to rob and murder the residents. He warned Ross that he would be last man standing, and 

then hours later he shot three people in the head in an episode that must have lasted several 

minutes. The evidence presented at trial therefore easily allowed a rational fact-finder to 

conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that Petitioner acted with premeditation and deliberation 

when he killed the two deceased victims. Without question, the adjudication of this claim by the 

state courts did not involve an unreasonable application of the clearly established Supreme Court 

standard. The petition will therefore be denied. 

IV. 

The petition for a writ of habeas corpus will be denied. Petitioner will also be denied a 

certificate of appealability. In order to obtain a certificate of appealability, a prisoner must make 

a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). To 

demonstrate this denial, the applicant is required to show that reasonable jurists could debate 

whether, or agree that, the petition should have been resolved in a different manner, or that the 

issues presented were adequate to deserve encouragement to proceed further. Slack v. McDaniel, 

529 U.S. 473, 483-84 (2000). When a district court rejects a habeas petitioner’s constitutional 

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claims on the merits, the petitioner must demonstrate that reasonable jurists would find the 

district court’s assessment of the constitutional claims to be debatable or wrong. Id. at 484. A 

federal district court may grant or deny a certificate of appealability when the court issues a 

ruling on the habeas petition. Castro v. United States, 310 F.3d 900, 901 (6th Cir. 2002). 

 For the reasons stated in this opinion, the Court will deny Petitioner a certificate of 

appealability because he has failed to make a substantial showing of the denial of a federal 

constitutional right. Dell v. Straub, 194 F. Supp. 2d 629, 659 (E.D. Mich. 2002). Because Lewis 

has not made a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right he is not entitled to the 

issuance of a certificate of appealability on this claim. See Heidelberg v. Illinois Prisoner Review 

Bd., 163 F.3d 1025, 1025-1027 (7th Cir. 1998). The Court will also deny Petitioner leave to 

proceed in forma pauperis on appeal because the appeal would be frivolous. 28 U.S.C. § 

1915(a)(3). 

V. 

 Accordingly, it is ORDERED, that the petition for a writ of habeas corpus is DENIED 

and DISMISSED with prejudice. 

 It is further ORDERED that a certificate of appealability is DENIED. 

 It is further ORDERED that leave to proceed in forma pauperis on appeal is DENIED. 

Dated: March 16, 2016 s/Thomas L. Ludington 

 THOMAS L. LUDINGTON 

 United States District Judge 

 

PROOF OF SERVICE 

The undersigned certifies that a copy of the foregoing order was served 

upon each attorney or party of record herein by electronic means or first 

class U.S. mail on March 16, 2016. 

 s/Michael A. Sian 

 MICHAEL A. SIAN, Case Manager 

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