Opinion ID: 157413
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: State’s Reweighing

Text: After the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals modified its denial of Petitioner’s direct appeal by finding the evidence was insufficient to support a finding of the aggravating circumstance the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel, Stouffer II, 742 P.2d at 563, the court weighed the remaining aggravating circumstances. It considered the murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution and the perpetrator knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person, with the mitigating circumstances, the lack of a criminal record and personality disorder, and concluded “the sentence of death [was] factually substantiated - 27 - and appropriate.” Id. at 564. The court further stated the “overwhelming evidence of guilt” rendered inclusion of the unsupported aggravator “at most harmless error.” Id. Examining his federal habeas claim, the district court rejected Petitioner’s argument that, despite its subsequent elimination, inclusion of the unconstitutional aggravating circumstance required vacating his sentence. Rather, it found the state court actually reweighed, “albeit described in a somewhat cursory fashion.” Here, Petitioner contests this conclusion, distinguishing that although the state court’s reweighing was correct in form, Clemons v. Mississippi, 494 U.S. 738, 748-54 (1990), it lacked the essential substance mandated by Richmond v. Lewis, 506 U.S. 40, 48 (1992). He maintains the decision was too summary to permit any adequate independent review and remained infected by the pervasive taint of the especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel aggravating circumstance. He urges the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals’ terse conclusion failed to reveal whether it “actually reweighed” to cure the otherwise constitutionally infirm sentence. Our de novo review of the decision reweighing the aggravating and mitigating factors must determine whether Stouffer II afforded Petitioner “an individualized and reliable sentencing determination based on the defendant’s circumstances, his background, and the crime.” Clemons, 494 U.S. at 749; Stafford v. Saffle, 34 F.3d 1557, 1569 (10th Cir. 1994). We are not required “to peer majestically over the [state] court’s shoulder so that [we] might second-guess its interpretation of facts,” Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U.S. 764, - 28 - 780-81 (1990) (quoting Godfrey v. Georgia, 446 U.S. 420, 450 (1980) (White, J., dissenting)), but rather, applying the standard used to review a conviction, we ask “whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt,” id. (quoting Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979)). The standard “is equally applicable in safeguarding the Eighth Amendment’s bedrock guarantee against the arbitrary or capricious imposition of the death penalty.” Lewis, 497 U.S. at 782. Thus, “[a]t a minimum, we must determine that the state court actually reweighed,” Richmond v. Lewis, 506 U.S. at 48, so that the statutory aggravating circumstance provides “principled guidance,” id. at 46, and not a “conclusive justification” for the death penalty, id. at 49. In light of the state court’s abbreviated reweighing, the district court sketched in those facts substantiating the appropriateness of the death sentence. It cited the “ample evidence” Ms. Reaves was shot at close range to substantiate Petitioner knowingly created a great risk of harm to more than one person “regardless of any evidence presented to show the gruesome or heinous nature of the crime.” Further, the court stated, “the absolute lack of connection between petitioner and Reaves prior to the shooting meant that Reaves was only shot to preclude her later appearing as a witness against petitioner,” as evidence in support of the second aggravating circumstance. - 29 - Nonetheless, Petitioner catalogs the numerous references in the State’s closing argument, describing the killing as heinous, atrocious or cruel, or some closely connected adjectival equivalent. The prosecution’s repeatedly characterizing defendant as pitiless, wicked, evil, greedy, cold-blooded, and unaffected by killing, however, Petitioner insists, illustrates how the presence of the heinous, atrocious or cruel aggravator fatally infected the process of arriving at a sentence. “[T]he United States Supreme Court ‘has never specified the degree of clarity with which a state appellant court must reweigh in order to cure an otherwise invalid death sentence.’” Correll v. Stewart, 137 F.3d 1404, 1418 (9th Cir. 1998) (quoting Jeffers v. Lewis, 38 F.3d 411, 414 (9th Cir. 1994)). Thus, the Court has not translated its call for “close appellate scrutiny of the import and effect of invalid aggravating factors,” Stringer v. Black, 503 U.S. 222, 230 (1992), into a clear set of requirements for a constitutional reweighing analysis. However, in reviewing its analysis, we may look at the evidence before the Court of Criminal Appeals to support Petitioner’s conviction.12 That evidence included Doug Ivens’ describing Petitioner’s standing over him firing a last shot into his face and Ms. Reaves’ exclaiming, “No,” trying to shield herself from Petitioner’s aim It remains, however, troubling in the interest of a comprehensive review and 12 principles of comity for the state court to have provided such a scant acknowledgment of its review. Although we do not disagree with the State’s assertion “[t]here are no magical terms which must be included in the reweighing determination,” the state court’s failure to even shorthand a conclusion based on its actual reweighing that with removal of the unsupported aggravator the jury would still have found ample evidence to support the remaining two aggravators, renders independent review more problematic. - 30 - before he shot her at close range. In arriving at a verdict of guilt in the first phase after only an hour’s deliberation, we may infer the jury fully embraced the State’s case and then rationally could channel that evidence to individualize its determination of the death sentence. Surely, a rational fact-finder viewing this evidence in the light most favorable to the State could find Petitioner’s actions created a risk of death to more than one person, and he shot either Ms. Reaves or Mr. Ivens to escape detection. The Court of Criminal Appeals noted the trial court’s advising the jury Petitioner’s personality disorder and lack of a prior criminal conviction involving violence were minimum mitigating circumstances. Stouffer II, 742 P.2d at 564 n.4. Thus, we must conclude the two remaining aggravating circumstances clearly outweighed the mitigating evidence presented. While this balance may be affected by counsel’s failure to investigate and present mitigating evidence of defendant’s circumstances and background, Clemons, 494 U.S. at 749, within the scope of our review, we believe the sentencing jury was guided by the overwhelming evidence of guilt. See Moore v. Reynolds, 153 F.2d 1086, 1115 (10th Cir. 1998).13