Opinion ID: 3032358
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Heading: analysis

Text: The statute governing our review. Habeas corpus is a fundamental right secured by the Constitution of the United BRADLEY v. HENRY 7459 States. U.S. Const. art. I., § 9, cl. 2. Its exercise is presently governed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). As governed by this statute, the great writ may be issued only if the state court’s ruling “resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States” or was “based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” Id. It is not difficult to determine when a decision is contrary to federal law established by the Supreme Court: it is a decision reaching a different result from the result reached by the Supreme Court on “facts that are materially indistinguishable . . . .” See Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 406 (2000). It is more difficult to determine whether a state court’s ruling “involved an unreasonable application” of controlling precedent from the Supreme Court. Nearly every case is different. The statutory term “unreasonable” invites debate as to what is or is not reasonable. “Applying a general standard to a specific case can demand a substantial element of judgment.” See Yarborough v. Alvarado, 541 U.S. 652, 664 (2004). We are admonished that the test is not our view of what would be erroneous but what is “objectively unreasonable.” See Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U.S. 63, 76 (2003). No doubt there is an insidious implication in this admonishment that there is an entirely objective perspective on each case, whereas as we know: “We may try to see things as objectively as we please. None the less, we can never see them with any eyes except our own.” Benjamin N. Cardozo, The Nature of the Judicial Process 13 (1921). We heed the Supreme Court’s advice by attempting with our own subjective abilities to state what we think some hypothetical reasonable jurist would find to be the case. [1] The conference in camera. We are given a relatively small set of precedents to consider, namely, “the holdings, as 7460 BRADLEY v. HENRY opposed to the dicta,” of the Supreme Court. Williams, 529 U.S. at 412. We turn to the relevant cases. In Stincer, the Supreme Court held that the exclusion of the defendant from an in camera hearing to determine the competency of two child witnesses against him was not a denial of the defendant’s rights under the Confrontation Clause or the Due Process Clause. See Stincer, 482 U.S. at 744-45. In the course of the opinion, Justice Cardozo’s statement in Snyder v. Massachusetts, 291 U.S. 97, 108 (1934) was quoted that due process requires that the defendant be allowed to be present “ ‘to the extent that a fair and just hearing would be thwarted by his absence.’ ” See Stincer, 482 U.S. at 745. [2] In Rushen v. Spain, 464 U.S. 114 (1983) the trial judge interviewed a juror about her knowledge of a murder connected with the Black Panthers, six of whom were on trial; their counsel were not present. The Supreme Court stated: “Our cases recognize that the right to personal presence at all critical stages of the trial and the right to counsel are fundamental rights of each criminal defendant.” Id. at 117. The Court went on to hold that “the alleged constitutional error [was] harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id. at 121. In United States v. Gagnon, 470 U.S. 522 (1985), the trial judge conducted an interview with a juror without the defen- dants being present but with the relevant defendant’s lawyer on hand. The Supreme Court quoted Synder as a statement of the decisive principle and went on to find that the defendants could have contributed nothing to the conference. Id. at 527. Further, the Court found that the defendants “neither then nor later in the course of the trial” asserted their right to be present and “did not even make any post-trial motions, although post-trial hearings may often resolve this sort of claim.” Id. at 528. [3] Snyder involved the jury’s viewing the crime scene in the absence of the defendant, see Snyder, 291 U.S. at 103-05; Stincer involved the competency of two children as witnesses. BRADLEY v. HENRY 7461 See Stincer, 482 U.S. at 732-34. Each case was focused chiefly on a defendant’s rights under the Confrontation Clause. In Snyder, the statement as to when a defendant has the right to be present appears to be not essential to the holding; the same is true of Stincer’s quotation of Snyder. Spain and Gagnon each deal with communications between a judge and a juror. In neither case was the absence of the defendant dispositive. Are the statements on a defendant’s right to be present to be disregarded as dicta? At first the answer appears evident. The authority of the Supreme Court to determine what law must be used is an authority identical with the Supreme Court’s supremacy in the system. As the Supreme Court says that only its holdings, not its dicta, must be followed in determining what is “established federal law,” only its holdings may be applied. Still, a doubt persists. Dicta in normal judicial parlance are statements of a court not necessary to its resolution of the case before it; holdings consist in the rules disposing of the case. But the Supreme Court often enough enunciates principles of law that are not actually applied in the case before it. The principles would be categorized as dicta if the court were not the Supreme Court. But these principles are treated by courts and commentators as established federal law. In the most famous and most fundamental of such readings, Chief Justice Marshall in Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 176 (1803), set out the principle empowering the Supreme Court to invalidate an unconstitutional law: “It is a proposition too plain to be contested, that the constitution controls any legislative act repugnant to it . . . . It is, emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is.” The Supreme Court went on to dismiss the case for want of jurisdiction. See id. at 175-76. All that was necessary for the decision was the holding that the Supreme Court had power to review legislation affecting its jurisdiction. Strictly speaking, Chief Justice Marshall’s pronounce7462 BRADLEY v. HENRY ment on the comprehensive power of the judicial department to review legislation was a dictum. No one, however, doubts that it was a holding. To illustrate by the case at hand, the district court treated Stincer, 482 U.S. at 745, as establishing the rule governing the defendant’s presence at a critical stage in the process. The Supreme Court itself in Stincer treated Justice Cardozo’s opinion in Snyder, 291 U.S. at 107-08, as having established the rule repeated in Stincer, viz, that due process requires the defendant to be present at every stage of the trial “to the extent that a fair and just hearing would be thwarted by his absence.” See Stincer, 482 U.S. at 745 (quoting Snyder, 291 U.S. at 107-08). Similarly in Spain, the Court declared “Our cases recognize . . .” going on to assert the fundamental right to be present at each critical stage. See Spain, 464 U.S. at 117. The teaching was reiterated by the Court in Gagnon, 470 U.S. at 527. It would be rash for us to disregard the pronouncement of Justice Cardozo and its acknowledgment in Stincer and Spain and Gagnon because a technical reading of these cases could classify the relevant principle as dicta. The Constitution lives by such comprehensive commentary from the Supreme Court. We cannot deprive the document of vitality by squeezing great principles into a dustbin labeled dicta. We apply as established federal law the broad principle set out in Snyder, Stincer, Spain and Gagnon. This approach appears to be confirmed by the gloss written by the Supreme Court on “holdings, as opposed to dicta.” Quoting this language from Williams, the Court said: “In other words, ‘clearly established Federal law’ under § 2254(d)(1) is the governing legal principle or principles set forth by the Supreme Court at the time the state court renders its decision.” See Lockyer, 538 U.S. at 71-72 (quoting Williams, 529 U.S. at 405, 413). We, therefore, apply established governing principles. [4] In the instant case, the conference in camera was a critical stage in the prosecution of Bradley. Her exclusion from it, BRADLEY v. HENRY 7463 apparently deliberate and without notice, deprived her of the opportunity to speak to the choice of counsel. She had no absolute right to choose her counsel. United States v. Wheat, 486 U.S. 153, 159 (1988). Absence of an absolute right does not reduce a defendant in a capital case to a zero in the delicate decision as to who will represent her as she stands trial for her life. To obtain reversal of the judgment, does Bradley have to show that she suffered harm beyond the fact of her exclusion? The Supreme Court has stated: “Obtaining reversal for violation of such a right does not require a showing of prejudice to the defense, since the right reflects constitutional protection of the defendant’s free choice independent of concern for the objective fairness of the proceeding.” See Flanagan v. United States, 465 U.S. 259, 268 (1984). This pronouncement was made in the course of a decision focused on the appealability of an order disqualifying counsel. Technically, it was dicta. In terms of Supreme Court practice, it appears to be a statement of constitutional principle and therefore to constitute federal law established by the Supreme Court. However, the en banc majority in Campbell v. Rice, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS, at  (9th Cir. 2005) did not apply this principle but required a showing of prejudice by the defendant to obtain reversal of his conviction. [5] We need not resolve the dilemma of whether we are bound by this recent circuit precedent or by the Supreme Court’s pronouncement of principle, because in our case the harm to Bradley is palpable. On trial for her life, with witnesses against her who had participated in the crime, she needed a lawyer whom she could trust, with whom she could communicate freely, who would be her friend, her champion, her sagacious counselor. As her subsequent unhappy relationship with Andrian demonstrates, he was none of these but an incubus she sought to rid herself of. The constitutional injury inflicted in her exclusion from the in camera conference had these clear harmful consequences. 7464 BRADLEY v. HENRY The state seems to imply that the security of the court required Bradley’s absence from the conference. But information as to her father’s conduct could have been furnished the court without any exploration of replacement of counsel. Nothing in the record appears to justify the conflation of reports on the menace of the father and the appointment of Andrian without Bradley’s participation. [6] We know that she objected to the withdrawal of Dunlevy and Steigerwalt. We know that, because of the prosecutor’s objection, she was denied the opportunity to present her objection in open court through retained counsel, Patrick Hutchinson. We know that in this ex parte fashion the contract between client and lawyer was dissolved without the client having a word to say. We know that at the in camera conference, with the district attorney and the prosecutor assenting, a lawyer was selected for her by the court as to whom she was not asked to consent. A fair and just hearing was thwarted by Bradley’s absence from the conference in