Title: David Leon Woods v. State of Indiana
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 06S00-0612-SD-544
State: Indiana
Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court
Date: March 26, 2007

In the  
Indiana Supreme Court 
 
David Leon WOODS,   
) 
 
Supreme Court Cause No. 
 
 
Petitioner, 
) 
 
06S00-0612-SD-544 
 
v. 
 
) 
 
 
 
 
)  
 
Boone Superior Court 
STATE of Indiana, 
) 
 
S 7007 
 
 
Respondent. 
) 
 
PUBLISHED ORDER CONCERNING SUCCESSIVE PETITION 
FOR POST-CONVICTION RELIEF IN CAPITAL CASE 
 
Introduction 
 
 
Having exhausted the judicial review to which he is entitled as a matter of right, David 
Leon Woods remains sentenced to death for the intentional killing of an elderly DeKalb County 
man during a robbery.  Before us now is Woods’s request to litigate a second, or “successive” 
post-conviction proceeding involving two claims:  (1) that he is exempt from the death penalty 
because he is mentally retarded, and (2) that his first state post-conviction proceeding was unfair 
because he had a dispute with his attorneys about strategy.  Because we conclude Woods has not 
met the threshold showing required on either claim, we deny authorization for any further 
successive post-conviction proceedings.  A date for execution of the sentence will be set by 
separate order.     
 
Background 
 
 
On April 7, 1984, in Garrett, Indiana, Woods, along with Greg Sloan and Pat Sweet, 
devised a plan to steal Juan Placencia’s television.  Placencia, age 77, was an acquaintance of 
Woods and his mother.  Woods, Sloan and Sweet went to Placencia’s home.  Woods was armed 
with a knife, but assured Sloan and Sweet that he intended only to scare Placencia with it.  While 
Sweet stayed in the yard, Woods and Sloan approached the apartment and rang the doorbell.  
When Placencia opened the door, Woods immediately jumped in and stabbed him several times 
with the knife.  Placencia fell back into a chair, directed the intruders to his money, and began 
asking for help.  Woods took $130 from Placencia's wallet, then stabbed Placencia again 
repeatedly—twenty-one times to the face, neck, and torso.  An autopsy showed Placencia died 
from three stabs wounds to the heart and one through the skull to the brain.  Woods and Sloan 
left Placencia’s apartment with the cash Woods had taken and a television they later sold for $20.  
They also washed their clothes and threw the knife and other incriminating items in a creek.   
 
 
Woods was charged with murder and robbery.  See Ind. Code § 35-42-1-1(1) (murder); 
§ 35-42-5-1 (robbery).  The State sought the death penalty, alleging one aggravating 
circumstance that rendered Woods eligible for a death sentence:  Woods had committed “an 
intentional murder in the commission of a robbery.”  Ind. Code § 35-50-2-9(b)(1).  Venue was 
transferred from DeKalb County to Boone County, and the case was tried in the Boone Superior 
Court.   
 
 
The jury found Woods guilty as charged and in the penalty phase that followed, the jury 
unanimously recommended the death sentence.  See I.C. § 35-50-2-9(e) (providing that a jury 
may recommend the death penalty only if it finds the state has proved an aggravating 
circumstance beyond a reasonable doubt and that any mitigating circumstances are outweighed 
by the aggravating circumstances).  The Boone Superior Court followed the jury’s 
recommendation and sentenced Woods to death.     
 
 
Courts have affirmed the convictions and death sentence at each stage of subsequent 
review.  We affirmed the death sentence on direct appeal in Woods v. State, 547 N.E.2d 772 
(Ind. 1989) (addressing arguments relating to Woods’s mental competence to stand trial,  
sufficiency of the evidence, the prosecutor’s conduct, fairness of the trial, and appropriateness of 
the death sentence), reh'g granted, 557 N.E.2d 1325 (Ind. 1990) (addressing, but rejecting, an 
argument concerning admission of victim impact evidence), cert. denied, 501 U.S. 1259 (1991).  
Woods sought collateral relief in a state trial court, but that court denied his post-conviction 
petition and we affirmed in Woods v. State, 701 N.E.2d 1208 (Ind. 1998) (addressing arguments 
relating to the effective assistance of counsel), reh’g denied (1999), cert. denied, 528 U.S. 861 
(1999).  Woods then sought relief in federal courts.  The United States District Court for the 
Southern District of Indiana denied Woods’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus in Woods v. 
Anderson, 302 F. Supp.2d 915 (S.D. Ind. 2004).  The United States Court of Appeals for the 
Seventh Circuit affirmed in Woods v. McBride, 430 F.3d 813 (2005), reh’g and reh’g en banc 
denied (2006), cert. denied, 127 S. Ct. 391 (2006). 
 
 
Woods has thus received the review of the convictions and death sentence to which he is 
entitled as a matter of right.  We have jurisdiction in this post-conviction proceeding because he 
is sentenced to death.  See Ind. Appellate Rule 4(A)(1)(a).   
 
Indiana’s Successive Post-Conviction Procedures 
 
 
Before us now is Woods’s request to litigate additional post-conviction claims.  As 
indicated, Woods has already availed himself of our rule that provides a person convicted of a 
crime in an Indiana state court one collateral review of a conviction and sentence in a post-
conviction proceeding.  See Ind. Post-Conviction Rule 1.  Because he has completed the review 
to which he is entitled as a matter of right, he needs our permission to litigate another or 
“successive” post-conviction claim.  We permit such a proceeding to go forward only “if the 
petitioner establishes a reasonable possibility that the petitioner is entitled to post-conviction 
relief.”  P-C.R. 1 § 12(b).  In deciding whether Woods has made the required showing, we 
consider the applicable law, the successive post-conviction papers,1 materials from his prior 
                                                 
1Woods tendered a “[Successive] Petition for Post-Conviction Relief,” and filed a “Successive Post-Conviction 
Relief Rule 1 Petition” and a “Petition and Memorandum in Support of Motion for Leave to File Successive Petition 
for Post-Conviction Relief and Motion for Funds.”  The State then filed the “State’s Verified Consolidated Response 
in Opposition to Motion for Leave to File Successive Petition for Post-Conviction Relief and Motion for Funds.”  
Woods was allowed to file “Petitioner’s Response to State’s Verified Consolidated Response in Opposition to 
Motion for Leave to File Successor Petition for Post Conviction Relief,” and the State was allowed to file the 
“State’s Verified Surreply to Petitioner’s Response.”   
 
 
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appeals and post-conviction proceedings, including the record, briefs and court decisions, and 
any other material we deem relevant.  See id.  If we authorize the proceeding to go forward, 
Woods would be entitled to counsel at public expense and the case would return to the trial court 
for further proceedings in accordance with Post-Conviction Rule 1.  See id. § 12(c). 
 
The Claims 
 
 
1.  Woods has not shown a reasonable possibility that he is mentally retarded.  
Woods claims (a) he is exempt from execution under the state and federal constitutions2 because 
he is mentally retarded as discussed in Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304, 122 S. Ct. 2242 (2002), 
and interpreted by this Court in Pruitt v. State, 834 N.E.2d 90, 103-110 (Ind. 2005); or (b) he at 
least should be allowed to hire experts and litigate whether he is mentally retarded.   
 
 
In Atkins, the United States Supreme Court declared that mentally retarded persons are 
regarded as less culpable because of their diminished mental capacities, identified a “national 
consensus” against executing mentally retarded persons, and held that execution of mentally 
retarded persons is an “excessive sanction” that violates the Eighth Amendment to the United 
States Constitution.  The descriptions of mental retardation cited in Atkins have two components; 
the person must have: (1) significantly subaverage intellectual functioning, and (2)  limitations in 
adaptive skills, both manifesting before the person reaches age eighteen.  536 U.S. at 308 n.3; 
122 S. Ct. at 2249 (citing descriptions of mental retardation from the American Association of 
Mental Retardation and the American Psychiatric Association).  Under these descriptions, a 
person is considered to meet the subaverage intellectual functioning component if the person’s 
full-scale IQ test score is two standard deviations below the mean; i.e., an IQ between 70 and 75 
or lower.  536 U.S. at 309 n.5, 122 S. Ct. at 2245; accord Williams v. State, 793 N.E.2d 1019, 
1028 (Ind. 2003).  
 
 
Indiana enacted legislation prohibiting execution of mentally retarded persons before 
Atkins was decided.3  Our statute provides that a “mentally retarded individual” is an individual 
                                                 
2 Woods cites two provisions of the U.S. Constitution:  the Eighth Amendment (prohibiting cruel and unusual 
punishment); and the Fourteenth Amendment (guaranteeing equal protection and due process to citizens).  He cites 
several sections in Article I of Indiana’s Constitution:  Section 13 (specifying, in part, that “the accused shall have 
the right to a public trial, by an impartial jury, in the county in which the offense shall have been committed; to be 
heard by himself and counsel; to demand the nature and cause of the accusation against him, and to have a copy 
thereof;  to meet the witnesses face to face, and to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor”); 
Section 16 (specifying that “[c]ruel and unusual punishments shall not be inflicted” and that “[a]ll penalties shall be 
proportioned to the nature of the offense”); and Section 18 (specifying that the “penal code shall be founded on the 
principles of reformation, and not of vindictive justice”).  
 
3 See Ind. Code §§ 35-36-9-1 through 7.  Under Indiana’s statutory scheme, whether a person is mentally retarded is 
to be decided before trial, but the legislation was enacted after Woods’s trial.  Our legislature specified this law 
applies to capital cases tried after June 1994.  See Pub. L. 158-1994 § 8, 1994 Ind. Acts 1849, 1857.  Woods was 
tried ten years earlier in 1984.  Although we have followed the legislature’s specific mandate of repose and have not 
applied the legislation to death sentences imposed before its effective date, we have nonetheless applied the Atkins 
proscription against execution of mentally retarded persons to death-sentenced inmates who have raised the claim.  
See, e.g., Williams, 793 N.E.2d at 1027-28 (denying inmate permission to litigate in successive post-conviction 
proceedings issue of whether he was mentally retarded pursuant to Atkins); Rastafari v. State, No. 45S00-0210-SD-
510 (Ind. Feb. 5, 2003) (unpublished order allowing inmate to litigate the issue).  
 
 
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who, before age 22, “manifests (1) significantly subaverage intellectual functioning; and (2) 
substantial impairment of adaptive behavior . . . documented in a court ordered evaluative 
report.”  Ind. Code § 35-36-9-2.  Although not identical to either description cited in Atkins, 
Indiana’s statute similarly requires proof that the person meets both the intellectual and behavior 
components.  We have said that IQ tests are not conclusive on the question of whether an 
individual meets the subaverage intellectual functioning component, and that courts may 
consider IQ scores together with other evidence of the person’s mental capacity.  Pruitt, 834 
N.E.2d at 106.  Nonetheless, IQ scores may be such that they show the person does not meet the 
intellectual component of mental retardation.  See, e.g., Williams, 793 N.E.2d at 1028. 
 
 
Woods has been the subject of a substantial amount of examination and testing; the 
record already contains extensive documentation about his mental status.  Woods was evaluated 
several times by educational and mental health professionals before he committed the murder.  
(See, e.g., PC Record, Def’s Exh. E, a separate volume of the record summarizing much of this 
information.)  He has retained at least three mental health experts to examine him at trial (Neil 
Shamberg, Ph.D) and in his first state post-conviction proceeding (Jeffrey Smalldon, Ph.D,  and 
Linda Wetzel, Ph.D).  At least three other psychological reports in the record address Woods’s 
intellectual functioning.  Most recently, Woods submitted a letter from Dr. Denis Keyes, Ph.D.  
([Successive] Post-Conv. Pet., unlabeled attachment, letter dated December 26, 2006.)  Despite 
considerable resources already having been spent to investigate Woods’s mental status, Woods is 
not identified as mentally retarded in any of these sources or by his own experts.   
 
 
Having reviewed the documentation cited by the parties, we conclude the record does not 
establish a reasonable possibility that Woods’s intellectual functioning puts him in the class of 
persons who are considered mentally retarded.  Woods was born in 1964.  In April 1977, at age 
12, Woods’s IQ was scored as 84 based on results of the California Test of Mental Maturity 
(CTMM).  (PC Record p. 1272, Def’s Exh. K, records of Garrett Junior High School.)  In 1980, 
as part of a full diagnostic evaluation at the Department of Correction Youth Authority, Woods 
scored a full-scale IQ of 84 on the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R)  
(PC Record p. 1408-09, evaluation by Betty Jean Valdez, M.A., behavioral clinician, and Ivan 
Pangrac, Ph.D, clinical psychologist.)  This report showed Woods’s subset nonverbal IQ score in 
the low average range and his verbal IQ in the range of borderline mentally retarded, but his 
intellectual functioning with reference to the full-scale score was described as “in the very low 
average range.”  (Id. p. 1409.)  This report recommended remedial education, but did not suggest 
special education or other services for mentally retarded children.  In 1979, an evaluator at the 
Northeastern Center observed that Woods appeared to be “within the normal range 
intellectually,” although no testing was performed.  (PC Record p. 1469, report of Bonita 
Sheldon, M.S.)   
 
 
Other testing occurred when Woods was an adult.  He scored a full-scale IQ of 93 in 
1984 on a Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) test performed by his trial defense expert.   
(PC Record p. 1481-82, Psychological Evaluation by Neil Shamberg Ph.D.)  Dr. Shamberg 
found the subtest scores to have an unusual pattern suggestive of minimal brain damage, 
dyslexia, or other learning disorder, but neither his report nor his testimony mentions mental 
retardation.  In 1994 and 1995, when he was in his thirties, Woods was extensively evaluated in 
connection with his first state post-conviction proceedings by Linda Wetzel, Ph.D. and Jeffrey 
Smalldon, Ph.D. (PC Record p. 2095-2138, Psychological Evaluation report by Dr. Smalldon.)  
 
4
Woods scored a full scale IQ of 86 on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised Test  
administered by Dr. Wetzel in 1994.  (PC Record p. 2129.)  Dr. Smalldon noted the unusual 
pattern of test scores and attributed that result to possible functional brain impairment, but he did 
not suggest that Woods was mentally retarded.  Even if, as Woods argues, these results should be 
discounted because Woods was older or because better tests were available, the fact remains that 
despite all this testing and the many examinations and consultations over the years, none of these 
professionals diagnosed him as mentally retarded. 
 
 
The information most favorable to Woods shows that in 1980 and 1981, he was evaluated 
by a staff psychologist in connection with being placed in a group home.  (PC Record p. 1293-
98, Def’s Exh. M, reports of Dr. Richard D. Kahoe, Ph.D.)  The psychologist administered a 
“Quick Test” on which Woods scored a “vocabulary mental age” equivalent to an IQ of 73.  (Id. 
p. 1297.)  The psychologist also administered portions of the Peabody Individual Achievement 
Tests; Woods scored higher than expected on the math portion and lower on language portions.  
(Id. p. 1296.)  Woods also points to a Wide Range of Achievement Test (WRAT), administered 
in 1984 when he was 20, which showed his performance in reading, spelling and arithmetic was 
performed at or below the sixth grade level.  (PC Record p. 1482, record of Northeastern Center, 
Psychological Evaluation by Neil Shamberg, Ph.D.)  Woods cites these scores, then notes that 
persons with mild mental retardation are generally considered “educable” up to a sixth grade 
level.  (Pet’s Resp. p. 4, citing Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Text 
Revision, 43 (4th ed. 2000).)  From this, Woods apparently would have us conclude that he is, 
therefore, mentally retarded.  As the State points out, however, these were not full-scale IQ 
scores, which is required in both descriptions cited in Atkins.  Even if IQ scores are not 
necessary or are not conclusive under Indiana’s statute, the fact remains that none of the mental 
health professionals, despite the extensive testing and evaluation, have concluded Woods is 
mentally retarded.   
 
 
Woods did poorly in school and he did not graduate from high school.  His lowest full-
scale IQ score was 84; his highest was 93.  He scored 73 on two partial tests.  But none of the 
experts have said Woods is mentally retarded.  Denis Keyes, Ph.D., who considered Woods’s 
case most recently, noted the “clear evidence of brain damage,” but he did not conclude that 
Woods meets the intellectual functioning component of the mental retardation descriptions.  The 
most Dr. Keyes was willing to say was that Woods “needs to be fully evaluated.”  Having 
considered the evidence, however, we conclude that Woods has not shown a reasonable 
possibility that he meets the intellectual functioning component of mental retardation.  In light of 
this, we need not address Woods’s argument relating to the adaptive behavior component.   
 
 
2.  Woods’s claim that he had a “conflict of interest” with the attorneys who 
represented him in the state post-conviction proceedings is raised too late, and in any event, 
other courts have concluded that he received a fair post-conviction hearing.  Attorneys on 
contract with the state public defender were appointed to represent Woods in his first post-
conviction proceeding according to our rules.  See P-C. R. 1, § 9; Ind. Criminal Rule 24(H) 
(providing for counsel at public expense in post-conviction proceedings).  Three weeks before 
the hearing on the merits of Woods’s first post-conviction petition, Woods filed, pro se, a 
“Motion for Change of Counsel,” stating that he disagreed with the manner in which the 
attorneys were handling his case and asking the post-conviction court to appoint new attorneys.  
(PC Record p. 277-85.)  His attorneys also filed a “Motion to Withdraw as Counsel,” stating that 
 
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the differences with Woods “raised concerns that counsel [would] be unable to provide effective 
assistance of counsel.”  (PC Record p. 281-83.)  The post-conviction court, concluding that 
“[n]either motion contains any facts which justify change or withdrawal of counsel,” denied both 
motions.  (PC Record p. 284-85.)  The case proceeded to a hearing on the merits of the post-
conviction petition which, as previously indicated, was denied by the post-conviction court and 
affirmed by this Court on appeal.  Woods did not raise the trial court’s denial of his motion for 
new attorneys as an issue in the post-conviction appeal. 
 
 
This disagreement with his attorneys about strategy is what Woods now labels a “conflict 
of interest,” and he asserts the post-conviction court’s denial of his motion for new attorneys left 
him in the “untenable position” of choosing between being represented by attorneys with whose 
strategy he disagreed or having to represent himself.  Woods claims he “has never had the 
opportunity to fully address this claim” and as a result, he has been denied a “fundamentally fair 
and adequate” post-conviction proceeding in violation of the state and federal constitutions.4   
 
 
Even assuming Woods had some cognizable claim that the post-conviction court erred in 
denying him new attorneys mere weeks before the scheduled post-conviction hearing, that 
argument could have been raised in the appeal from the denial of post-conviction relief, but was 
not.  See Woods v. State, 701 N.E.2d 1208.  Woods concedes he knew about the issue but did not 
raise it.  (Mem. in Support p. 6.)  Our case law is clearly established that an issue known and 
available but not raised in an earlier proceeding, is procedurally defaulted as a basis for relief in 
subsequent proceedings.  See, e.g., Matheney v. State, 834 N.E.2d 658, 662 (Ind. 2005); Daniels 
v. State, 741 N.E.2d 1177, 1184-87 (Ind. 2001).  Woods’s claim is procedurally defaulted, and 
he is not entitled to have us decide his claim now.    
 
 
In any event, Woods has already litigated this issue in two federal courts, and he lost.  In 
the federal habeas proceeding, Woods argued the State should have provided him “with the 
opportunity to air his concerns about the ‘conflict,’ and the denial of that opportunity was a 
violation of due process.”  Woods v. McBride, 430 F.3d at 827.  The district court found “no 
basis for concluding that either the trial court's ruling denying the motion to withdraw filed by 
counsel for Woods in August 1995 or the existence, manner, or type of review afforded on this 
subject by the Indiana Supreme Court denied Woods representation in the post-conviction action 
in a manner violative of due process.”  Woods v. Anderson, 302 F. Supp.2d at 944.  The Seventh 
Circuit affirmed, agreeing with the district court that there was no basis for concluding that 
Woods had been deprived of any constitutional right:   
 
[W]e agree with the state’s argument that, in certain respects, what Woods has 
characterized as a “conflict” with his counsel is really nothing more than an 
attempt to advance an ineffective assistance of PCR counsel claim while 
sidestepping procedural default.  Viewed in that light, there was certainly nothing 
unreasonable about PCR counsel’s decision to push forward with a powerful 
mitigation strategy at the PCR hearing and to elicit mitigation testimony from 
Woods himself (who, at trial counsel's suggestion, chose not to take the stand in 
                                                 
4 Woods cites the same constitutional provisions:  the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal constitution 
and Article 1, Sections 13, 16 and 18 of Indiana’s constitution.   
 
 
6
the penalty phase).  Central to the post-conviction litigation strategy was the effort 
to frame and support the argument that trial counsel was constitutionally 
defective, and as discussed at length above, a cornerstone of that strategy was to 
elicit additional details at the PCR hearing that would suggest that trial counsel 
was not up to snuff during the penalty phase.  We have already disposed of that 
line of argument, but it is equally clear to us that PCR counsel’s strategy was a 
sound one.   PCR counsel did, after all, turn up additional mitigation details—
albeit details insufficient to indicate that trial counsel was constitutionally 
ineffective in not eliciting those details the first time around. 
 
* * * * 
 
As far as Woods's suggestion of an “actual conflict of interest,” we find at most a 
disagreement between Woods and his PCR counsel as to strategy.  We have found 
that personality conflicts and disagreements over trial strategy of this sort do not 
constitute reversible error.  Likewise, to the extent Woods may be suggesting it, 
we find nothing to indicate that the strategic disagreement hampered his ability to 
assist PCR counsel at the hearing.  It follows that there was not an actual conflict 
of interest in Woods’s case such that the Indiana courts were required to put off 
post-conviction review in order to hear Woods's claims or risk running afoul of 
the Constitution.  Woods's disagreement with his PCR counsel over post-
conviction strategy simply does not rise to that level, particularly in light of the 
eminently reasonable mitigation strategy undertaken by his PCR counsel. 
 
Woods v. McBride, 430 F.3d at 827-28 (citations omitted).   We agree with this analysis of the 
federal courts.   
 
Conclusion 
 
 
Because Woods has not met his burden of establishing a reasonable possibility that he is 
entitled to post-conviction relief on either of the claims he presents, we decline to authorize the 
filing of a successive petition.  A date for execution of the death sentence will be set by separate 
order. 
 
 
The Clerk is directed to send a copy of this order to counsel of record and to West Group 
for publication in the bound volumes of this Court’s decisions.   
 
Done at Indianapolis, Indiana, this 26 day of March, 2007. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
/s/ 
Randall T. Shepard 
Chief Justice of Indiana 
 
Shepard, C.J., and Dickson, Sullivan, Boehm, and Rucker, JJ., concur. 
 
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