Opinion ID: 707605
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Estoppel--Due Process

Text: 28 Respondent next argues that the district court improperly granted relief on the basis of its conclusion that the prosecutor violated principles of estoppel and due process by arguing for and obtaining a conviction and death sentence against two men for firing a single bullet. Respondent contends that the district court in this respect granted Nichols the benefit of a new rule not compelled by existing precedent when Nichols' conviction became final, contrary to Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288, 109 S.Ct. 1060, 103 L.Ed.2d 334 (1989), and that in any event the district court erred because collateral estoppel is not applicable in criminal cases lacking common defendants, and even if it were, the question of who fired the fatal bullet is not an issue to which estoppel would apply. 29 The district court concluded that the due process boundary upon prosecutorial conduct and the appearance of basic fairness derived from that boundary command[s] a determination that, in a criminal prosecution, the State is constitutionally estopped from obtaining a fact finding in one trial and seeking and obtaining an inconsistent fact finding in another trial. Nichols, 802 F.Supp. at 74 (emphasis added). The court also noted that while Williams and Nichols can both be guilty of capital murder because the state of Texas has determined, by law, that both are equally culpable without regard to who fired the bullet which killed Shaffer.... William and Nichols cannot both be guilty of firing the same bullet because physics will not permit it. Id. (emphasis in original). The district court did not conclude that Williams had in fact fired the fatal bullet, or that any of the prosecutor's evidence and argument in Nichols' trial was factually false. With respect to the state's arguments in Nichols' second trial that Nichols fired the fatal shot and its arguments in Williams' case that Williams did, the court stated this Court acknowledges the State's argument that the above are merely different interpretations of the same evidence, id. at 74, and the court never suggested that this characterization was factually inaccurate. Nor did the district court with respect to what the evidence showed at any of the three trials ever state anything in this respect more definite or precise than the only conclusion which the record supports is that both Williams and Nichols shot at Shaffer but that either Williams or Nichols actually shot Shaffer. Id. at 73 (original emphasis). 27 What the district court did determine was that, regardless of what the actual facts were or what the evidence showed, the Williams trial legally or judicially established that Williams, not Nichols, fired the fatal shot. Thus, the district court stated: 30 ... the State argued, the jury found, and the court accepted the determination in the Williams trial that Williams was the triggerman, not just a party to the offense. That fact was established as the truth. This Court has also concluded that the prosecutor in charge of Nichols II offered evidence and argued to the jury and court that Nichols was the triggerman. By prior judicial determination, the evidence submitted was necessarily false. Accordingly, this Court finds that the prosecutor in charge of Nichols II knowingly used false evidence to obtain the conviction and sentence in Nichols II. Id. at 75. 31 The district court, citing Rogers v. Lynaugh, 848 F.2d 606 (5th Cir.1988), noted that due process violations could either be specific, where particular protections of the Bill of Rights incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment were transgressed, or generic. Nichols, 802 F.Supp. at 72. As no particular Bill of Rights provision was cited by the district court, it appears to have relied on the concept of a generic due process violation. But such a concept generally focuses on the reliability or fairness of the fact finding process in the particular trial the result of which is being challenged. Cf. Rogers at 610 (noting that prosecutor's injecting into the challenged trial issues broader than the guilt or innocence of the accused under the controlling law could constitute a generic due process violation). What happened in Williams' trial--which the Nichols defense team was clearly aware of--did not affect the reliability or fairness of the fact finding process in either of Nichols' trials. 32 What the district court in substance did here was to hold that the state was collaterally estopped from taking in Nichols' case a different position as to who fired the fatal bullet than that which it took in Williams' prosecution. As the Supreme Court observed in Schiro v. Farley, --- U.S. ----, ----, 114 S.Ct. 783, 790, 127 L.Ed.2d 47 (1994): 33 In Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469 (1970), we held that the Double Jeopardy Clause incorporates the doctrine of collateral estoppel in criminal proceedings.... Collateral estoppel, or, in modern usage, issue preclusion, 'means simply that when an issue of ultimate fact has once been determined by a valid and final judgment, that issue cannot again be litigated between the same parties in any future lawsuit.' Ashe, 397 U.S., at 443, 90 S.Ct., at 1194. (Emphasis added). 34 It is apparent from this that Ashe, which was a state prosecution, rests not on generic due process, but rather on the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment, which Benton v. Maryland, 395 U.S. 784, 89 S.Ct. 2056, 23 L.Ed.2d 707 (1969), had previously held was incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause. We have rejected attempts to erect a due process basis, independent of the double jeopardy clause, for the application of collateral estoppel. Showery v. Samaniego, 814 F.2d 200, 203 (5th Cir.1987). 28 35 Because Nichols was not in jeopardy in Williams' trial, the results of that trial do not bind the state in its prosecution of Nichols. Moreover, the rule of collateral estoppel described in Ashe as having been applied in federal criminal cases for more than 50 years--and which it ultimately held mandated by the double jeopardy clause--required that the two actions be between the same parties. Ashe, 397 U.S. at 443, 90 S.Ct. at 1194. Thus, because Nichols was not a party in Williams' trial, the result in that trial could not collaterally estop the state in its prosecution of Nichols even under the federal common law rule of collateral estoppel in criminal cases. We have declined to apply collateral estoppel against the United States in a criminal prosecution on the basis of an earlier determination in the United States' criminal prosecution of a different defendant. United States v. Mollier, 853 F.2d 1169, 1176 (5th Cir.1988) (where defendants are different collateral estoppel has no application in criminal cases); United States v. Montes, 976 F.2d 235, 239 (5th Cir.1992) (same), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 113 S.Ct. 1831, 123 L.Ed.2d 459 (1993). 36 We recognize, as we did in Mollier and Montes, that in civil cases collateral estoppel is now applied even where the parties are not the same, so that if a suitor has fully and fairly litigated an issue and it is determined against him in an action against one party, then third parties unrelated to the original action can generally bar that suitor from relitigating that same issue in a subsequent action again them. See Mollier at 1175 n. 7; Montes at 239. However, as we pointed out in Mollier, citing Standefer v. United States, 447 U.S. 10, 100 S.Ct. 1999, 64 L.Ed.2d 689 (1980), the efficiency concerns that drive the collateral estoppel policy on the civil side are not nearly so important in criminal cases. Mollier at 1176. We also observe that even in the civil context the modern broad rule of collateral estoppel is frequently not applied against the government acting in its sovereign capacity. See United States v. Mendoza, 464 U.S. 154, 104 S.Ct. 568, 78 L.Ed.2d 379 (1984) (holding in an immigration context that the government could not be collaterally estopped from litigating a constitutional issue concerning its administration of the Nationality Act, adjudicated against it in a prior action brought by a different party). Moreover, we observe that [u]ntil relatively recently, however, the scope of collateral estoppel was limited by the doctrine of mutuality of parties. Parklane Hosiery Co., Inc. v. Shore, 439 U.S. 322, 326, 99 S.Ct. 645, 649, 58 L.Ed.2d 552 (1979). See also Restatement of Judgments Sec. 93 (1942) ([A] person who is not a party ... is not bound by or entitled to claim the benefits of an adjudication). Consequently, allowing persons to claim collateral estoppel benefits of an adjudication to which they were strangers can hardly be considered as mandated by historic concepts of fundamental fairness or due process. 37 Moreover, the district court clearly erred in its conclusion that in the Williams trial the jury found that Williams fired the fatal shot. The jury made no such finding. Williams pleaded guilty and the jury was instructed to return a verdict of guilty. It did so, merely signing and returning the verdict form finding Williams guilty of the offense of capital murder, as charged in the indictment. The jury charge said nothing about the elements of the offense or about whether Williams fired the fatal bullet (or personally killed Shaffer) or whether the jury had to so find. 29 Nor is it relevant that the indictment (see note 5, supra ) alleged that Williams killed Shaffer by shooting him, for under Texas law the indictment was clearly sufficient to support a conviction based on the law of parties with the fatal shot being fired by Nichols (see cases cited in the last paragraph of note 9, supra ). Moreover, the evidence at the guilt/innocence stage of Williams' trial showed that both Williams and Nichols were acting together to commit armed robbery of Shaffer, that both fired at Shaffer, and that one of these shots was fatal, but it was not clearly established which. While the evidence would support the conclusion that Williams fired the fatal shot, a jury could have had a reasonable doubt of this and still found Williams guilty as charged under the law of parties. In any event, under Texas law when a defendant pleads guilty before the jury, as Williams did, the plea itself establishes his guilt and the evidence is unnecessary and immaterial unless it affirmatively demonstrates his innocence. Williams, 674 S.W.2d at 318, 320. 30 And, the punishment phase verdict contained no finding that Williams fired the fatal shot. Further, neither the form of the punishment issues, nor the court's charge, nor the evidence, required such a finding in order to return an affirmative answer to the three punishment special issues. 31 Although the Court of Criminal Appeals in reciting the evidence on Williams' direct appeal stated that he fired the fatal shot, Williams at 317, nothing in its opinion suggests that this was a necessary predicate for its affirmance of the sentence (or the conviction). In finding the evidence sufficient to support the affirmative answers to the punishment special issues, the Court of Criminal Appeals in Williams relied on Smith v. State, 540 S.W.2d 693 (1976), a case in which it sustained a death sentence for a nontriggerman (there, the defendant's gun misfired. The co-defendant shot and killed the attendant). Williams at 321. In Nichols ' case, the Court of Criminal Appeals held the evidence sufficient to support the affirmative answers to the three special issues although it concluded it was factually unknown and evidentiarily improvable who fired the fatal shot. Nichols, 754 S.W.2d at 202 n. 18. 32 38 In Dowling v. United States, 493 U.S. 342, 347, 110 S.Ct. 668, 672, 107 L.Ed.2d 708 (1990), the Court noted that the rule of Ashe was that  'when an issue of ultimate fact has once been determined by a valid and final judgment, that issue cannot again be litigated between the same parties in any future lawsuit.'  Id. (quoting Ashe at 443, 90 S.Ct. at 1194). Dowling refused to give the defendant's prior acquittal in another case preclusive effect because the prior acquittal did not determine an ultimate issue in the present case. Dowling at 347, 110 S.Ct. at 672. In Schiro, the Court rejected a claim of double jeopardy based on the jury verdict in the defendant's first trial, because the defendant has not met his burden of establishing ... that an 'issue of ultimate fact has once been determined' in his favor. Id., --- U.S. at ----, 114 S.Ct. at 790. Here Nichols has failed to demonstrate that Williams' trial determined that Williams, rather than Nichols, fired the fatal shot. Nichols has likewise failed to demonstrate that whether Williams, rather than Nichols, fired the fatal shot was an ultimate issue in either his own trial or in Williams' trial. Hence Nichols fails to meet the requirements of collateral estoppel on these additional bases, as well as because he was not a party to the Williams case. 39 Nichols also contends in this connection that the state was barred by the doctrine of judicial estoppel from taking a position in his trial inconsistent with that it had taken in Williams', a view which the district court appears to likewise have adopted. 40 Common law judicial estoppel has been referred to as an obscure doctrine, United States v. McCaskey, 9 F.3d 368, 378 (5th Cir.1993), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 1565, 128 L.Ed.2d 211 (1994); United States v. Kattar, 840 F.2d 118, 129-130 n. 7 (1st Cir.1988), lacking defined principles and subject to criticism as basically an 'ad hoc' decision in each case. Jackson Jordan, Inc. v. Plasser American Corp., 747 F.2d 1567, 1579 (Fed.Cir.1984). See also Morris v. State of California, 966 F.2d 448, 453 (9th Cir.1991) (the doctrine of judicial estoppel 'is an equitable doctrine invoked by the court at its discretion' ), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 113 S.Ct. 96, 121 L.Ed.2d 57 (1992). The doctrine has not been uniformly adopted by federal courts. Bates v. Long Island Ry. Co., 997 F.2d 1028, 1037 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 550, 126 L.Ed.2d 452 (1993). The Tenth Circuit, however, has rejected the doctrine of judicial estoppel. United States v. 49.01 Acres of Land, 802 F.2d 387, 390 (10th Cir.1986). In Konstantinidis v. Chen, 626 F.2d 933, 938 (D.C.Cir.1980), the court held that the judicial estoppel doctrine has no validity in this jurisdiction, referring to local District of Columbia law, and stated that judicial estoppel has not been followed by anything approaching a majority of jurisdictions, nor is there a discernible modern trend in that direction. In UMWA 1974 Pension v. Pittston Co., 984 F.2d 469 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 113 S.Ct. 3039, 125 L.Ed.2d 726 (1993), the Court observed we have not previously embraced the doctrine of judicial estoppel in this circuit and we decline to do so in this case. Id. at 477 (footnote omitted). In Bates the Second Circuit stated that judicial estoppel's elements have never been clearly defined in this Circuit. Id. at 1037 (footnote omitted). See also Morris at 452 (Although this circuit has adopted the doctrine of judicial estoppel, we have not yet determined the circumstances under which it will be applied). 41 Two things, however, may be said about the rather amorphous doctrine of judicial estoppel. First, there is no indication in the authorities that it is constitutionally mandated. Second, it has apparently never been applied against the government in a criminal case. See McCaskey at 378 (an obscure doctrine that has apparently never been applied in a criminal case); Kattar at 129-30 n. 7 (as far as we can tell, this obscure doctrine has never been applied against the government in a criminal proceeding). See also, e.g., State v. Abbott, 64 N.J.Super. 191, 165 A.2d 537, 543 (App.Div.1960) (the application of estoppel against the State is particularly inappropriate in areas such as criminal prosecution), rev'd on other grounds, aff'd in this respect, 36 N.J. 63, 174 A.2d 881, 889 (N.J.1961); 28 Am.Jur.2d, Estoppel and Waiver, Sec. 126 at 788 (same). Cf. Office of Personnel Management v. Richmond, 496 U.S. 414, 421, 423, 110 S.Ct. 2465, 2470 (we have reversed every finding of estoppel [against the government] that we have reviewed), 2471, 110 L.Ed.2d 387 ([w]e leave for another day whether an estoppel claim could ever succeed against the Government) (1990). 33 42 In the present circumstances, to hold that the state was constitutionally barred by any form of estoppel--whether under the rubric of collateral estoppel or some variety of judicial or other estoppel--from taking the position in Nichols' case that the shot he fired was the fatal shot because it had previously taken the position in Williams' case, in which Williams received the death sentence, that the fatal shot was the one fired by Williams, would be to apply a new rule of constitutional law not dictated by precedent existing at the time Nichols' conviction became final--January 9, 1989--contrary to Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288, 301, 109 S.Ct. 1060, 1070, 103 L.Ed.2d 334 (1989) (original emphasis). The two Teague exceptions are inapplicable. The rule contended for by Nichols plainly is not one which places 'certain kinds of primary, private individual conduct beyond the power of the criminal law-making authority to proscribe.'  Teague, 489 U.S. at 311, 109 S.Ct. at 1075. Certainly, Nichols was properly eligible for the death penalty whether or not the shot he fired at Shaffer--as opposed to that fired by his co-actor Williams--was the cause of Shaffer's death. Nor is the other Teague exception available here, as it applies only to those new procedures without which the likelihood of an accurate conviction is seriously diminished. Id. at 313, 109 S.Ct. at 1077 (emphasis added). What the prosecution argued in the Williams case, and the result there, has nothing to do with the likely accuracy of any determinations made in the subsequent Nichols case. 43 As noted, a rule is new for Teague purposes unless dictated  by prior precedent. Id. at 301, 109 S.Ct. at 1070 (original emphasis); Butler v. McKellar, 494 U.S. 407, 412, 110 S.Ct. 1212, 1216, 108 L.Ed.2d 347 (1990). The prior precedent must be such that it would have compelled the result; Saffle v. Parks, 494 U.S. 484, 485-86, 110 S.Ct. 1257, 1260, 108 L.Ed.2d 415 (1990), and it is not enough that the contended for rule merely is within the 'logical compass' of an earlier decision, or indeed that it is 'controlled' by a prior decision. Butler at 415, 110 S.Ct. at 1217. The authority relied on by Nichols does not come even close to meeting this standard. 34 Nor can this result be avoided by invoking longstanding judicial pronouncements that due process concerns itself with fundamental fairness and similar concepts. Such a level of generality ... is far too great to provide any meaningful guidance for purpose of our Teague inquiry. Gilmore v. Taylor, --- U.S. ----, ----, 113 S.Ct. 2112, 2119, 124 L.Ed.2d 306 (1993). See also Sawyer v. Smith, 497 U.S. 227, 235, 110 S.Ct. 2822, 2828, 111 L.Ed.2d 193 (1990) (Teague test would be meaningless if applied at this level of generality). 44 In Jacobs v. Scott, 31 F.3d 1319, 1326 (5th Cir.1994), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 711, 130 L.Ed.2d 618 (1995), we held that a similar contention to that advanced by Nichols here was barred by Teague. 45 We accordingly hold that the district court erred in granting Nichols relief on the basis that the state was in some manner estopped or barred by its arguments and the result in the Williams trial from taking the position in the subsequent Nichols trial that the shot fired by Nichols was the fatal shot. Relief on any such basis was barred by Teague.