Opinion ID: 2973240
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Austin and Cowherd

Text: The Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) of 1996, 28 U.S.C. § 2244, dramatically altered the power of the federal courts to issue writs of habeas corpus. Specifically relevant here, AEDPA imposes two distinct requirements on petitioners seeking writs of habeas corpus before federal courts: (1) a petition must be filed within one year of the finality of the underlying conviction; and (2) petitioners may not bring claims in a numerically second petition that could have been brought in an earlier petition. 28 U.S.C. § 2244. Furthermore, petitioners must fully exhaust all of their claims in the state courts before seeking federal review. Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509, 510 (1982). In order for petitioners to file petitions that are both timely and have been fully exhausted, the period during which a petitioner’s claims are before the state courts is tolled: The time during which a properly filed application for State post-conviction or other collateral review with respect to the pertinent judgment or claim is pending shall not be counted toward any period of limitation under this subsection. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2). As long as petitioners are seeking review in a state court, the one-year statute of limitations does not run. Thus, § 2244(d)(2) allows petitioners to both completely exhaust all habeas claims before the state courts, and file habeas claims within one year of the date upon which a conviction becomes final. In Austin v. Mitchell, 200 F.3d 391 (6th Cir. 2000), we held that AEDPA’s statute of limitation is not tolled by state post-conviction proceedings that do not involve the federally cognizable claims later made in a habeas petition. In that case, we considered a petitioner’s federal habeas petition. Id. at 392. The petitioner’s conviction became final in 1992. Before filing his federal habeas claim in 1998, the petitioner pursued state post-conviction relief on state procedural grounds and on the basis that his counsel was constitutionally ineffective. Id. at 392-93. The state court dismissed his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, finding that it did not have jurisdiction to consider the claim because it was filed in the wrong state court. Id. at 393. Thus, his state procedural claim was the only claim pending in state post-conviction proceedings. Upon federal review, we held that the petitioner’s state procedural claim could not toll the statute of limitation under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2), because it was not a federally cognizable claim. Id. at 394. We further held that the petitioner’s application for state post-conviction relief on his claim of ineffective assistance of counsel did not toll the AEDPA statute of limitation. Although there was some question as to whether that claim was “properly filed” before the state court, id. at 395, we did not reach that question. Instead, we relied on the fact that the petitioner did not bring his ineffective assistance of counsel claim before the federal habeas court. Id. Answering whether the state postconviction proceeding must concern at least one of the claims being made in the federal habeas petition in order to toll the statute of limitation, we held: Just as such state review must concern a federally cognizable claim to toll the AEDPA period of limitation, so also the rule should be that such review must concern a federally cognizable claim that is being made in the instant habeas petition. Id. Because the purpose of tolling is to allow the state the first opportunity to resolve a habeas petitioner’s federal claims, we concluded that the purpose of tolling is not implicated unless the postconviction proceedings involve at least one of the claims actually being made in the federal habeas petition. The government argues that while Austin was the law in this circuit until 2004, Bowen should have remained in state court in order to exhaust his ineffective assistance of counsel claim, No. 04-1286 In re Bowen Page 4 and then filed all of his federal claim in one petition. It argues that, under Austin, Bowen could have remained in state court to exhaust his ineffective assistance claim, because the exhaustion of any one federal ground would have tolled AEDPA’s statute of limitation as it applied to all other federal habeas claims. The Government relies on the holding in Austin: [A] state petition for post-conviction or other collateral review that does not address one or more of the grounds of the federal habeas petition in question is not a review “with respect to the pertinent judgment or claim” within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2), therefore does not toll the one-year AEDPA statute of limitation. Resp. Brief at 7 (citing Austin, 200 F.3d at 395) (emphasis in Resp. Brief). However, as Bowen points out, the question of whether a federally cognizable claim in state post-conviction proceedings will toll other claims, already made final, was neither before, nor decided by, the Austin court. It does not follow from the holding of Austin that any one federally cognizable claim will toll the statute of limitation for all of a petitioner’s habeas claims. Other circuit courts immediately rejected our analysis in Austin. See Ford v. Moore, 296 F.3d 1035, 1040 (11th Cir. 2002); Sweger v. Chesney, 294 F.3d 506, 517 (3d Cir. 2002) (“Reading this language to require that the state post-conviction proceeding raise the claims contained in the habeas petition ignores the use of the word ‘judgment’ in the statute.”); Carter v. Litscher, 275 F.3d 663, 665 (7th Cir. 2001) (“Austin reads the word ‘judgment’ out of § 2244(d)(2) and tolls the time only while a particular ‘claim’ (which Austin took to mean ‘theory of relief’) is before the state court.”); Tillema v. Long, 253 F.3d 494, 502 n.10 (9th Cir. 2001) (“[T]he Sixth Circuit made no attempt to account for the inclusion of the word ‘judgment,’ as well as the word ‘claim,’ in the text of section 2244(d)(2).”). In a subsequent en banc decision, we held that the Austin panel erred in its analysis of § 2244(d)(2). Cowherd v. Million, 380 F.3d 909 (6th Cir. 2004). Following the analysis of every other circuit court to consider Austin, the Cowherd court held that Austin read the word “judgment” out of § 2244(d)(2) in its holding that state post-conviction proceedings for a claim not at issue in the subsequent habeas proceeding do not toll AEDPA’s statute of limitation. Cowherd, 380 F.3d at 914. Our opinion in Cowherd clarified the holding of Austin; state post-conviction proceedings with respect to a claim would toll AEDPA’s statute of limitation, but state proceedings related to the general judgment would not toll those claims that were not at issue in the precise state proceedings. Because Austin implied that state post-conviction proceedings on Bowen’s ineffective assistance claims would not toll AEDPA’s statute of limitation as it applied to his already exhausted claims, Bowen had no recourse but to file his exhausted claims for federal habeas review before exhausting his remaining claims, as it had been nearly one year since he had exhausted his state remedies with regard to those claims. Furthermore, Bowen could not file his exhausted claims along with his unexhausted claims, because his “mixed petition” would be dismissed pursuant to Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509 (1982). In Rose, the Supreme Court adopted a complete exhaustion rule, which requires federal courts to dismiss petitions that contain both exhausted and unexhausted claims. Id. at 522. Petitioners who brought mixed petitions were entitled to resubmit petitions with only exhausted claims, or were allowed to exhaust the remainder of their claims and then resubmit all their now-exhausted claims. Id. at 520. Notably, Rose was decided before the effective date of AEDPA, and thus does not discuss the effect dismissing mixed petitions might have on the tolling of AEDPA’s statute of limitation. No. 04-1286 In re Bowen Page 5 Given Rose and Austin, if Bowen had presented his mixed petition between 2000 and 2004 it would have been dismissed, and state court proceedings would not toll AEDPA’s statute of limitation as it applied to his already exhausted state law claims. When Bowen filed his first petition, we had not yet approved of the “stay and abeyance” procedure, which some courts have adopted in order to allow habeas review of those petitions for which the one-year statute tolls while they remain pending before the district court, only to have them dismissed due to an unexhausted claim.2 See Palmer v. Carlton, 276 F.3d 777, 781 (6th Cir. 2002) (acknowledging and approving the stay and abeyance procedure). The Supreme Court did not recognize the scope of a district court’s power to stay such proceedings until last term. See Rhines v. Weber, 125 S. Ct. 1528 (2005). Thus, in 2000, Bowen could not have relied on the procedure now in place that would have allowed a district court to retain jurisdiction over Bowen’s appeal while he exhausted his ineffective assistance claim.