Opinion ID: 2974292
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Kim Berry’s Testimony

Text: Respondent next argues that the district court erred in holding that the admission of Kim Berry’s testimony prejudiced Defendant’s due process rights. During the guilt phase of trial, the prosecution presented the testimony of Kim Berry in order to rebut Petitioner’s statement that he did not use children in his drug trade. Kim Berry, the thirteen year old daughter of Merle Berry, testified that she had sold drugs for Petitioner on at least one occasion and that Petitioner had used her to hide drugs from the police. The Ohio Supreme Court held that the admission of Kim Berry’s testimony violated Ohio Rule of Evidence 608(B), which prohibits the admission of extrinsic evidence of specific acts to impeach a witness. Williams, 528 N.E.2d at 919. Nonetheless, the Ohio Supreme Court concluded that the admission of Kim Berry’s testimony was not reversible error because the error was harmless. Id. The district court agreed with Petitioner and granted the writ of habeas corpus on Petitioner’s sentence. In reaching its decision, the district court relied on the affidavits of two jurors, Edith Bolden and Issac Diggs, stating that they considered Kim Berry’s testimony in recommending Petitioner’s death sentence. Because we find that Petitioner procedurally defaulted this claim, we hold that the district court erred in granting relief on this ground. Nos. 04-3515/3585 Williams v. Anderson Page 13 Federal courts will not consider the merits of procedurally defaulted claims, unless the petitioner demonstrates cause for the default and prejudice resulting therefrom, or that failing to review the claim would result in a fundamental miscarriage of justice. Lundgren v. Mitchell, 440 F.3d 754, 763 (6th Cir. 2006) (citing Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U.S. 72, 87 (1977)). A claim may become procedurally defaulted in two ways. Id. First, a petitioner may procedurally default a claim by failing to comply with state procedural rules in presenting his claim to the appropriate state court. Id.; see also Maupin v. Smith, 785 F.2d 135, 138 (6th Cir. 1986). If, due to the petitioner’s failure to comply with the procedural rule, the state court declines to reach the merits of the issue, and the state procedural rule is an independent and adequate grounds for precluding relief, the claim is procedurally defaulted. Id. Second, a petitioner may procedurally default a claim by failing to raise a claim in state court, and pursue that claim through the state’s “ordinary appellate review procedures.” O’Sullivan v. Boerckel, 526 U.S. 838, 848-7 (1999). If, at the time of the federal habeas petition, state law no longer allows the petitioner to raise the claim, the claim is procedurally defaulted. Engle v. Isaac, 456 U.S. 107, 125 n.28 (1982); see also Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. at 731-2. This second type of procedural default is often confused with exhaustion. Exhaustion and procedural default, however, are distinct concepts. AEDPA’s exhaustion requirement only “refers to remedies still available at the time of the federal petition.” Engle, 456 U.S. at 125 n.28. Where state court remedies are no longer available to a petitioner because he or she failed to use them within the required time period, procedural default and not exhaustion bars federal court review. Id. In Ohio, a petitioner is not entitled to raise claims in post-conviction proceedings where those claims could have been raised on direct appeal. Id. Thus, if an Ohio petitioner failed to raise a claim on direct appeal, which could have been raised on direct appeal, the claim is procedurally defaulted. Id. A claim is adequately raised on direct appeal if it was “fairly presented” to the state court. To fairly present a claim to a state court a petitioner must assert both the legal and factual basis for his or her claim. McMeans v. Brigano, 228 F.3d 674, 681 (6th Cir. 2000). Accordingly, a “petitioner must present his claim to the state courts as a federal constitutional issue – not merely as an issue arising under state law.” Koontz v. Glossa, 731 F.2d 365, 368 (6th Cir. 1984). A petitioner can take four actions in his brief which are significant to the determination as to whether a claim has been fairly presented as a federal constitutional claim: “(1) reliance upon federal cases employing constitutional analysis; (2) reliance upon state cases employing federal constitutional analysis; (3) phrasing the claim in terms of constitutional law or in terms sufficiently particular to allege a denial of a specific constitutional right; or (4) alleging facts well within the mainstream of constitutional law.” Newton v. Million, 349 F.3d 873, 877 (6th Cir. 2003). In this case, Petitioner procedurally defaulted his claim that the admission of Kim Berry’s testimony violated his federal due process rights. Although Petitioner raised the issue in his appeal to the Eighth District Court of Appeals, he failed to raise the issue to the Ohio Supreme Court in pursuing direct review. O’Sullivan, 526 U.S. at 847-48 (holding a claim procedurally defaulted where the petitioner did not appeal the claim to the state supreme court). In his brief to the Ohio Supreme Court, Petitioner argued that the introduction of Kim Berry’s testimony violated the Ohio Rules of Evidence, but not that the introduction violated the federal Constitution. Petitioner’s claim was entitled “The Prosecution May Not Prove Specific Incidents of the Defendant-Appellant’s Bad Character through a Rebuttal Witness.” (J.A. at 4670.) Petitioner’s brief did not once mention the Due Process Clause, the Constitution, or the Fourteenth Amendment, nor did it cite to a single Supreme Court case. Additionally, the Ohio cases Petitioner did cite in his brief do not address relevant federal constitutional law. Therefore, it would seem that Petitioner failed to properly raise this issue before the Supreme Court of Ohio. Petitioner nonetheless argues that this claim is not procedurally defaulted. He relies on the Ohio Supreme Court’s citation to Delaware v. VanArsdall, 475 U.S. 673 (1986), in its decision Nos. 04-3515/3585 Williams v. Anderson Page 14 rejecting his claim, which he claims indicates that the Ohio Supreme Court understood Petitioner to be articulating a constitutional claim. In VanArsdall, the United States Supreme Court applied harmless error analysis to a Confrontation Clause claim. Id. Thus, Petitioner reasons, the Ohio Supreme Court understood Petitioner’s claim as one of constitutional error. We disagree. Ohio, like most states, applies harmless error analysis to state evidentiary errors. The citation to VanArsdall, which contains an extensive analysis of what constitutes harmless error, read in the context of the Ohio Supreme Court’s entire opinion, simply supports the proposition that evidentiary errors are not reversible if harmless. It does not indicate that the Ohio Supreme Court applied a due process analysis. Our conclusion is further supported by the fact that VanArsdall is not a due process case, the Ohio Supreme Court never once refers to due process, and Petitioner’s brief did not raise due process. Because Petitioner failed to fairly present this issue to the Ohio Supreme Court, the claim is procedurally defaulted. As Petitioner failed to argue cause and prejudice to excuse the default, we hold that the default is not excused and decline to reach the merits of Petitioner’s due process claim. Accordingly, we reverse the order of the district court granting relief on this ground.