Opinion ID: 772982
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: presentation to the district court

Text: 17 The State of Idaho first argues that we may not consider this claim, that Zichko was denied ineffective assistance of counsel when attorney Brown did not appeal the initial conviction, because Zichko did not present it to the district court. It is true that  `[h]abeas claims that are not raised in the petition before the district court are not cognizable on appeal.'  Selam v. Warm Springs Tribal Corr. Facility, 134 F.3d 948, 952 (9th Cir. 1993) (quoting Belgarde v. Montana , 123 F.3d 1210, 1216 (9th Cir. 1997)). 18 Zichko did raise an ineffective assistance of counsel claim in the United States district court. The specific factual bases for that claim were that Attorney Brown: 19 threatened my family to get a bogus guilty plea . . . [;] [h]e did not check into exculpatory evidence . . . [;] [h]e entered a bogus stipulation in a child protection case that was somehow used in a child protection case . . . [;] [he] would not tell me just what it was that was `adjudicated to' at the 1987 criminal case trial, which put the sex offenders jacket on me[;] . . . [and he] was on medication for his terminal cancer and had mood-swings. 20 Zichko did not specifically identify the failure to appeal as one of the grounds for an ineffective assistance of counsel claim. However, we have a duty . . . to construe pro se pleadings liberally. Hamilton v. United States , 67 F.3d 761, 764 (9th Cir. 1995) (citing Hughes v. Rowe, 449 U.S. 5, 9 (1980) (quotation omitted)). This rule particularly applies to complaints and motions filed by pro se prisoners. See, e.g., United States v. Seesing, 234 F.3d 456, 462-63 (9th Cir. 2001). 21 Zichko did allege that his attorney had failed to communicate with him at times, a concern in which the FloresOrtega decision was grounded. 528 U.S. at 480 (holding that counsel has a constitutionally-imposed duty to consult with the defendant about an appeal in certain circumstances) (emphasis added). And elsewhere in the petition, Zichko claimed that his public defender said he would appeal the case but he did not, as he told a Presbyterian minister he would appeal . . . . Given our duty to read Zichko's petition liberally, these two statements are sufficient to establish that Zichko did raise the claim in his federal habeas petition. The district court could have looked to the entire petition to see if the ineffective assistance of counsel claim had any merit; had it done so, the court would have found the allegation that Brown failed to appeal. Cf. Selam, 134 F.3d at 952 (reaching the merits of the petitioner's claim because hedid raise his sexual abuse conviction in his habeas petition, although not as clearly as he might have) (emphasis in original). Zichko's ineffective assistance of counsel claim under Flores-Ortega was thus adequately presented to the district court.