Opinion ID: 1040865
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: “Courtroom layout” claim

Text: McKinney exhausted his “courtroom layout” claim. “To exhaust his Arizona remedies, [a petitioner must] give the Arizona courts a fair opportunity to act on his federal due process claim before presenting it to the federal courts.” Castillo v. McFadden, 399 F.3d 993, 998 (9th Cir. 2005) (internal quotation marks omitted). In so doing, a petitioner must apprise the state court that he is “making a claim under the U.S. Constitution, and describe both the operative facts and the federal legal theory on which [the] claim is based . . . .” Id. at 999 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). This can be accomplished by citing “specific provisions of the federal constitution or . . . federal or state cases involving the legal standard for a federal constitutional violation.” Id. “Mere ‘general appeals to broad constitutional principles, such as due process, equal protection, and the right to a fair trial,’ do not establish exhaustion.” Id. (quoting Hiivala v. Wood, 195 F.3d 1098, 1106 (9th Cir. 1999) (per curiam)); see also Fields v. Waddington, 401 F.3d 1018, 1021 (9th Cir. 2005) (holding MCKINNEY V. RYAN 13 that a petitioner failed to exhaust a federal due process claim where petitioner’s briefing to the state court mentioned the federal constitution only twice and due process only once). In short, a petitioner must “alert the state courts to the fact that he [is] asserting a claim under the United States Constitution.” Hiivala, 195 F.3d at 1106. McKinney set forth the “federal legal theory” underlying his prejudicial courtroom layout claim in his opening brief to the Arizona Supreme Court. McKinney claimed: “The bizarre and prejudicial seating arrangement deprived the appellant of due process under the Arizona and Federal Constitutions.” The brief’s table of contents also cites the page containing that sentence under its entry for the “Fifth Amendment.” Taken together, the argument and the table of contents allude to a specific provision of the U.S. Constitution. McKinney’s brief also invokes the U.S. Constitution numerous times in reference to other claims. Accordingly, McKinney’s brief was sufficient to alert the Arizona Supreme Court that McKinney raised a federal claim. See Robinson v. Schriro, 595 F.3d 1086, 1103 (9th Cir. 2010) (“This is not a case where the petitioner failed to make clear that he was invoking a federal right, or where the petitioner’s general appeal to a constitutional guarantee was too vague to put the state court on notice of the federal claim.” (internal citations and quotation marks omitted)); Hiivala, 195 F.3d at 1106. Thus, we conclude that McKinney exhausted his “courtroom layout” claim. Turning to the merits of McKinney’s “courtroom layout” claim, we must determine whether the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision rejecting this claim was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law. We conclude that it was not. McKinney cites no Supreme 14 MCKINNEY V. RYAN Court case, and our search reveals no case, that would provide the basis for relief under § 2254(d)(1). Accordingly, we echo the Arizona Supreme Court’s McKinney opinion, which held: “McKinney has not demonstrated any prejudice and provides no authority for his argument that there is a constitutional right to a standard American courtroom arrangement, and we decline to invent such a right.” 917 P.2d at 1232. McKinney is not entitled to relief on his prejudicial courtroom layout claim.