Opinion ID: 680760
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the arizona supreme court opinion is ambiguous.

Text: 61 Our review of the Arizona Supreme Court's opinion is guided by the U.S. Supreme Court's opinions in Clemons and its progeny. In these cases, the Supreme Court addressed the Eighth Amendment requirements that a state appellate court in a weighing state must follow if it chooses not to remand to the trial court for resentencing after invalidating an aggravating circumstance. The touchstone requirement is a thorough analysis of the role an invalid aggravating factor played in the sentencing process. Stringer v. Black, --- U.S. ----, ----, 112 S.Ct. 1130, 1136, 117 L.Ed.2d 367 (1992). 62 Our review of the record requires us to be sure that the required de novo sentencing or harmless error analysis was actually undertaken. See Clemons, 494 U.S. at 754, 110 S.Ct. at 1451 (remanding for further proceedings because we cannot be sure whether the state supreme court engaged in harmless error analysis). See also Richmond v. Lewis, --- U.S. at ----, 113 S.Ct. at 535 ([a]t a minimum, we must determine that the state court actually reweighed). Where the appeals court decision does not clearly indicate that the required analysis was undertaken, the sentence must be vacated and the case remanded to the state court for resentencing. Clemons, 494 U.S. at 741, 110 S.Ct. at 1444 (vacating and remanding because it is unclear whether the Mississippi Supreme Court correctly reweighed or applied harmless error analysis). See also Stringer, --- U.S. at ----, 112 S.Ct. at 1137 (opinion in Barclay v. Florida, 463 U.S. 939, 103 S.Ct. 3418, 77 L.Ed.2d 1134 (1983) is illustrative of the requirements of appellate review, where the Supreme Court affirmed the sentence only because it was clear that the state appellate court had engaged in harmless error analysis); Sochor, --- U.S. at ----, 112 S.Ct. at 2123 (requiring state appellate court clarity about whether it engaged in harmless error analysis). But see Richmond v. Lewis, --- U.S. at ----, 113 S.Ct. at 535 (the Supreme Court has not yet specified the degree of clarity required). 2 63 The Arizona Supreme Court's opinion is too ambiguous to satisfy this standard. As the majority notes, the opinion twice refers to the court's obligation to weigh the aggravating and mitigating circumstances. But this alone is not dispositive. In Clemons, too, the state appellate court opinion vacated by the U.S. Supreme Court recited that the court had weighed the aggravating and mitigating circumstances against each other. See Clemons, 494 U.S. at 744, 110 S.Ct. at 1446 (quoting the state supreme court opinion, that noted, after reviewing the record, that  '[i]n our opinion ... the punishment of death is not too great when the aggravating and mitigating circumstances are weighed against each other....'  (Alterations in original.)). The Supreme Court deemed such language insufficient because it was unclear whether the state court intended to convey the message that it was conducting appellate reweighing as we understand the concept. Id. at 752, 110 S.Ct. at 1450 (emphasis added). 64 The statements in State v. Jeffers, 661 P.2d 1105, are similarly unenlightening. The first reference to weighing in the opinion serves to introduce the Arizona Supreme Court's discussion of the aggravating circumstances. The opinion notes: 65 In death penalty cases this court independently reviews the facts that the trial court found established the presence or absence of mitigating circumstances, and we determine for ourselves if the latter outweigh the former when we find both to be present. State v. Blazak, 114 Ariz. 199, 560 P.2d 54 (1977); State v. Richmond, 114 Ariz. 186, 560 P.2d 41 (1976). 66 State v. Jeffers, 135 Ariz. at 428, 661 P.2d at 1129 (emphasis added). Then, after separately discussing Jeffers's proffered mitigating circumstances, and his challenges to the aggravating factors, the court concludes by stating that it has, indeed, weighed the aggravating and mitigating factors. In so doing, the Arizona Supreme Court's opinion uses almost the same language as did the Mississippi Supreme Court in the Clemons decision that was reversed by the U.S. Supreme Court. The Arizona Supreme Court opinion states: 67 We have carefully reviewed the record as required to determine whether the factors in mitigation outweigh the aggravating circumstances, State v. Richmond, 114 Ariz. 186, 560 P.2d 41 (1976), cert. denied, 433 U.S. 915 [97 S.Ct. 2988, 53 L.Ed.2d 1101] (1977) and we find they do not. 68 State v. Jeffers, 135 Ariz. at 431-32, 661 P.2d at 1132-33. 69 Although these statements refer to some sort of weighing, we must be sure that the court was referring to the de novo reweighing required by Clemons. Clemons requires that [w]here the death sentence has been infected by a vague or otherwise constitutionally invalid aggravating factor, the state appellate court or some other state sentencer must actually perform a new sentencing calculus, if the sentence is to stand. Richmond v. Lewis, --- U.S. at ----, 113 S.Ct. at 535 (emphasis added). Closely read, the passages quoted above do not suggest such a de novo reweighing. Rather, they indicate that the Arizona Supreme Court's independent review is limited to the facts established by the trial court. 70 Of even greater import, neither in the above quoted passages, nor elsewhere, does the opinion specify the nature of the Arizona Supreme Court's independent review. In other words, although the court independently reviews the facts, and determines for itself whether the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating ones, the court does not specify what standard of review it employs to decide whether to disturb the trial court's findings. 71 The wording of the passages quoted above is consistent with a species of appellate review, for error, rather than the new sentencing calculus that the Eighth Amendment requires when a death sentence has been infected by invalid aggravating factors. Richmond v. Lewis, --- U.S. at ----, 113 S.Ct. at 535. In fact, as discussed in the following section, the Arizona Supreme Court at the time State v. Jeffers was decided in 1983, did not generally conduct a de novo review of the death penalty sentencing calculus when it saw fit to invalidate an aggravating factor. Nothing in the Arizona Supreme Court's opinion in State v. Jeffers suggests that the court departed from what was then its normal procedure when it reviewed the instant case. 72 Our confidence that the Arizona Supreme Court actually conducted the requisite thorough analysis of the role an invalid aggravating factor played in the sentencing process, Stringer, --- U.S. at ----, 112 S.Ct. at 1136, is further shaken by the inconsistencies found in its discussion of the valid and invalid factors. For example, in part of the second passage, quoted above, the Arizona Supreme Court says it has weighed the aggravating circumstances in plural. But the court earlier held that there was only one such circumstance. This error raises a suspicion that the court substituted boilerplate language for the careful individualized analysis required by the Eighth Amendment. 73 In addition, the opinion contradicts itself as to which, if any, mitigating factors the court weighed, or indeed whether the court found or did not find that there were any mitigating circumstances at all. For example, on page ---- - ----, 112 S.Ct. page 1132-33 of the opinion, quoted above, the court asserts that it has weighed mitigating factors. In contrast, on page ----, 112 S.Ct. page 1133 of the same opinion we are informed that the Arizona Supreme Court found no mitigating factors. 74 Moreover, the Arizona Supreme Court appears to contradict itself on whether it understood Judge Birdsall to have found any mitigating circumstances. Compare, e.g., trial court's statement ([t]he court finds that there are no mitigating circumstances) with State v. Jeffers, 135 Ariz. at 431, 661 P.2d at 1132 (finding that the trial court found no mitigating factors sufficiently substantial to call for leniency (emphasis added)). The State v. Jeffers opinion is full of such ambiguous and contradictory language on these critical issues, as was fully discussed in the opinion withdrawn by the majority today. Jeffers v. Lewis, 5 F.3d 1199 (9th Cir.1993). 75 So, how can we be sure that the Arizona Supreme Court actually reweighed the aggravating and mitigating circumstances in the case at bar, when even the Arizona Attorney General had trouble figuring out whether that court did so? In January of 1991, the Arizona Attorney General implicitly admitted that the Arizona Supreme Court in Jeffers did not independently reweigh the aggravating and mitigating factors. Respondents Answering Brief, filed January 30, 1991, pp. 9-11. 3 Today the Arizona Attorney General reads his court's Jeffers opinion differently, and argues that the court did reweigh the aggravating and mitigating circumstances. We, who are in the dissent, also find it difficult to determine whether the Arizona Supreme Court did, or did not, engage in the proper weighing calculus. 76