Opinion ID: 71998
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Abdul-Kabir and Brewer

Text: The Supreme Court most recently addressed the Texas special issues in Abdul-Kabir, 550 U.S. 233, 127 S.Ct. 1654, 167 L.Ed.2d 585, and Brewer v. Quarterman, 550 U.S. 286, 127 S.Ct. 1706, 167 L.Ed.2d 622 (2007). [4] These cases describe the clearly established law as it existed in 1999 and 2001, respectively, and Abdul-Kabir indicates that the same clearly established law existed as early as 1990. Abdul-Kabir, 550 U.S. at 238, 127 S.Ct. 1654; Brewer, 550 U.S. at 294-95, 127 S.Ct. 1706. Abdul-Kabir instructs that the relevant state-court judgment for purposes of review under AEDPA is the judgment adjudicating the merits of the petitioner's state habeas application. 550 U.S. at 238, 127 S.Ct. 1654. The TCCA rejected Pierce's petition for habeas relief in 2001. Therefore, the clearly established law described in Abdul-Kabir and Brewer controls this case. This circuit has construed Abdul-Kabir and Brewer as imposing a two-part test to determine whether resentencing is required: First, the reviewing court must determine whether the mitigating evidence presented by the petitioner satisfies the `low threshold for relevance' articulated by the Supreme Court. Coble v. Quarterman, 496 F.3d 430, 444 (5th Cir.2007). [5] If the relevance threshold is met, the court must determine whether there was a reasonable likelihood that the jury applied the special issues in a manner that precluded it from giving meaningful consideration and effect to all of [the petitioner's] mitigating evidence. Id. Both Abdul-Kabir and Brewer emphasize the importance of allowing juries to give meaningful effect to any mitigating evidence providing a basis for a sentence of life rather than death. Abdul-Kabir, 550 U.S. at 260, 127 S.Ct. 1654 (emphasis added); accord Brewer, 550 U.S. at 296, 127 S.Ct. 1706 ([T]he jury must be allowed not only to consider such evidence, or to have such evidence before it, but to respond to it in a reasoned, moral manner and to weigh such evidence in its calculus of deciding whether a defendant is truly deserving of death.). [6] In particular, the Texas special issues will be constitutionally insufficient as applied when the mitigating evidence presented supports an entirely different reason for not imposing a death sentence than permitted by the special issues. Abdul-Kabir, 550 U.S. at 259, 127 S.Ct. 1654. Abdul-Kabir and Brewer also indicate that courts should consider whether the prosecutor's comments to the jury may have undermined the jury's ability to give meaningful consideration and effect to all of the petitioner's mitigating evidence by suggesting that the jurors may not consider mitigating evidence for relevance outside the special issues. Abdul-Kabir, 550 U.S. at 261, 127 S.Ct. 1654; Brewer, 550 U.S. at 291, 127 S.Ct. 1706.