United States Court of Appeals 

For the First Circuit 

No. 15-1739 

REGINALD BUTLER, 

Petitioner, Appellant, 

v. 

LISA MITCHELL, 

Respondent, Appellee. 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS 

[Hon. William G. Young, U.S. District Judge] 

Before 

Barron, Circuit Judge, 

Souter, Associate Justice,*

and Selya, Circuit Judge. 

Michael J. Fellows, for appellant. 

Christopher Hurld, Assistant Attorney General, with whom 

Maura Healey, Attorney General of Massachusetts, was on brief, for 

appellee. 

March 9, 2016 

 * Hon. David H. Souter, Associate Justice (Ret.) of the 

Supreme Court of the United States, sitting by designation. 
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SOUTER, Associate Justice. Reginald Butler appeals the 

denial of a petition for habeas corpus in which he claims that his 

Sixth Amendment rights to a speedy trial and effective assistance 

of counsel were violated in the course of a Massachusetts state 

prosecution. We affirm. 

I 

In 1991, a Massachusetts state district court issued an 

arrest warrant supported by a criminal complaint charging Butler 

with rape. In 1993, while incarcerated on unrelated charges, 

Butler signed a standard form requesting a speedy trial on the 

1991 complaint, but the case lay dormant. 

After further proceedings immaterial here, the 

Commonwealth obtained an indictment against Butler on the rape 

charge in 1999, and he was arraigned in the Massachusetts superior 

court. His trial began in 2003 and ended with a conviction. On 

direct appeal, the state intermediate appellate court affirmed, 

and the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts (SJC) denied 

review. 

In 2008, Butler sought a new trial by motion filed in 

the superior court, claiming that his counsel on direct appeal had 

been ineffective for failing to argue that Butler's speedy-trial 

rights under the Massachusetts and Federal Constitutions had been 

violated. The superior court denied the motion, and both the 

intermediate appellate court and the SJC affirmed. 
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Butler then in 2013 filed a petition for habeas corpus 

in federal district court, raising speedy-trial and ineffectiveassistance claims under the Sixth Amendment. The petition was 

denied, and Butler has appealed. We affirm. 

II 

 As it concerns this case, the Antiterrorism and 

Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2254(d)(1), provides that habeas relief "shall not be granted 

with respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in 

State court proceedings unless the adjudication of the claim 

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." 

Butler says that each standard was violated by the SJC's 

adjudication of his speedy-trial and ineffective-assistance 

claims. We review the district court's contrary decision denying 

habeas relief de novo. Scott v. Gelb, 810 F.3d 94, 98 (1st Cir. 

2016). 

As for his speedy-trial claim, Butler relies for 

precedent on Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514 (1972), applying the 

Sixth Amendment, and its progeny, principally Doggett v. United 

States, 505 U.S. 647 (1992). The SJC ultimately denied Butler's 

speedy-trial claim under both the Federal and Massachusetts 

Constitutions, but, because the SJC considers the standards under 
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both Constitutions to be analogous, it identified Barker and 

Doggett as the controlling law in setting out the considerations 

for determining permissible delay once the speedy-trial clock has 

begun to run.1 Accordingly, this case turns on whether the SJC's 

decision involves an unreasonable application of those precedents 

as governing the federal issue before us here. See Rashad v. 

Walsh, 300 F.3d 27, 35 (1st Cir. 2002) ("[The 'contrary to'] branch 

of the AEDPA standard is only marginally involved in this appeal-

-the state court correctly deduced that Barker constituted the 

controlling Supreme Court precedent--and so we do not dwell upon 

it."). 

Barker prescribed a balancing analysis requiring four 

enquiries: "Length of delay, the reason for the delay, the 

defendant's assertion of his right, and prejudice to the 

defendant." 407 U.S. at 530. The SJC determined that the first 

factor "weigh[ed] heavily against the Commonwealth." Com. v. 

Butler, 985 N.E.2d 377, 385 (Mass. 2013). Naturally, Butler does 

not challenge that determination, but as we consider it for 

purposes of the federal claim we have to say that it overvalues 

the evidence in Butler's favor. 

 1 As the SJC put it, "[a]lthough we ultimately decide this 

case pursuant to art. 11 of the Massachusetts Declaration of 

Rights, we cite Federal cases that interpret the Sixth Amendment 

to the United States Constitution because the analysis is 

analogous." Com. v. Butler, 985 N.E.2d 377, 381 n.5 (Mass. 2013). 
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The SJC computed "over ten years" of relevant delay 

because it applied a rule of state constitutional law that the 

speedy-trial right attached and the time began to run upon issuance 

of the 1991 criminal complaint. Id. Under the Sixth Amendment, 

however, the speedy-trial right attached, and the count began, not 

when the complaint was issued, but when the 1999 indictment was 

announced. 

In United States v. Marion, 404 U.S. 307, 313, 320 

(1971), the Supreme Court held that the speedy-trial right attaches 

when a defendant is indicted, arrested, or otherwise officially 

accused. See also United States v. MacDonald, 456 U.S. 1, 6 (1982) 

(discussing Marion). In Rashad, we explained that "only a 'public 

accusation' animates the right to a speedy trial," 300 F.3d at 36 

(quoting Marion, 404 U.S. at 321), and that, "in the absence of 

either an indictment or an information, 'only the actual restraints 

imposed by arrest and holding to answer a criminal charge' engage 

the speedy trial right," id. (quoting United States v. Loud Hawk, 

474 U.S. 302, 310 (1986)). In Rashad, as in the instant case, a 

Massachusetts criminal complaint had issued years before an 

indictment. Id. at 30-31, 35. But because the complaint "was 

unaccompanied by any public accusation or act of detention," we 

held that the date of its issuance was "irrelevant for speedy trial 

purposes." Id. at 36. Although in Rashad, as in this case, the 

petitioner had been in custody in the period after the complaint, 
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it was on unrelated charges, id. at 35, and because he was not 

arrested "in connection with the same charge on which he [wa]s 

eventually put to trial," we held that the detention was "of no 

consequence," id. at 36. On the facts of Rashad, which are thus 

materially similar to those here, we concluded that "the date of 

the indictment [wa]s the starting point for the speedy trial 

analysis." Id. Hence, in this case, the time elapsed was not 

"over ten years," but four. 

Butler invites us to reconsider Rashad given the SJC's 

explanation in his case for federal as well as state purposes that 

a complaint triggers the speedy-trial clock. See supra note 1. 

Quite apart from the constraints upon us as a subsequent panel, 

however, we decline, for there are good reasons in the logic of 

prior law for Rashad's holding that a Massachusetts criminal 

complaint, standing alone, is not the public, official accusation 

that the Sixth Amendment requires. For example, as Butler's 

counsel acknowledged at argument, under Massachusetts law the 

Commonwealth cannot proceed on a complaint alone unless the 

defendant waives indictment. See Mass. R. Crim. P. 3. It is thus 

the indictment or waiver, not the complaint, that functions as the 

charge necessary to commence the prosecutorial process in earnest. 

See Rashad, 300 F.3d at 36 n.4 ("This case does not call upon us 

to analyze the issue of what happens when there is no requirement 

that the government obtain an indictment, or when the defendant 
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has waived the right to proceed by indictment." (citing Mass. R. 

Crim. P. 3)). And this view of relevant events under Marion has 

commended itself to other circuits that look to something more 

than a criminal complaint for purposes of starting the Sixth 

Amendment speedy-trial clock. See, e.g., Pharm v. Hatcher, 984 

F.2d 783, 785-86 (7th Cir. 1993); Favors v. Eyman, 466 F.2d 1325, 

1327-28 (9th Cir. 1972).2

The SJC found that the second Barker criterion, the 

reason for the delay, "weigh[ed] only lightly against the 

Commonwealth." Butler, 985 N.E.2d at 385. Butler does not argue 

otherwise, presumably because, in finding that it was mere 

negligence that caused the delay, the SJC was still taxing the 

Commonwealth with responsibility for seven-and-a-half years of the 

period exceeding ten that it recognized under the state 

constitutional rule. With respect to the four-year period relevant 

under the Federal Constitution, however, the SJC acknowledged that 

"most of the delays were either at the defendant's request or by 

agreement of the defendant's counsel"; indeed, only 310 days of 

 2 In a Rule 28(j) letter, Butler cites Moore v. Illinois, 434 

U.S. 220 (1977), Coleman v. Alabama, 399 U.S. 1 (1970), and 

Hamilton v. Alabama, 368 U.S. 52 (1961), to support the claim that 

we should look to state law to determine when the Sixth Amendment 

right attaches. These cases, however, do not teach that federal 

courts defer to state law to determine when a federal right 

attaches. Rather, they show that, in assessing when a federal 

right attaches, federal courts apply federal law to the 

consequences of state procedures. 
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those four years were attributable to the Commonwealth. Id. at 

386 (citing Com. v. Butler, 864 N.E.2d 33, 39 (Mass. App. Ct. 

2007)). 

The SJC determined that the third consideration, the 

defendant's assertion of his right, "weigh[ed] slightly against 

[Butler]," because, other than signing the form in 1993, "he failed 

to make any inquiry regarding the status of his request," 

suggesting by his reticence that "he intended to take advantage of 

the government's silence or error to fly under the radar to avoid 

prosecution." Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). Butler 

protests, but this determination was not an unreasonable 

application of Barker. Indeed, as on the preceding points, the 

SJC looked more favorably on Butler's behavior than Sixth Amendment 

law allows. The SJC credited Butler with having asserted his right 

in 1993, but, as already explained, this was before his federal 

right had even attached. As we explained in Rashad, "a notice 

sent before the formal commencement of a criminal case is deemed 

premature (and, therefore, carries little weight) for speedy trial 

purposes." 300 F.3d at 39. In Rashad, as here, during the time 

"that elapsed between the petitioner's indictment and his trial, 

he never requested a prompt disposition of his case." Id. 

Finally, the SJC determined that the fourth point, 

prejudice to the defendant, "count[ed] against [Butler]." Butler, 

985 N.E.2d at 387. Butler says that, by refusing to presume 
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prejudice, the SJC unreasonably applied Doggett, but we think not. 

Doggett explained that "affirmative proof of particularized 

prejudice is not essential to every speedy trial claim," and that 

"excessive delay presumptively compromises the reliability of a 

trial." 505 U.S. at 655. "While such presumptive prejudice cannot 

alone carry a Sixth Amendment claim without regard to the other 

Barker criteria," the Court said, "its importance increases with 

the length of delay." Id. at 655-56. Although Doggett did not 

purport to set any precise length of delay either necessary or 

sufficient to give rise to such presumptive prejudice, the facts 

of the case offer a standard of comparison: the Court thought it 

sufficient where "[t]he lag between Doggett's indictment and 

arrest was 81⁄2 years, and he would have faced trial 6 years earlier 

than he did but for the Government's inexcusable oversights." Id. 

at 657. Here, by contrast, the relevant delay was four years, 

only 310 days of which were attributable to the Commonwealth. 

Given Doggett's finding of presumptive prejudice from an 

inexcusable six-year delay, the case is no authority for inferring 

such prejudice from a chargeable delay of 310 days, and the SJC's 

conclusion is no unreasonable application of clear precedent in 

adjudicating the federal claim. 

Nor can we say that the SJC's ultimate conclusion 

involved an unreasonable application of federal law when it held 

that the federal speedy-trial right had not been violated. As we 
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have said, if anything the SJC overvalued the first, second, and 

third Barker considerations in Butler's favor insofar as they 

concern the Sixth Amendment claim. 

This summary disposes of the remaining issue in this 

appeal. The SJC determined that Butler's direct-appeal counsel 

was not ineffective for failing to make what would have amounted 

to a losing speedy-trial argument. Butler does not deny that his 

ineffective-assistance claim must rise or fall with his claim of 

a speedy-trial violation, and our disposition of the one thus 

resolves the other. 

III 

The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.