Opinion ID: 3065125
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The 1994 Declaration

Text: The referee did not resolve the question of whether Gholston actually reviewed and approved the 1994 declaration preHAMILTON v. AYERS 13593 pared by the CAP investigators, although the referee did determine, and the California Supreme Court agreed, that the declaration’s “extreme statements” regarding Uncle Frank did not “accurately convey the experience Gholston was trying to describe.” Id. [3] Hamilton argues that the enthusiasm with which Gholston repudiated all signatures and initials attributed to her, even those from the 1996 declaration prepared by the California Attorney General, as well as her extreme position that she never even saw the 1994 declaration, indicates willful deceptiveness on Gholston’s part. The scope of Gholston’s repudiation may have been excessive, but her vehemence at the 1997 hearing does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that all of her testimony should be discredited. Further, while the testimony of CAP investigator Scarlet Nerad did conflict with Gholston’s testimony, the record demonstrates why the referee credited Gholston’s testimony over Nerad’s. Specifically, the 1997 hearing transcript supports the conclusions that (1) Gholston did not understand the purpose of the investigators’ 1994 visits; (2) Gholston did not pay attention to what she was signing; and (3) Gholston’s 1997 testimony about her experiences in 1994 and during Hamilton’s trial was generally reliable, though tinged at times by exaggerated, overemphatic denials. The State accurately distinguishes the cases Hamilton offers in support of this claim. In Dyer v. Calderon, we explicitly found not only that “the facts were not properly developed by the state court,” but also that the potentially biased juror had “plainly lied” in answering certain questions and that “no rational trier of fact could find otherwise.” 151 F.3d 970, 979 (9th Cir. 1998) (en banc). Specifically, the juror stated on voir dire that no member of her family had been the victim of a homicide, when in fact her brother had been murdered. Id. at 972-73. When questioned during trial about this omission, she stated she thought the killing was an accident, although the circumstances of the crime actually confirmed 13594 HAMILTON v. AYERS that the killing was deliberate. Id. at 974. Nonetheless, after a brief in camera hearing, the judge concluded the juror was not biased. Id. at 975. We disagreed, finding implied bias where a juror “chose to conceal a very major crime—the killing of her brother in a way that she knew was very similar to the way [the petitioner] was accused of killing his victims.” Id. at 982. In contrast to Dyer, California provided Hamilton with a two-day evidentiary hearing on the issue of juror misconduct. Further, Gholston’s incomplete voir dire answers were not “plain lies,” and Hamilton has failed to demonstrate the necessary “excess of zeal” that led the Dyer panel to infer the impermissible taint of bias. Id. Similarly, in Green v. White, the allegedly biased juror did not disclose a prior assault conviction. We found it “hard to imagine that [the juror] could have forgotten about the six months he spent in the brig for the past assault, no matter how much time had passed.” 232 F.3d 671, 676 (9th Cir. 2000). In contrast, it is not hard to imagine that, several months after briefly discussing the Hamilton murder with a neighbor and reading about it in multiple newspapers, Gholston only recalled her primary source of information. b) Actual Bias from the “Encounter” [4] So far as the potential impact on Gholston is concerned, it is irrelevant whether Vicki (the “skinnier” Hamilton sister) and her fiancé were actually parked in the car that Gholston saw in the alley behind her home. Aside from conclusory allegations, Hamilton fails to explain how the supposed encounter engendered bias. In theory, an encounter of this nature could introduce the “kind of unpredictable factor into the jury room that the doctrine of implied bias is meant to keep out.” Dyer, 151 F.3d at 982. Nonetheless, Hamilton fails to overcome the presumption of correctness we accord the state’s findings on this issue. As the California Supreme Court found: The episode described by Gholston was brief, iso- lated, and ambiguous. The people Gholston saw HAMILTON v. AYERS 13595 parked in her alley did not approach or speak to her. Gholston mentioned no display of weapons or threatening gestures. According to Gholston, the two individuals simply sat in their car, and they drove away rapidly the instant they realized that Gholston had seen them. By Gholston’s own account, “it never occurred to [her]” to report the incident to the trial court. She further insisted she never discussed the incident with other jurors, and there is no contrary evidence. In re Hamilton, 975 P.2d at 621 (alteration in original). We agree with the California Supreme Court that the “episode affords no basis for relief,” id., and affirm the district court’s conclusion that Hamilton has not shown, and the record does not reveal, that Gholston was biased against him. Cf. United States v. Armstrong, 654 F.2d 1328, 1333 (9th Cir. 1981) (finding no abuse of discretion in the district court’s refusal to declare a mistrial as a result of phone calls received by a juror’s husband, where the calls “did not refer to the merits,” “did not articulate threats,” and were not “identified with either side,” and agreeing with the district court that any resulting irregularity did not compromise the “essential fairness of the process”).