Opinion ID: 379222
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Independent Review Standard

Text: 112 A mechanical use of the clearly erroneous standard in habeas cases involving the voluntariness of a confession may be inconsistent with Supreme Court precedent. Furthermore, there may be policy reasons favoring a somewhat more active review standard when fundamental constitutional rights are at stake. The panel opinion states: 113 We are, according to the Supreme Court, under a duty (as) an appellate court . . . 'to examine the entire record and make an independent determination of the ultimate issue of voluntariness,'  Beckwith v. United States, 425 U.S. 341, 348, 96 S.Ct. 1612, 1617, 48 L.Ed.2d 1 (1976), quoting Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U.S. 737, 741-42, 86 S.Ct. 1761, 16 L.Ed.2d 895 (1966); see also Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 2417, 57 L.Ed.2d 290 (1978); in other words, we may overturn the district court's conclusion on this issue even if it is not clearly erroneous. 114 593 F.2d at 677 (emphasis added). This brief comment does not explain the three-phase review process articulated by the Supreme Court and described below. Moreover, the panel never considers whether the Supreme Court standard applies in the habeas corpus context. 7 After first arguing that the Supreme Court's independent review standard may very well apply in habeas cases, we proceed to flesh out the precise content of that standard. 115  The Supreme Court, in articulating the standard of review governing voluntariness of confession cases, has rarely explicitly differentiated between cases on direct appeal from state Courts and cases reviewing Federal Court decisions on habeas corpus. However, the Supreme Court habeas cases strongly suggest that the same standard applies. For instance, in Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U.S. 737, 86 S.Ct. 1761, 16 L.Ed.2d 895 (1966), the Court was faced with a habeas appeal from the District Court and the United States Court of Appeals in a state criminal case. The issue was the voluntariness of the confession. The Court applied the same standard of review that it had consistently applied in direct appeals from state Courts: 116 (The) factual allegations were resolved against Davis by the District Court and we need not review these specific findings here. 117 It is our duty in this case, however, as in all of our prior cases dealing with the question whether a confession was involuntarily given, to examine the entire record and make an independent determination of the ultimate issue of voluntariness. (Citing authority.) 118 Id. at 741-42, 86 S.Ct. at 1764, 16 L.Ed.2d at 898. See also Reck v. Pate, 367 U.S. 433, 81 S.Ct. 1541, 6 L.Ed.2d 948 (1961); Thomas v. Arizona, 356 U.S. 390, 78 S.Ct. 885, 2 L.Ed.2d 863 (1958); Leyra v. Denno, 347 U.S. 556, 74 S.Ct. 716, 98 L.Ed. 948 (1953). Cf. Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 318, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 2789, 61 L.Ed.2d 560, 573 (1979); Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 316, 83 S.Ct. 745, 758, 9 L.Ed.2d 770, 787 (1963). 119 These cases strongly suggest that the clearly erroneous test may not be the correct test in analyzing the voluntariness of confessions, even in the habeas corpus context. Indeed, a number of Circuit Judges have felt bound by these Supreme Court cases when reviewing habeas appeals from the Federal District Court. See, e. g., Makarewicz v. Scafati, supra ; Outing v. North Carolina, supra (Frank Kaufman, D. J., dissenting); Collins v. Beto, supra (Friendly, J., sitting by designation, concurring); Bell v. Patterson, supra. On the other hand, the cases applying the clearly erroneous rule do not even try to distinguish such cases as Davis v. North Carolina, supra, and, indeed, do not even hint at the possibility that the Supreme Court may require a standard of review broader than that of clearly erroneous. See the cases applying the clearly erroneous rule, cited on, p. 957 of this opinion. Because of the strong possibility that the Circuit Courts are required to make an independent review of the evidence in habeas appeals, we believe it necessary to consider the independent review test in some detail. 120 ii 121 The Supreme Court has iterated and reiterated its independent review test on numerous occasions. See, e. g., Chambers v. Florida, 309 U.S. 227, 229, 60 S.Ct. 472, 473, 84 L.Ed. 716, 718 (1940); Lisenba v. California, 314 U.S. 219, 237-40, 62 S.Ct. 280, 290-91, 86 L.Ed. 166, 180-82 (1941); Ashcraft v. Tennessee, 322 U.S. 143, 147-48, 64 S.Ct. 921, 923, 88 L.Ed. 1192, 1196 (1944); Gallegos v. Nebraska, 342 U.S. 55, 61-63, 72 S.Ct. 141, 145-146, 96 L.Ed. 86, 92-93 (1951); Blackburn v. Alabama, 361 U.S. 199, 205, 80 S.Ct. 274, 279, 4 L.Ed.2d 242, 247 (1960); Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503, 516-17, 83 S.Ct. 1336, 1344-45, 10 L.Ed.2d 513, 522-23 (1963); Davis v. North Carolina, supra, 384 U.S. at 741-42, 86 S.Ct. at 1764, 16 L.Ed.2d at 898; Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 398, 98 S.Ct. 2408, 2417, 57 L.Ed.2d 290, 304 (1978). By far the Court's most comprehensive analysis on the subject is Mr. Justice Frankfurter's opinion in Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 81 S.Ct. 1860, 6 L.Ed.2d 1037 (1961). 8 As the opinion makes clear, the determination of whether a confession is voluntary involves a three-part analysis: 122 The inquiry whether, in a particular case, a confession was voluntarily or involuntarily made involves, at the least, a three-phased process. First, there is the business of finding the crude historical facts, the external, phenomenological occurrences and events surrounding the confession. Second, because the concept of voluntariness is one which concerns a mental state, there is the imaginative recreation, largely inferential, of internal, psychological fact. Third, there is the application to this psychological fact of standards for judgment informed by the larger legal conceptions ordinarily characterized as rules of law but which, also, comprehend both induction from, and anticipation of, factual circumstances. 123 Id. at 603, 81 S.Ct. at 1879, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1058. 124 As Justice Frankfurter makes clear, the standard of review is not the same with respect to each stage. As to the first stage, the historical fact finding, the clearly erroneous rule (or the likes thereof) does indeed apply: 125 In a case coming here from the highest court of a State in which review may be had, the first of these phases is definitely determined, normally, by that court. Determination of what happened requires assessments of the relative credibility of witnesses whose stories, in cases involving claims of coercion, are frequently, if indeed not almost invariably, contradictory. That ascertainment belongs to the trier of facts before whom those witnesses actually appear, subject to whatever corrective powers a State's appellate processes afford. 126 This means that all testimonial conflict is settled by the judgment of the state courts. Where they have made explicit findings of fact, those findings conclude us and form the basis of our review with the one caveat, necessarily, that we are not to be bound by findings wholly lacking support in evidence. 127 Id., 81 S.Ct. at 1879, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1058. See also Lisenba v. California, supra, 314 U.S. at 238, 62 S.Ct. at 290, 86 L.Ed. at 181; Gallegos v. Nebraska, supra, 342 U.S. at 61, 72 S.Ct. at 145, 96 L.Ed. at 92. 128 In addition, where there are no explicit findings of fact and the proper legal standards have been applied, all conflicts in the testimony must be resolved against the defendant and the reviewing Court may consider only the undisputed facts: 129 Where there are no explicit findings, or in the case of lacunae among the findings, the rejection of a federal constitutional claim by state criminal courts applying proper constitutional standards resolves all conflicts in testimony bearing on that claim against the criminal defendant. In such instances, we consider only the uncontested portions of the record: the evidence of the prosecution's witnesses and so much of the evidence for the defense as, fairly read in the context of the record as a whole, remains uncontradicted. 130 367 U.S. at 603-04, 81 S.Ct. at 1879-80, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1058. See also Thomas v. Arizona, supra, 356 U.S. at 402-03, 78 S.Ct. at 892, 2 L.Ed.2d at 871-72; Ashcraft v. Tennessee, supra, 322 U.S. at 152, 153, 64 S.Ct. at 925, 926, 88 L.Ed. at 1198, 1199. See generally Note, Supreme Court Review of State Findings of Fact in Fourteenth Amendment Cases, 14 Stan.L.Rev. 328, 339-41 (1962) (hereafter referred to as Stanford Note). 131 With respect to the second and third phases of the examination, the reviewing Court is not constrained by the clearly erroneous standard: 132 The second and third phases of the inquiry determination of how the accused reacted to the external facts, and of the legal significance of how he reacted although distinct as a matter of abstract analysis, become in practical operation inextricably interwoven. This is so, in part, because the concepts by which language expresses an otherwise unrepresentable mental reality are themselves generalizations importing preconceptions about the reality to be expressed. It is so, also, because the apprehension of mental states is almost invariably a matter of induction, more or less imprecise, and the margin of error which is thus introduced into the finding of fact must be accounted for in the formulation and application of the rule designed to cope with such classes of facts. The 133 (367 U.S. 605) 134  notion of voluntariness is itself an amphibian. It purports at once to describe an internal psychic state and to characterize that state for legal purposes. Since the characterization is the very issue to review which this Court sits, (quoting authority), the matter of description, too, is necessarily open here. 135 No more restricted scope of review would suffice adequately to protect federal constitutional rights. For the mental state of involuntariness upon which the due process question turns can never be affirmatively established other than circumstantially that is, by inference; and it cannot be competent to the trier of fact to preclude our review simply by declining to draw inferences which the historical facts compel. 136 367 U.S. at 604-05, 81 S.Ct. at 1880, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1059. 137 It is absolutely critical to emphasize, however and the panel and Judge Garza overlook this point that even with respect to the second and third phases of the inquiry, the role of the reviewing Court is not entirely unlimited. Even with respect to these phases, inferences drawn by the lower Courts may be entitled to some weight: 138 Great weight, of course, is to be accorded to the inferences which are drawn by the state courts. In a dubious case, it is appropriate, with due regard to federal-state relations, that the state court's determination should control. 139 Id. at 605, 81 S.Ct. at 1880, 6 L.Ed.2d at 1059. See also Haynes v. Washington, supra, 373 U.S. at 515, 83 S.Ct. at 1344, 10 L.Ed.2d at 522, which states: (T)he determination of the trial judge or the jury . . . may be entitled to some weight even with respect to the ultimate conclusion on the crucial issue of voluntariness. (Emphasis added.) 9 140 As articulated in the case law, the Fifth Circuit's clearly erroneous review standard may not be that much different from the independent review standard set forth by the Supreme Court. First, as to historical facts, the Supreme Court itself indicates that a clearly erroneous type standard should apply. Thus the phrase independent review of the record does not mean that the appellate Court should act as a fact finding body and we strongly disagree with anything in the panel opinion which could be read as suggesting otherwise. Moreover, because this Circuit does not apply the clearly erroneous rule with respect to inferences drawn from documents, transcripts, or undisputed facts, the Supreme Court's requirement that an appellate Court make an independent determination based on the undisputed facts 10 will be met even under a clearly erroneous review standard. 11 141 However, there are differences between the two tests. Under the clearly erroneous standard, there is a danger that the appellate Court may give too much deference to the ultimate conclusions of voluntariness by the Courts below. The various cases applying the clearly erroneous rule give the District Court's conclusion on the ultimate question of voluntariness a heavy presumption of correctness. The Supreme Court's standard cautions against giving strong weight to the ultimate finding of voluntariness (as opposed to subsidiary findings) except in close cases, where it is entirely appropriate to give deference to the lower Courts even on the ultimate question of voluntariness.