Opinion ID: 770890
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Territorial Court's Jurisdiction for Habeas Corpus Petitions under V.I. Law2

Text: 13
14 Parrott's effort to obtain collateral relief before the Territorial Court under the local habeas statute requires us once again to clarify the scope of the jurisdictional changes brought about by Congress's 1984 amendments to the Revised Organic Act. See 48 U.S.C. SS 1611-1616 (West 1987 & Supp. 2000). 3 15 With the 1984 amendments, Congress established the framework for a dual system of local and federal judicial review in the Virgin Islands. By virtue of these amendments, the District Court now possesses the jurisdiction of a District Court of the United States. 48 U.S.C. S 1612(a). 4 After the 1984 amendments, the District Court continued to possess its statutorily granted local jurisdiction. The Virgin Islands Legislature was now able, however, to divest the District Court of original jurisdiction for local matters by vesting that jurisdiction in territorial courts established by local law for all causes for which any court established by the Constitution and laws of the United States does not have exclusive jurisdiction. 48 U.S.C. S 1611(b). 16 To the extent that that divestiture power is exercised by the legislature, the District Court loses jurisdiction to the Territorial Court over local matters. 5 See 48 U.S.C. S 1612(b); see also Estate Thomas Mall, Inc. v. Territorial Ct. of Virgin Islands, 923 F.2d 258, 262-63 (3d Cir. 1991) (holding that, following the enactment of S 1612, divestiture is not self-executing). Section 1612(b) provided the mechanism to eliminate the overlap between the District Court and the Territorial Court on local matters: 17 The purpose of section 22(b) [48 U.S.C. S 1612(b)] is to eliminate the present situation of both the district court and the local court having jurisdiction over strictly local causes. Upon the effective date, the district court will not [sic] longer have jurisdiction over any cause over which local law has vested jurisdiction in the local courts. The decision as to whether jurisdiction over strictly local causes should be vested in the district courts or the local courts will be made by local law. At any time,... by vesting jurisdiction in the local courts, the local law will have the effect of divesting the district court of jurisdiction. 18 103 Cong. Rec. S10527 (daily ed. Aug. 10, 1984) (statement by Sen. Weicker) (emphasis added). 19 This divestiture is reinforced by S 1613 of the Revised Organic Act, which formalizes the separate institutional relationship between the District Court and the Territorial Court for, among other questions, habeas petitions: 20 The relations between the courts established by the Constitution or laws of the United States and the courts established by local law with respect to... the issuance of writs of habeas corpus... shall be governed by the laws of the United States pertaining to the relations between the courts of the United States, including the Supreme Court of the United States, and the courts of the several States in such matters and proceedings. 21 48 U.S.C. S 1613. This section ensures that the relations between the local courts of the Virgin Islands and the federal courts... shall be the same as the relation between the state courts and the federal courts.... 130 Cong. Rec. S10527 (daily ed. Aug. 10, 1984) (statement by Sen. Weicker). 22 The Territorial Legislature took the first steps toward eliminating concurrent jurisdiction in 1991 when it divested the District Court of original jurisdiction over purely local civil matters. See 4 V.I. Code Ann. S 76(a) (1997). 6 As we reasoned in Brow, S 1613 of the Revised Organic Act acts in combination with S 76(a) of the V.I. Code to effectively repeal any grant of concurrent jurisdiction to the District Court over local actions once the Virgin Islands Legislature has vested jurisdiction over local civil actions in the Territorial Court. See Brow, 994 F.2d at 1035-36 (recognizing implicit repeal in 4 V.I. Code Ann. S 32). 23 Because habeas proceedings are generally considered civil in nature, see Hilton v. Braunskill, 481 U.S. 770, 776 (1987), the term civil action includes habeas petitions. 7 Thus, S 76(a)'s implied repeal of the District Court's jurisdiction for local civil actions governs our interpretation of the grant of jurisdiction in S 1303. 24 The situation here is complicated, however, by the fact that, despite S 76(a)'s grant of jurisdiction in local actions to the Territorial Court, the Virgin Islands code continues to provide that [t]he writ of habeas corpus may be granted by the district court, upon petition by or on behalf of any person restrained of his liberty. 5 V.I. Code Ann. S 1303 (emphasis added). We must, therefore, determine whether the 1984 amendments affected the jurisdictional provisions inherent in the language of S 1303 in that that section's specific reference to writs of habeas corpus being granted by the district court has never been amended. However, when interpreting other Virgin Islands statutes in which the grant of jurisdiction over civil actions had been made expressly to the district court, as it was in the habeas provision, we have reached the conclusion that the reference to the district court had been impliedly repealed. See Moravian Sch. Advisory Bd. v. Rawlins, 70 F.3d 270, 273 (3d Cir. 1995) (construing implied repeal for 5 V.I. Code Ann. S 1421); Tamarind Resort Assoc. v. Government of Virgin Islands, 138 F.3d 107, 114 (3d Cir. 1998) (construing same for 21 V.I. Code Ann. S 913(d)). We conclude that there is ample precedent in our interpretation of other Virgin Islands statutes to conclude that the reference to the district court in S 1303 has been impliedly repealed by S 76(a). Cf. Walker v. Government of Virgin Islands (3d Cir. Oct. 13, 2000) (holding that District Court properly determined it was without jurisdiction to grant habeas relief under S 1303 to prisoner convicted in Territorial Court). 25 We note that when the District Court tried Parrott's case, it did so as a local court acting under its then general jurisdiction, which authorized it to serve the dual functions of local territorial and federal court. The District Court no longer fulfills these twin roles. Nevertheless, this former duality of function does not prevent us from finding that the elimination of the District Court's territorial function impliedly repealed its territorial habeas function. 26 In sum, because S 76(a) operates to divest the District Court of jurisdiction for all civil actions, including habeas proceedings, we hold that the correct forum for Parrott's habeas petition under 5 V.I. Code Ann. S 1303 is not the District Court but the Territorial Court. Nor are we dissuaded from reaching this result because the District Court now has the jurisdiction of a District Court of the United States. As explained in the next section, while that newly bestowed status circumscribes the District Court's original jurisdiction, it does not create a constitutional obstacle to the Territorial Court's review of its earlier decisions. 27
28 In analyzing whether the Territorial Court had jurisdiction for petitions brought under the Virgin Islands habeas statute, the District Court gave priority to the institutional separation between the two courts that S 1613 of the Revised Organic Act requires, rather than to the jurisdictional separation required by the Revised Organic Act's S 1612. This priority, however, is mistaken. Because both the Territorial Court and the District Court derive their power from the same sovereign, i.e., the U.S. Congress, the institutional separation is administrative rather than constitutional. Consequently, this separation does not prevent the Territorial Court from reviewing prior decisions made by the District Court in cases in which the District Court sat as a local court. 29 Because the separation is administrative rather than constitutional, when the jurisdiction of these courts is changed, as was accomplished by S 1612, there is no bar to the Territorial Court exercising its revised jurisdiction to review a judgment of the District Court made under territorial law. The jurisdictional separation discussed above indeed requires that the divesting of the District Court of its jurisdiction for local civil actions also strips it of jurisdiction for local habeas petitions from territorial prisoners like Parrott, even though the District Court sentenced those prisoners. 30 Under our earlier reasoning in Brow and Moravian Sch. Advisory Bd., the Territorial Court possesses jurisdiction over local habeas provisions from prisoners it tried and sentenced. See Walker, slip opinion at 3-4 (3d Cir. Oct. 13, 2000) (citing Callwood v. Enos, 230 F.3d 632 (3d Cir. Oct. 13, 2000)); Parrott, 56 F. Supp. 2d at 596 n.10. The District Court, nevertheless, concluded that our decision in Joseph v. DeCastro, 805 F. Supp. 1242 (D.V.I. 1992), aff'd, 995 F.2d 217 (3d Cir. 1993) (affirming without opinion), and the newly established federal-state relationship between the two courts, which the Revised Organic Act's S 1613 codified, prevented the Territorial Court from reviewing the District Court's earlier convictions. Were it to relinquish this jurisdiction, the District Court reasoned, prisoners such as Parrott would be deprived of habeas relief because territorial courts, like state courts, cannot review a federal District Court decision. See Parrott, 56 F. Supp. 2d at 596. This denial would in turn violate the Virgin Islands Bill of Rights, which guarantees that [a]ll persons shall have the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus and the same shall not be suspended except as herein expressly provided. 48 U.S.C. S 1561 (West 1987 & Supp. 2000); see also Parrott, 56 F. Supp. 2d at 596. We are not persuaded, however, that this is the correct interpretation of the Revised Organic Act's revised jurisdictional scheme. 31 First, the decision in Joseph, which concluded that the District Court is the more appropriate forum for review of local habeas petitions, can be distinguished because at the time Joseph was decided, the District Court retained original jurisdiction over many local criminal actions. Moreover, the court in Joseph recognized that its conclusion would change at such time as jurisdiction over local crimes was vested in the local judicial system. Joseph, 805 F. Supp. at 1252. As of 1994, however, when the Virgin Islands Legislature vested jurisdiction for all local crimes with the Territorial Court, that jurisdictional obstacle was removed. See 4 V.I. Code Ann. S 76(b)(1) & (c) (1997). 8 Thus, the District Court now lacks the concurrent jurisdiction over local criminal actions that it shared with the Territorial Court at the time of Joseph. 9 The elimination of concurrent jurisdiction does not prevent the Territorial Court from reviewing District Court decisions before 1994 that were based on local law. It does, however, preclude the local court's review, under the local habeas law, of any District Court criminal convictions decided after 1994. The Territorial Court can only exercise habeas review of cases in which it is the successor court to the District Court of the District Court's now-terminated territorial jurisdiction. 10 32 The District Court was reluctant to construe the Territorial Court's habeas jurisdiction to parallel our reasoning in Brow and Moravian Sch. Advisory Bd. because it wished to avoid having the Territorial Court review the decision of a federal court. This purported federalism concern is, however, a red herring: The restructuring of the relationship between the District Court and the Territorial Court in SS 1612 and 1613 of the Revised Organic Act requires the opposite conclusion. 33 The District Court's power originates under Article IV, S 3, which authorizes Congress to regulate the various U.S. territories. See Binns v. United States, 194 U.S. 486, 491 (1904) (recognizing Congress's plenary power to define institutional relationships in territories). Congress exercises this authority through the Revised Organic Act, which serves as the Virgin Islands constitution. See 48 U.S.C. SS 1541-1645 (West 1987 & Supp. 2000); Brow, 994 F.2d at 1032. As such, the Revised Organic Act is also the source of authority for the Virgin Islands Legislature. See 48 U.S.C. S 1574(a). It is through the Revised Organic Act that Congress authorizes the local legislature to grant the Territorial Court its jurisdiction. See 48 U.S.C. S1611(b). Consequently, both the Territorial Court and the District Court derive their respective jurisdictional grants from the same sovereign -- namely, Congress, exercising its authority under Article IV, S 3. 34 As a result, the District Court does not derive its jurisdiction, as do other federal courts, from Article III. See United States v. George, 625 F.2d 1081, 1088-89 (3d Cir. 1980). 11 Nor has the District Court previously been treated as a court of the United States or, as we say more commonly, as an Article III court. See generally United States v. Kennings, 861 F.2d 381 (3d Cir. 1988). In Kennings, we applied the federal anti-bribery statute to proceedings in the District Court of the Virgin Islands because the statute covered the solicitation of bribes before any court, not just to bribery attempts by witnesses appearing before courts of the United States. Id. at 388-89. Indeed, the District Court continues, even after the 1984 amendments, to classify itself as territorial, rather than federal, in a constitutional sense. See 35 Acres Assoc. v. Adams, 962 F. Supp. 687, 690 (D.V.I. 1997). 35 Thus, while Congress has elected, for administrative purposes, to treat the Virgin Islands as a separate sovereign, see Government of Virgin Islands v. Schneider, 893 F. Supp. 490, 495 (D.V.I. 1995), the constitutional relationship between the territories and the federal government remains unified: 36 [I]n a federal Territory and the Nation, as in a city and a State, [t]here is but one system of government, or of laws operating within [its] limits. City and State, or Territory and Nation, are not two separate sovereigns to whom the citizen owes separate allegiance in any meaningful sense, but one alone. 37 United States v. Wheeler, 435 U.S. 313, 321 (1978) (internal citations omitted). Moreover, vesting a territorial court with jurisdiction similar to that vested in the District Courts of the United States does not make it a `District Court of the United States.'  Mookini v. United States, 303 U.S. 201, 205 (1938). See also Barnard v. Thorstenn, 489 U.S. 546, 551-52 (1989) (holding that Supreme Court lacked supervisory power over District Court of the Virgin Islands because that court was not an Article III federal district court). Before the 1984 amendments, the District Court considered itself a local court, see George, 625 F.2d at 1088, so that, for the purposes of Parrott's trial, the District Court sat as a local court. Federalism concerns, therefore, are not implicated in matters where the District Court, in the past, reviewed questions of local law sitting as a territorial court and exercising its general jurisdiction. See Spink v. General Accident Ins. Co. of Puerto Rico, Ltd., 36 F. Supp. 2d 689, 691 n.6 (D.V.I. 1999). 38 Until 1994, the District Court and the Territorial Court had concurrent jurisdiction over most criminal actions and thus shared power over these local actions. Now, that jurisdiction lies solely in the Territorial Court. In this sense, the Territorial Court's authority to review certain District Court criminal convictions under local law is akin to that of a successor court's power to review the decisions of its predecessor in jurisdiction. See Excavation Constr., Inc. No. One Contracting Corp. v. Quinn, 673 F.2d 78, 80 (3d Cir. 1982) (recognizing territorial court's successor jurisdiction to municipal court). Cf. Beck v. Beck, 432 A.2d 63, 65 (N.J. Sup. Ct. 1981) (recognizing its successor jurisdiction from former Court of Chancery); Pennsylvania Power & Light Co. v. Pennsylvania Pub. Util. Comm'n, 311 A.2d 151, 154 (Pa. Commw. Ct. 1973) (recognizing its successor jurisdiction from former Superior Court); Schiller v. Flatbush Message Bureau, Inc., 108 N.Y.S.2d 828, 830 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. 1951) (recognizing its successor jurisdiction from courts of colony of New York). 39 Treating the Territorial Court as a successor court, moreover, is consistent with Congress's objective to eliminate the situation in which the District Court and the Territorial Court share jurisdiction over purely local matters. It also unifies in a single tribunal the review of habeas petitions initiated under territorial law for territorial law convictions. By contrast, the District Court's approach would bifurcate this review so that prisoners sentenced under local law by the District Court would have to submit their local law petitions to that court, while all other territorial prisoners would submit their petitions for review by the Territorial Court. 40 Finally, S 1613's administrative separation of the two courts does not implicitly deprive prisoners like Parrott of their guaranteed right to habeas relief under the Revised Organic Act's S 1561. No federalism concerns are implicated when the two courts share, as products of Congress's authority under Article IV, S 3, the same sovereign as the source of their jurisdiction. For that reason, the restrictions placed on the District Court's original jurisdiction by S 1612 properly limit review of local habeas petitions to the Territorial Court.