Opinion ID: 770779
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Petitioner's Certificate of Probable Cause

Text: 16 Before Congress enacted AEDPA, a party who wished to appeal a district court's denial of a petition for habeas corpus was required to obtain a CPC, as Petitioner did in this case. To obtain a CPC, a petitioner was required to make a substantial showing of the denial of [a] federal right. Barefoot v. Estelle, 463 U.S. 880, 893 (1983) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). If a petitioner made such a showing as to any issue in his petition, then all the issues in the petition could be appealed. See Chacon v. Wood, 36 F.3d 1459, 1467 (9th Cir. 1994). 17 Congress changed that requirement with the passage of AEDPA, substituting the certificate of appealability (COA) for the CPC. Unlike a CPC, which allows a party to appeal an entire petition, a COA is granted on an issue-by-issue basis. A petitioner specifically must request a COA as to each issue that he or she wishes to appeal, and a court may not consider on appeal any issue not specified in a COA. See 28 U.S.C. 2253(c); Hiivala v. Wood, 195 F.3d 1098, 1103 (9th Cir. 1999). 18 Before Slack v. McDaniel, the rule in this circuit was that the new requirement of a COA did not apply in cases that were filed in the district court before the effective date of AEDPA. See, e.g., Fuller v. Roe, 182 F.3d 699, 702-03 (9th Cir. 1999) (as amended). Thus, a petitioner who filed a petition for habeas corpus before AEDPA was required in this circuit to obtain a CPC, not a COA, even if the petitioner filed his or her notice of appeal after AEDPA. 19 However, Slack overruled circuit law on this issue. See Slack, 120 S. Ct. at 1603. In Slack, the Supreme Court held that, because the petitioner had sought appellate review after AEDPA's effective date, the provisions of AEDPA governed his appeal, even though he had filed his petition before AEDPA took effect. Specifically, the requirement for a COA -not a CPC -applied. See id. 20 Under Slack, then, Petitioner was required to obtain an issue-by-issue COA. Through no fault of his own, he obtained a CPC instead. In cases in which Slack has had this effect, we treat the petitioner's notice of appeal as a request for a COA on the issues raised in the briefs, and we grant a COA on those issues as to which the petitioner has made the requisite substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right. Schell v. Witek, 218 F.3d 1017, 1021 n.4 (9th Cir. 2000). 21 Under that new procedure, we turn to the claims that Petitioner raises on appeal. As noted, Petitioner raised 43 claims in his petition, all of which the district court denied. Petitioner does not present to this court any argument concerning a number of those claims. Petitioner has abandoned those claims that he does not address in his briefs. See Poland v. Stewart, 169 F.3d 573, 590 (9th Cir. 1999) (as amended). 22 The claims on which Petitioner does seek a COA fall into two categories: claims that were denied on the merits, and claims that were denied on procedural grounds. 23
24 We conclude that Petitioner has made a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right as to the following issues, which the district court resolved on the merits: (1) whether the trial court's comments to the jury violated Caldwell v. Mississippi, 472 U.S. 320 (1985), as alleged in Claim 24; (2) whether the district court's guilt-phase instruction concerning accomplice liability denied Petitioner a fair trial, as alleged in Claim 14; (3) whether Avette Barrett's and Allison Eckstrom's plea agreements were unduly coercive, as alleged in Claims 1 and 2; 1 and (4) whether Special Instruction 60, which the district court gave during the penalty phase, denied Petitioner a fair trial, as alleged in Claims 36 and 40. 25 We hereby grant a COA as to those issues. 26
27 In Slack, the Court set out a two-step analysis for deciding whether to grant a COA when a district court denies a habeas petition on procedural grounds without reaching the prisoner's underlying constitutional claim. Slack, 120 S. Ct. at 1604. In those circumstances, a COA should issue if the prisoner can show: (1) that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling; and (2) that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the petition states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Id. 28 Here, Petitioner appeals the district court's dismissal, on procedural grounds, of all or part of Claims 8, 17, 37, and 38. In determining whether to grant a COA on those claims, we apply the two-step analysis from Slack. 29 First, we consider whether the district court's procedural ruling was debatable among jurists of reason. We conclude that it was. The district court dismissed the claims on the ground that they previously had been denied by the California Supreme Court on an independent and adequate statelaw ground. In a federal habeas action brought by a state prisoner under 28 U.S.C. 2254, a federal court will not review a question of federal law decided by a state court if the decision of that court rests on a state law ground that is independent of the federal question and adequate to support the judgment. Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 729 (1991). 30 In this case, the California Supreme Court had denied Petitioner's second state-court petition because it was untimely under the holding of Clark, 855 P.2d at 737-40. The district court concluded that the California Supreme Court's untimeliness decision rested on an independent and adequate state-law ground and denied those claims (which Petitioner also had presented in the second state-court petition) on that basis. However, this court has held that the untimeliness bar from Clark is not an independent and adequate state-law ground. See La Crosse v. Kernan, 211 F.3d 468, 474 (9th Cir. 2000). 2 Accordingly, the California Supreme Court's denial, under Clark, of Defendant's second state habeas petition does not bar federal review of claims raised in that petition. See id. The district court's holding that all or parts of claims 8, 17, 37, and 38 are procedurally barred, then, is incorrect. 31 Because the district court's procedural ruling was incorrect, we must issue a COA if jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the petition states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 120 S. Ct. at 1604. In completing that second step of the two-step Slack analysis, we are guided by this court's recent decision in Lambright v. Stewart, 220 F.3d 1022 (9th Cir. 2000). Under Lambright, our task is simply [to] take a quick look at the face of the complaint to determine whether the petitioner has facially allege[d] the denial of a constitutional right. Id. at 1026 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). Any claims that satisfy that modest standard, id. at 1027, must receive a COA. 32 We conclude that three of the four procedurally barred issues that Petitioner raises meet that standard. Those issues are: (1) whether Petitioner received ineffective assistance of counsel, as alleged in claim 37; (2) whether Petitioner was denied a fair trial by the state's erroneous introduction of excluded evidence, as alleged in Claim 8; and (3) whether Petitioner was incompetent to aid and assist in his own defense, as alleged in claim 38. 33 We hereby grant a COA as to those issues. 34