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US Supreme Court Decisions - On-Line> Volume 477 > KUHLMANN V. WILSON, 477 U. S. 436 (1986)
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After his arraignment on charges arising from a 1970 robbery and murder in New York, respondent was confined in a cell with a prisoner, named Benny Lee, who had previously agreed to act as a police informant. Respondent made incriminating statements, and Lee reported them to the police. Prior to trial in a New York court, respondent moved to suppress the statements on the ground that they were obtained in violation of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel. After an evidentiary hearing, the trial court denied the motion, finding that Lee had obeyed a police officer's instructions only to listen to respondent for the purpose of identifying his confederates in the robbery and murder, but not to question respondent about the crimes. The court also found that respondent's statements to Lee were "spontaneous" and "unsolicited." In 1972, respondent was convicted of, and sentenced to imprisonment for, common law murder and felonious possession of a weapon, and the Appellate Division affirmed. In 1973, respondent sought federal habeas corpus relief, asserting that his statements to Lee were obtained by police investigative methods that violated his Sixth Amendment rights. The District Court denied the writ, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. After the 1980 decision in United States v. Henry, 447 U. S. 264 -- which applied the "deliberately elicited" test of Massiah v. United States, 377 U. S. 201, to suppress statements made to a paid jailhouse informant -- respondent unsuccessfully sought to have his conviction vacated by the state courts on the basis of his Sixth Amendment claim. In 1982, respondent filed the instant habeas corpus petition in Federal District Court, again asserting his Sixth Amendment claim. The District Court denied relief, but the Court of Appeals reversed. As an initial matter, the Court of Appeals concluded that, under Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1, the "ends of justice" required consideration of this petition for habeas corpus, notwithstanding the adverse determination on the merits of respondent's Sixth Amendment claim in the earlier federal habeas corpus proceedings. The court then held that, under Henry, respondent was entitled to relief. chanrobles.com-red
JUSTICE POWELL, joined by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, JUSTICE REHNQUIST, and JUSTICE O'CONNOR, delivered an opinion with respect to Parts II and III, concluding that the Court of Appeals erred in holding that the "ends of justice" would be served by entertaining respondent's present "successive" petition for habeas corpus, and that the District Court and the Court of Appeals should have dismissed this successive petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b) on the ground that the prior judgment denying relief on respondent's identical Sixth Amendment claim was final. Sanders v. United States derived its "ends of justice" test directly from language of the then-applicable statute, and left for another day the task of defining the considerations that properly support a decision to entertain a successive petition. Although § 2244(b) makes no reference to the "ends of justice," that phrase still may be used generally to describe the standard for identifying those cases where successive review may be appropriate. However, specific guidance should be given to the federal courts as to the kind of proof that a state prisoner must offer to establish that the "ends of justice" will be served by relitigation chanrobles.com-red
POWELL, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered the opinion of the Court with respect to Parts I, IV, and V, in which BURGER, C.J.,and WHITE, BLACKMUN, REHNQUIST, and O'CONNOR, JJ., joined, and an opinion with respect to Parts II and III, in which BURGER, C.J.,and REHNQUIST and O'CONNOR, JJ., joined. BURGER, C.J.,filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 477 U. S. 461. BRENNAN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which MARSHALL, J., joined, post, p. 477 U. S. 461. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. 477 U. S. 476.
In the early morning of July 4, 1970, respondent and two confederates robbed the Star Taxicab Garage in the Bronx, New York, and fatally shot the night dispatcher. Shortly chanrobles.com-red
Before respondent arrived in the jail, Lee had entered into an arrangement with Detective Cullen, according to which Lee agreed to listen to respondent's conversations and report his remarks to Cullen. Since the police had positive evidence of respondent's participation, the purpose of placing Lee in the cell was to determine the identities of respondent's confederates. Cullen instructed Lee not to ask respondent any questions, but simply to "keep his ears open" for the names of the other perpetrators. Respondent first spoke to Lee about the crimes after he looked out the cellblock window at the Star Taxicab Garage, where the crimes had occurred. Respondent said, "someone's messing with me," and began talking to Lee about the robbery, narrating the same story that he had given the police at the time of his arrest. Lee advised respondent that this explanation "didn't chanrobles.com-red
After hearing the testimony of Cullen and Lee, [Footnote 2] the trial court found that Cullen had instructed Lee "to ask no questions of [respondent] about the crime but merely to listen as to what [respondent] might say in his presence." The court determined that Lee obeyed these instructions, that he "at no time asked any questions with respect to the crime," and that he "only listened to [respondent] and made notes regarding what [respondent] had to say." The trial court also found that respondent's statements to Lee were "spontaneous" and "unsolicited." Under state precedent, a defendant's volunteered statements to a police agent were admissible in evidence because the police were not required to prevent talkative defendants from making incriminating statements. See People v. Kaye, 25 N.Y.2d 139, 145, 250 N.E.2d 329, 332 (1969). The trial court accordingly denied the suppression motion. chanrobles.com-red
A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed. Wilson v. Henderson, 584 F.2d 1185 (1978). The court noted that a defendant is denied his Sixth Amendment rights when the trial court admits in evidence incriminating statements that state agents "had deliberately elicited from him after he had been indicted and in the absence of counsel.'" Id. at 1189, quoting Massiah v. United States, supra, at 377 U. S. 206. Relying in part on Brewer v. Williams, 430 U. S. 387 (1977), the court reasoned that the "deliberately elicited" test of Massiah requires something more than incriminating statements uttered in the absence of counsel. On the facts found by the state trial court, which were entitled to a presumption of correctness under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), the court held that respondent had not established a violation of his Sixth Amendment rights. [Footnote 3] We denied a chanrobles.com-red
On July 6, 1982, respondent returned to the District Court for the Southern District of New York on a habeas petition, again arguing that admission in evidence of his incriminating statements to Lee violated his Sixth Amendment rights. Respondent contended that the decision in Henry constituted a new rule of law that should be applied retroactively to this case. The District Court found it unnecessary to consider retroactivity, because it decided that Henry did not undermine the Court of Appeals' prior disposition of respondent's Sixth Amendment claim. Noting that Henry reserved the question whether the Constitution forbade admission in evidence of an accused's statements to an informant who made "no effort to stimulate conversations about the crime charged," see United States v. Henry, supra, at 447 U. S. 271, n. 9, chanrobles.com-red
A different, and again divided, panel of the Court of Appeals reversed. Wilson v. Henderson, 742 F.2d 741 (1984). As an initial matter, the court stated that, under Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1 (1963), the "ends of justice" required consideration of this petition, notwithstanding the fact that the prior panel had determined the merits adversely to respondent. 742 F.2d 743. The court then reasoned that the circumstances under which respondent made his incriminating statements to Lee were indistinguishable from the facts of Henry. Finally, the court decided that Henry was fully applicable here, because it did not announce a new constitutional rule, but merely applied settled principles to new facts. 742 F.2d 746-747. Therefore, the court concluded that all of the judges who had considered and rejected respondent's claim had erred, and remanded the case to the District Court with instructions to order respondent's release from prison unless the State elected to retry him. [Footnote 5] chanrobles.com-red
In concluding that it was appropriate to entertain respondent's successive habeas corpus petition, the Court of Appeals relied upon Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1 (1963), which announced guidelines for the federal courts to follow when presented with habeas petitions or their equivalent claimed to be "successive" or an "abuse of the writ." [Footnote 6] The narrow question in Sanders was whether a federal prisoner's motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 was properly denied without a hearing on the ground that the motion constituted a successive application. Id. at 373 U. S. 4-6. The Court undertook not only to answer that question, but also to explore the standard that should govern district courts' consideration of successive petitions. Sanders framed the inquiry in terms of the requirements of the "ends of justice," advising district courts to dismiss habeas petitions or their equivalent raising claims determined adversely to the prisoner on a prior petition if chanrobles.com-red
Until the early years of this century, the substantive scope of the federal habeas corpus statutes was defined by reference chanrobles.com-red
Our decisions have not been limited to expanding the scope of the writ. Significantly, in Stone v. Powell, we removed from the reach of the federal habeas statutes a state prisoner's claim that "evidence obtained in an unconstitutional search or seizure was introduced at his trial" unless the prisoner could show that the State had failed to provide him "an opportunity for full and fair litigation" of his Fourth Amendment claim. 428 U.S. at 428 U. S. 494 (footnotes omitted). Although the Court previously had accepted jurisdiction of search and seizure claims, id. at 428 U. S. 480, we were persuaded that any "advance of the legitimate goal of furthering Fourth Amendment rights" through application of the judicially created chanrobles.com-red
In decisions of the past two or three decades construing the reach of the habeas statutes, whether reading those statutes broadly or narrowly, the Court has reaffirmed that "habeas corpus has traditionally been regarded as governed by equitable principles." Fay v. Noia, 372 U. S. 391, 372 U. S. 438 (1963), citing United States ex rel. Smith v. Baldi, 344 U. S. 561, 344 U. S. 573 (1953) (dissenting opinion). See Stone v. Powell, supra, at 428 U. S. 478, n. 11. The Court uniformly has been guided by the proposition that the writ should be available to afford relief to those "persons whom society has grievously wronged" in light of modern concepts of justice. Fay v. Noia, supra, at 372 U. S. 440-441. See Stone v. Powell, supra, at 428 U. S. 492, n. 31. Just as notions of justice prevailing at the inception of habeas corpus were offended when a conviction was issued by a court that lacked jurisdiction, so the modern conscience found intolerable convictions obtained in violation of certain constitutional commands. But the Court never has defined the scope of the writ simply by reference to a perceived need to assure that an individual accused of crime is afforded a trial free of constitutional error. Rather, the Court has performed its chanrobles.com-red
28 U.S.C. § 2244 (1964 ed.) (emphasis added). Accordingly, in describing guidelines for successive chanrobles.com-red
In construing this language, we are cognizant that Congress adopted the section in light of the need -- often recognized by this Court -- to weigh the interests of the individual prisoner against the sometimes contrary interests of the State in administering a fair and rational system of criminal laws. [Footnote 11] chanrobles.com-red
Senate Report at 2; see House Report at 5. The Senate Report explicitly states that the "purpose" of the amendments was to "alleviate the unnecessary burden" by adding "to section 2244 . . . provisions for a qualified application of the doctrine of res judicata." Senate Report at 2; see House Report at 8. The House also chanrobles.com-red
Based on the 1966 amendments and their legislative history, petitioner argues that federal courts no longer must consider the "ends of justice" before dismissing a successive petition. We reject this argument. It is clear that Congress intended for district courts, as the general rule, to give preclusive effect to a judgment denying on the merits a habeas petition alleging grounds identical in substance to those raised in the subsequent petition. But the permissive language of § 2244(b) gives federal courts discretion to entertain successive petitions under some circumstances. Moreover, Rule 9(b) of the Rules Governing Section 2254 Cases in the United States District Courts, which was amended in 1976, contains similar permissive language, providing that the district court "may" dismiss a "second or successive petition" that does not "allege new or different grounds for relief." Consistent with Congress' intent in enacting § 2244(b), however, the Advisory Committee Note to Rule 9(b), 28 U.S.C. p. 358, states that federal courts should entertain successive petitions only in "rare instances." [Footnote 13] Unless those "rare instances" are to be identified by whim or caprice, district judges must be given guidance for determining when to exercise the limited discretion granted them by § 2244(b). Accordingly, as a means of identifying the rare case in which federal courts should exercise their discretion to hear a successive petition, we continue to rely on the reference in Sanders to the "ends of justice." Our task is to provide a definition of the "ends of justice" that will accommodate Congress' intent to give finality to federal habeas judgments with chanrobles.com-red
Balanced against the prisoner's interest in access to a forum to test the basic justice of his confinement are the interests of the State in administration of its criminal statutes. Finality serves many of those important interests. Availability of unlimited federal collateral review to guilty defendants frustrates the State's legitimate interest in deterring crime, since the deterrent force of penal laws is diminished to the extent that persons contemplating criminal activity believe there is a possibility that they will escape punishment chanrobles.com-red
Id. at 456 U. S. 128, n. 32 (quoting Bator, Finality in Criminal Law and Federal Habeas Corpus for State Prisoners, 76 Harv.L.Rev. 441, 452 (1963)). See Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. at 412 U. S. 262 (POWELL, J., concurring). Finality also serves the State's legitimate punitive interests. When a prisoner is freed on a successive petition, often many years after his crime, the State may be unable successfully to retry him. [Footnote 15] Peyton v. Rowe, 391 U. S. 54, 391 U. S. 62 (1968). This result is unacceptable if the State must forgo conviction of a guilty defendant through the "erosion of memory" and "dispersion of witnesses" that occur with the passage of time that invariably attends collateral attack. [Footnote 16] chanrobles.com-red
In the light of the historic purpose of habeas corpus and the interests implicated by successive petitions for federal habeas relief from a state conviction, we conclude that the "ends of justice" require federal courts to entertain such petitions only where the prisoner supplements his constitutional claim with a colorable showing of factual innocence. This standard was proposed by Judge Friendly more than a decade ago as a prerequisite for federal habeas review generally. Friendly, supra. As Judge Friendly persuasively argued then, a requirement that the prisoner come forward with a colorable showing of innocence identifies those habeas petitioners who are justified in again seeking relief from their incarceration. We adopt this standard now to effectuate the clear intent of Congress that successive federal habeas review should be granted only in rare cases, but that it should be available when the ends of justice so require. The prisoner may make the requisite showing by establishing that, under the probative evidence, he has a colorable claim of factual innocence. The prisoner must make his evidentiary showing even though -- as argued in this case -- the evidence of guilt may have been unlawfully admitted. [Footnote 17] chanrobles.com-red
Applying the foregoing standard in this case, we hold that the Court of Appeals erred in concluding that the "ends of justice" would be served by consideration of respondent's successive petition. The court conceded that the evidence of respondent's guilt "was nearly overwhelming." 742 F.2d 742. The constitutional claim argued by respondent does not itself raise any question as to his guilt or innocence. The District Court and the Court of Appeals should have dismissed this successive petition under § 2244(b) on the ground that the prior judgment denying relief on this identical claim was final. [Footnote 18] chanrobles.com-red
The decision in Massiah had its roots in two concurring opinions written in Spano v. New York, 360 U. S. 315 (1959). See Maine v. Moulton, 474 U. S. 159, 474 U. S. 172 (1985). Following his indictment for first-degree murder, the defendant in Spano retained a lawyer and surrendered to the authorities. Before leaving the defendant in police custody, counsel cautioned him not to respond to interrogation. The prosecutor and police questioned the defendant, persisting in the face of his repeated refusal to answer and his repeated request to speak with his lawyer. The lengthy interrogation involved improper police tactics, and the defendant ultimately confessed. chanrobles.com-red
Ibid., quoting United States v. Massiah, 307 F.2d 62, 72-73 (1962) (Hays, J., dissenting in part). Thus, the Court made clear that it was concerned with interrogation or investigative techniques that were equivalent to interrogation, and that it so viewed the technique in issue in Massiah. [Footnote 20] chanrobles.com-red
Earlier this Term, we applied the Massiah standard in a case involving incriminating statements made under circumstances substantially similar to the facts of Massiah itself. In Maine v. Moulton, 474 U. S. 159 (1985), the defendant made incriminating statements in a meeting with his accomplice, who had agreed to cooperate with the police. During that meeting, the accomplice, who wore a wire transmitter to record the conversation, discussed with the defendant the charges pending against him, repeatedly asked the defendant to remind him of the details of the crime, and encouraged the defendant to describe his plan for killing witnesses. Id. at 474 U. S. 165-166, and n. 4. The Court concluded that these investigatory techniques denied the defendant his right to counsel on the pending charges. [Footnote 21] Significantly, the Court emphasized that, because of the relationship between the defendant chanrobles.com-red
It is thus apparent that the Court of Appeals erred in concluding that respondent's right to counsel was violated under the circumstances of this case. Its error did not stem from any disagreement with the District Court over appropriate resolution of the question reserved in Henry, but rather from its implicit conclusion that this case did not present that open question. That conclusion was based on a fundamental mistake, namely, the Court of Appeals' failure to accord to the state trial court's factual findings the presumption of correctness expressly required by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). Patton v. Yount, 467 U. S. 1025 (1984); Sumner v. Mata, 449 U. S. 539 (1981). chanrobles.com-red
742 F.2d 745. After thus revising some of the trial court's findings, and ignoring other more relevant findings, the Court of Appeals concluded that the police "deliberately elicited" respondent's incriminating statements. Ibid. This conclusion conflicts with the chanrobles.com-red
The Court of Appeals observed that suppression of respondent's statements would serve "no useful purpose" because Cullen had not engaged in "reprehensible police behavior," but rather had made a "conscious effort" to protect respondent's "constitutional rights [under Massiah] while pursuing a crucial homicide investigation." Wilson v. Henderson, 584 F.2d 1191.
Judge Van Graafeiland, dissenting, observed that the majority conceded that there had been no change in the law that had "transformed conduct that we formerly held to be constitutional into conduct that is now unconstitutional." 742 F.2d 749. Thus, the majority's rejection of the conclusion reached by the judges who previously had considered respondent's claim was based on its refusal to accept the trial court's factual determinations. Id. at 748. The dissent criticized the majority for disregarding
The defendant in Massiah made the incriminating statements in a conversation with one of his confederates, who had secretly agreed to permit Government agents to listen to the conversation over a radio transmitter. The agents instructed the confederate to "engage Massiah in conversation relating to the alleged crimes." United States v. Massiah, 307 F.2d 72 (Hays, J., dissenting in part).
742 F.2d 749 (citations omitted).
In Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1, 373 U. S. 15 (1963), we held that a federal court may refuse to entertain a successive petition for habeas relief or its equivalent under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 where "the ends of justice would not be served by reaching the merits of the subsequent application." The decision whether to hear a successive petition, we stated, was committed "to the sound discretion of the federal trial judges." Id. at 373 U. S. 18. We declined to define precisely "the chanrobles.com-red
Ante at 477 U. S. 454, n. 16 (quoting Stone v. Powell, 428 U. S. 465, 491 U. S. 491-492, n. 31 (1976)). Having thus implied that factual innocence is central to our habeas jurisprudence generally, the plurality declares that it is fundamental to the proper interpretation of "the ends of justice." Neither the plurality's standard for chanrobles.com-red
consideration of successive petitions nor its theory of habeas corpus is supported by statutory language, legislative history, or our precedents. [Footnote 2/2] chanrobles.com-red
in the context of federal collateral proceedings. Ibid. Subsequent cases have uniformly construed Stone v. Powell as creating a special rule only for Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule claims, and have repeatedly refused to extend its limitations on federal habeas review to any other context. Kimmelman v. Morrison, ante p. 477 U. S. 365 (declining to extend Stone v. Powell to Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel claims where the principal allegation and manifestation of inadequate representation is counsel's chanrobles.com-red
28 U.S.C. § 2241(c)(3). Nor does anything in the legislative history of the habeas statute support the view that Congress intended to limit habeas review in the manner proposed by the Court. For more than 30 years, our construction of the habeas statute to permit federal collateral review of virtually all nondefaulted constitutional claims -- with the narrow exception, over dissent, of Fourth Amendment claims -- without reference to actual guilt or innocence or to the competing interests of the State and the prisoner, has been unmistakably clear. See Brown v. Allen, 344 U. S. 443 (1953). Several times during this period, Congress has had the Court's interpretation expressly brought to its attention through bills proposing drastic revision of federal habeas jurisdiction. See L. Yackle, Postconviction Remedies § 19, pp. 91-92 (1981) (describing relevant bills introduced in past several Congresses). Each of those times, Congress steadfastly refused to make any significant changes in this Court's construction of that jurisdiction. Id. § 19, at 92 ("[S]ince 1948, the only amendments to the [habeas] statutes that the Congress has approved have . . . simply tracked contemporaneous Supreme Court decisions") (footnote omitted). The fact that chanrobles.com-red
Congress clearly intended that courts continue to determine which successive petitions they may choose not to hear by reference to the Sanders ends-of-justice standard. First, nothing in the House or Senate Reports accompanying the bill that amended § 2244 in 1966 suggests that Congress chanrobles.com-red
When we review habeas cases, our task is "to give fair effect to the habeas corpus jurisdiction enacted by Congress." Brown v. Allen, 344 U.S. at 344 U. S. 500 (opinion of Frankfurter, J.). With respect to successive habeas petitions, giving "fair effect" to the intent of Congress is to construe "the ends of justice" as Sanders did -- to mean that it is within the sound discretion of the court to refuse to hear abusive, meritless petitions and to hear petitions in which the prisoner advances a potentially meritorious claim and provides a good justification chanrobles.com-red
In the instant case, respondent alleged a potentially meritorious Sixth Amendment claim. He also advanced a complete justification for returning to federal court a second time with this claim. Between his first and second federal habeas petitions, this Court decided United States v. Henry, 447 U. S. 264 (1980), a case in which the facts were substantially similar to the facts of respondent's case [Footnote 2/6] and in which we elaborated on the Sixth Amendment's prohibition against government interference with an accused's right to counsel, a prohibition that we had previously recognized in Massiah v. United States, 377 U. S. 201 (1964), and Brewer v. Williams, 430 U. S. 387 (1977). The intervention of Henry, supra, clarified the appropriate analysis for Sixth Amendment claims like respondent's; thus, the Court of Appeals did not abuse its discretion by granting reconsideration of respondent's constitutional claim under the dispositive legal standard. [Footnote 2/7] chanrobles.com-red
The Court of Appeals did not disregard the state court's finding that Lee asked respondent no direct questions regarding the crime. Rather, the Court of Appeals expressly accepted that finding, Wilson v. Henderson, 742 F.2d 741, 745 (CA2 1984) ("[e]ven accepting that Lee did not ask Wilson any direct questions . . ."), but concluded that, as a matter of law, the deliberate elicitation standard of Henry, supra, and Massiah, supra, encompasses other, more subtle forms of stimulating incriminating admissions than overt questioning. The court suggested that the police deliberately placed respondent in a cell that overlooked the scene of the crime, hoping that the view would trigger an inculpatory comment to respondent's cellmate. [Footnote 2/8] The court also observed that, while Lee asked respondent no questions, Lee nonetheless stimulated conversation concerning respondents' role in the Star Taxicab Garage robbery and murder by remarking that respondent's exculpatory story did not "sound too good,'" and that he had better come up with a better one. 742 F.2d 745. Thus, the Court of Appeals concluded that respondent's case did not present the situation reserved in Henry, where an accused makes an incriminating remark within the hearing of a jailhouse informant, who "makes no effort to stimulate conversations about the crime charged." 447 U.S. at 447 U. S. 271, n. 9. Instead, the court determined this case to be virtually indistinguishable from Henry.
The Sixth Amendment guarantees an accused, at least after the initiation of formal charges, the right to rely on counsel as the "medium" between himself and the State. Maine v. Moulton, 474 U. S. 159, 474 U. S. 176 (1985). Accordingly, the Sixth Amendment "imposes on the State an affirmative obligation to respect and preserve the accused's choice to chanrobles.com-red
Id. at 447 U. S. 271. chanrobles.com-red
In the instant case, as in Henry, the accused was incarcerated, and therefore was "susceptible to the ploys of undercover Government agents." Ibid. Like Nichols, Lee was a secret informant, usually received consideration for the services he rendered the police, and therefore had an incentive to produce the information which he knew the police hoped to obtain. Just as Nichols had done, Lee obeyed instructions not to question respondent and to report to the police any statements made by the respondent in Lee's presence about the crime in question. App. 62. And, like Nichols, Lee encouraged respondent to talk about his crime by conversing with him on the subject over the course of several days and by telling respondent that his exculpatory story would not convince anyone without more work. However, unlike the situation in Henry, a disturbing visit from respondent's brother, rather than a conversation with the informant, seems to have been the immediate catalyst for respondent's chanrobles.com-red
The Court of Appeals noted that "[a]s soon as Wilson arrived and viewed the garage, he became upset and stated that someone's messing with me.'" 742 F.2d 745.
When a district court is confronted with the question whether the "ends of justice" would be served by entertaining a state prisoner's petition for habeas corpus raising a claim that has been rejected on a prior federal petition for the same relief, one of the facts that may properly be considered is whether the petitioner has advanced a "colorable claim of innocence." But I agree with JUSTICE BRENNAN that this is not an essential element of every just disposition of a successive petition. More specifically, I believe that the District Court did not abuse its discretion in entertaining the petition in this case, although I would also conclude that this is one of those close cases in which the District Court could have properly decided that a second review of the same contention was chanrobles.com-red