Case Name: Rhonda WILLIAMS, a/k/a Victoria Tribble, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Elaine LORD, Superintendent, Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, Respondent-Appellee
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Jurisdiction: United States
Decision Date: 1993-07-01
Citations: 996 F.2d 1481
Docket Number: No. 626, Docket 92-2429
Parties: Rhonda WILLIAMS, a/k/a Victoria Tribble, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Elaine LORD, Superintendent, Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, Respondent-Appellee.
Judges: Before LUMBARD, CARDAMONE, and McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judges.
Reporter: Federal Reporter 2d Series
Volume: 996
Pages: 1481–1485

Head Matter:
Rhonda WILLIAMS, a/k/a Victoria Tribble, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Elaine LORD, Superintendent, Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, Respondent-Appellee.
No. 626, Docket 92-2429.
United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.
Argued May 20, 1992.
Decided July 1, 1993.
Mary C. Rothwell, New York City (The Legal Aid Soc., New York City, Philip L. Weinstein, of counsel), for petitioner-appellant.
Robin A.' Forshaw, Asst. Dist. Atty., Kew Gardens, NY (Richard A. Brown, Dist. Atty. of Queens County, Barbara D. Underwood, Asst. Dist. Atty., Kew Gardens, NY, of counsel), for respondent-appellee.
Before LUMBARD, CARDAMONE, and McLAUGHLIN, Circuit Judges.

Opinion:
LUMBARD, Circuit Judge:
Rhonda Williams appeals from a judgment of the Eastern District of New York, Kor-man, J., dismissing her petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The district court rejected her contention that her 1987 conviction in the Supreme Court of New York, Queens County, on charges of second degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon, violated her constitutional right to present a defense because the trial court excluded evidence of the victim's prior violent act. We affirm.
On July 9, 1986, Williams fatally stabbed John Neil Bennett in the chest in a parking lot located at 41-09 12th Street in Queens County, New York. The next day, the New York City Housing Authority Police, following a tip, questioned her about the incident. She admitted stabbing Bennett but claimed she had acted in self-defense. She made both a written and a videotaped statement to that effect.
According to these statements, Williams, a prostitute, was paid by Bennett to have oral sex. While in his car, Bennett smoked some crack for about fifteen minutes and then "started going crazy," grabbing her by the neck, calling her a "bitch," and saying "you ain't going nowhere." He punched her in the face and legs. He then grabbed a knife from under the seat and cut her arm. When he tried to cut her face, she grabbed the knife by the blade, wrestled it from him, and stabbed him in the chest. She got out of the car and ran, as Bennett yelled, "[b]itch, you cut me." She threw the knife behind a storefront grate. She then found her "man," Kenneth Simmons, who had her retrieve the knife, which he threw down a sewer.
At trial, the government introduced both Williams' written and videotaped statements. The police officers who interrogated her testified that they had not noticed any evidence that she had been injured, such as blood on her body or swelling. Furthermore, the medical examiner testified that the only injuries suffered by Bennett were the stab wound and a small abrasion on one finger of his left hand. The toxicologist testified that no drugs or alcohol were found in Bennett's system and concluded that this was "inconsistent" with his having smoked crack.
During trial, a prosecutorial memorandum revealing that Bennett was the subject of a prior rape investigation was inadvertently disclosed to the defense. Defense counsel tried unsuccessfully to contact the victim in the prior rape,, whom we shall refer to as Doe, but was told by her mother that Doe had identified Bennett as the rapist.
Defense counsel moved for a continuance to allow Doe to appear in court to identify Bennett. In response to the court's questions as to the admissibility of this testimony, counsel argued it should be admissible because the similarities between the two situations suggested that Bennett had a "modus operandi of committing these types of assaul-tive acts in conjunction with sexual assaults." Cf. People v. Molineux, 168 N.Y. 264, 293, 61 N.E. 286 (1901) (evidence of a defendant's prior acts admissable to show motive, intent, absence of mistake, identity, or a common scheme or plan).
The court denied the motion, and Williams offered no evidence in her defense. The jury convicted, and Williams was sentenced to concurrent terms of imprisonment of fifteen years for murder and one year for weapons possession.
Williams moved to set aside the verdict, claiming that the government's failure to disclose information concerning the rape investigation in a timely manner was prosecutorial misconduct. Doe's affidavit in support of this motion established that she had gone out with "Neil," who had raped her at knifepoint after smoking some marijuana. She had identified Bennett's picture in July 1986 and was told by the police that he was dead. Defense counsel argued that this testimony was admissible to show a modus operandi, motive, intent, or absence of mistake. The court denied her motion, ruling that "[e]vi-dence to show the reputation of the victim as a person of violence or specific violent acts of the victim, are [sic] admissible only if the defendant had knowledge thereof prior to the homicide of the victim, of which the defendant had concededly none." See In re Robert S. (anonymous), 52 N.Y.2d 1046, 438 N.Y.S.2d 509, 420 N.E.2d 390 (1981) (reaffirming the exclusion of evidence of the victim's prior violent acts, if the defendant was unaware of the acts).
Williams appealed, arguing that the evidence was crucial to her defense and noting that New York followed the minority rule as to its admissibility. She urged the admission of this evidence, claiming, "When a defendant's constitutional right to present a defense is implicated, the court should err on the side of admissibility. United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683, 709 [94 S.Ct. 3090, 3108, 41 L.Ed.2d 1039] (1974); Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284, 302 [93 S.Ct. 1038, 1049, 35 L.Ed.2d 297] (1973)." The Appellate Division affirmed her conviction, without commenting on the evidentiary issue. People v. Williams, 160 A.D.2d 753, 553 N.Y.S.2d 818 (2d Dep't 1990).
In a letter dated April 16, 1990, Williams sought leave to appeal to the New York Court of Appeals, claiming, "Where evidence goes to the heart of a defendant's case, his right to present a defense outweighs trial court discretion to prohibit such evidence. People v. Hudy, 73 N.Y.2d 40, 56-58 [538 N.Y.S.2d 197, 535 N.E.2d 250] (1988)." The Court of Appeals summarily denied her application. People v. Williams, 76 N.Y.2d 745, 558 N.Y.S.2d 906, 557 N.E.2d 1202 (1990).
Williams then filed the instant petition, alleging that the exclusion of the evidence violated her constitutional right to present a defense under the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments. Noting that it was "doubtful whether [she] properly alerted the New York courts to the federal constitutional underpinning of her claim," the district court denied the writ, reasoning that the rule was constitutional because it did not arbitrarily exclude more evidence than was justified by its purpose. Williams now appeals.
A. Exhaustion of state comt remedies
We find that Williams has exhausted her state court remedies. Although she did not cite specific constitutional provisions in her brief to the Appellate Division, she explicitly asserted her constitutional right to present a defense. Furthermore, she cited a leading Supreme Court case in this area, Chambers v. Mississippi 410 U.S. 284, 302, 93 S.Ct. 1038, 1049, 35 L.Ed.2d 297 (1973) (holding that an evidentiary rule barring a party from impeaching his own witness violated the constitutional right to present a defense).
Thus, Williams satisfied the exhaustion requirement by fully presenting her claim to the state court. See Daye v. Attorney Gen. of New York, 696 F.2d 186, 191 (2d Cir.1982) (in bane), cert. denied, 464 U.S. 1048, 104 S.Ct. 723, 79 L.Ed.2d 184 (1984). Her reliance on the constitutional right to present a defense presented her claim by stating it "in terms so particular as to call to mind a specific right protected by the Constitution." Id. at 194. Furthermore, her citation to Chambers and Nixon, "pertinent federal cases employing constitutional analysis," also satisfied this requirement. Id.; see also Abdurrahman v. Henderson, 897 F.2d 71, 73 (2d Cir.1990) (petitioner's mention of "Strickland v. Washington" in a pro se supplemental brief adequately alerted the Appellate Division to his constitutional claim of ineffective assistance of counsel).
B. Constitutional Hght to present a defense
Williams claims that the exclusion of evidence in this case violated her constitutional right to present a defense. Although the source of this right is somewhat unclear, its existence is well established. As the Supreme Court explained: "Whether rooted directly in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment or in the Compulsory Process or Confrontation Clauses of the Sixth Amendment, the Constitution guarantees criminal defendants 'a meaningful opportunity to present a complete defense.' " Crane v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 683, 690, 106 S.Ct. 2142, 2146, 90 L.Ed.2d 636 (1986) (citations omitted); see also United States v. Almonte, 956 F.2d 27, 30 (2d Cir.1992) (per curiam) ("The due process clause of the Fifth Amendment and the compulsory process clause of the Sixth Amendment guarantee each criminal defendant the right to present a defense.") (citing Rosario v. Kuhlman, 839 F.2d 918, 924 (2d Cir.1988)).
Of course, the right to present a defense "is not absolute, and may, in appropriate cases, bow to accommodate other legitimate interests in the criminal trial process." Chambers, 410 U.S. at 295, 93 S.Ct. at 1046. Such restrictions, however, may not be "arbitrary or disproportionate to the purposes they are designed to serve." Rock v. Arkansas, 483 U.S. 44, 55-56, 107 S.Ct. 2704, 2711, 97 L.Ed.2d 37 (1987). Thus, "a State must evaluate whether the interests served by a rule justify the limitations imposed on the defendant's constitutional right to testify." Id.
We believe that the limitation on Williams' ability to introduce evidence of Bennett's pri- or rape satisfies the balancing test set forth in Rock. The rule at issue serves two legitimate state interests. First, New York has an interest in seeing that every person, regardless of his worth to the community, is not unlawfully assaulted. See People v. Miller, 39 N.Y.2d 543, 551, 384 N.Y.S.2d 741, 349 N.E.2d 841 (1976) (a "jury [might] find a homicide justifiable for the wrong reason— i.e., that the deceased was unworthy of life"). Moreover, "there is a very real danger that the trier of fact will overestimate [the evidence's] significance." People v. Hudy, 73 N.Y.2d 40, 55, 538 N.Y.S.2d 197, 535 N.E.2d 250 (1988). Second, by avoiding the need to establish the truth of Doe's accusation about the rape, the rule narrows the issues for the jury, preventing "undue diversion to collater al matters." Miller, 39 N.Y.2d at 551, 384 N.Y.S.2d 741, 349 N.E.2d 841.
Moreover, this evidence has little probative value. It does not bear on the reasonableness of Williams' actions, because she did not know Bennett was a suspect in a prior rape. Nor were the attacks on Williams and Doe similar enough to constitute evidence of a modus operandi on Bennett's part. Therefore, the evidence is only relevant to Bennett's general propensity for violence. Under New York law, however, propensity evidence is viewed as having limited relevance. "[T]he commission of an independent offense is not proof in itself of the commission of another crime." Molineux, 168 N.Y. at 293, 61 N.E. 286. Thus, such evidence has "little or no bearing on the guilt or innocence of the defendant." Miller, 39 N.Y.2d at 551, 384 N.Y.S.2d 741, 349 N.E.2d 841.
Accordingly, we find that the balance drawn by New York in excluding such evidence is neither arbitrary nor disproportionate. Williams was not denied her constitutional right to present a defense. The goals served by New York's rule, along with the evidence's limited relevance, justify its exclusion. To the same effect is the First Circuit's decision in Lagasse v. Vestal, 671 F.2d 668, 669 (1st Cir.), cert. denied, 457 U.S. 1122, 102 S.Ct. 2939, 73 L.Ed.2d 1337 (1982), holding that a rule similar to New York's rule did not violate defendant's right to a fair trial because "the exclusion of the proffered testimony was a rational means of barring marginally relevant but highly prejudicial evidence."
Affirmed.