Opinion ID: 2998368
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The AEDPA Statute of Limitations

Text: The AEDPA provides that “[a] 1-year period of limitation shall apply to an application for a writ of habeas corpus by a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court.” 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1). This one-year period runs from the latest of the following: (1) the date the judgment becomes final or the expiration of time to seek review; (2) the date that the impediment to filing created by state action in violation of the Constitution is removed; (3) the date that the constitutional right asserted was recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review; or (4) the date on which the factual predicate of the claim could have been discovered by due diligence. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1). This one-year time limit will be tolled, however, during such time that the petitioner has state post-conviction or other collateral review with respect to the pertinent judgment pending in state court. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2). Balsewicz’s habeas petition was due one year from “the date on which the judgment became final by the conclusion of direct review or the expiration of the time for seeking such review.” 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1)(A). On direct appeal, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals affirmed Balsewicz’s conviction and issued a Remittitur to the Circuit Court on May 24, 1994. In Wisconsin, a direct challenge to a conviction becomes “final” the day the Remittitur issues. See Wis. Stat. § 809.26; State ex rel. Fuentes v. Wisconsin Court of Appeals, 593 N.W.2d 48, 51 (Wis. 1999). Balsewicz sought neither discretionary review of the Court of Ap- peals decision by the Wisconsin Supreme Court nor certiorari review by the United States Supreme Court. As a result, his conviction became final on August 22, 1994, allowing for the ninety days in which Balsewicz could have applied for certiorari. See Anderson v. Litscher, 281 F.3d 672, 675 (7th Cir. 2002). No. 04-2629 5 For prisoners whose convictions became final prior to the AEDPA’s enactment on April 24, 1997, however, there was a one-year grace period in which to file. Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U.S. 320, 336 (1997); Newell v. Hanks, 283 F.3d 827, 832 (7th Cir. 2002). Balsewicz’s conviction became final before the effective date of the AEDPA, so he had the benefit of the grace period and could have timely filed his habeas petition at any time until April 24, 1997. He did not, however, file his habeas petition until October 20, 2003, more than six years later. Also, from the date of the Remittitur, May 24, 1994, until the date that he filed his motion for post-conviction relief, February 5, 1999, Balsewicz did not pursue any challenge in state court that would have tolled the statute of limitations. Thus, his habeas petition was untimely. Even accepting the fact that the petition was untimely, Balsewicz argues that his constitutional claims of ineffective assistance of counsel merit consideration because he is “actually innocent” due to a mental disease or defect he suffered at the time of the crime. He proposes a “miscarriage of justice” exception to § 2244, similar to the “miscarriage of justice” exception found elsewhere in habeas jurisprudence that would allow him to assert this claim of “actual innocence.” See Dellinger v. Bowen, 301 F.3d 758, 767 (7th Cir. 2002) (discussing the miscarriage of justice exception that applies where a petitioner procedurally defaulted his federal claims in state court). As Balsewicz concedes, the AEDPA does not reference an exception to the limitations period predicated on a petitioner’s actual innocence for an initial habeas petition, see 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d), although the statute provides just such an exception for successive habeas petitions. See id. § 2244(b)(2). Neither the Supreme Court nor this Court has recognized a freestanding actual innocence exception to § 2244 that would allow a petitioner to overcome a failure to file the petition in a timely manner. Gildon v. Bowen, 384 F.3d 883, 6 No. 04-2629 887 (7th Cir. 2004). The courts that have acknowledged that the exception might be warranted under appropriate circumstances have declined to resolve the issue “unless the petitioner was able to demonstrate that he was actually innocent.” Souter v. Jones, 395 F.3d 577, 589 (6th Cir. 2005); see also Lucidore v. New York State Div. of Parole, 209 F.3d 107, 114 (2d Cir. 2000); Wyzykowski v. Dep’t of Corr., 226 F.3d 1213, 1218 (11th Cir. 2000). In order to demonstrate actual innocence in a collateral proceeding, a petitioner must present “new reliable evidence that was not presented at trial” and “show that it is more likely than not that no reasonable juror would have found [him] guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.” Schlup v. Delo, 513 U.S. 298, 299, 327-28 (1995). In his briefs and affidavits, Balsewicz has presented evidence not introduced at trial to the effect that over the course of his life, he has heard voices threatening to kill him, suffered from hallucinations in which he saw snakes and spiders, set his own house on fire to avoid those spiders, severely beaten a cat he believed to be inhabited by a demon, and killed the victim believing him to be a demon. Taken together, Balsewicz argues, this new evidence reveals that Balsewicz suffered from a mental disease or defect at the time of the crime, thus negating the intent to kill required for homicide under Wisconsin law. See Wis. Stat. § 940.01(1)(a). This argument fails. First, the Milwaukee County Circuit Court, in a decision affirmed by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, retrospectively concluded that Balsewicz was competent at the time of the April 1994 trial. Second, even assuming that Balsewicz in fact suffered from a mental defect, it would not negate the intent element of first-degree homicide. See Wis. Stat. § 971.15(3). As the Wisconsin Supreme Court has held, mental disease or defect is an affirmative defense to “responsibility”—it relieves the person of the sanctions for criminal conduct. It does No. 04-2629 7 not relieve the person already found guilty in the first phase of the factual finding of criminal conduct. Rather, the successful assertion of the affirmative defense in phase two results in a noncriminal-sanction disposition. Thus, it is clear that phase two is not determinative of guilt in the sense of criminal conduct but only determinative of the disposition of the defendant in terms of the treatment to be afforded one who was insane at the time the guilty conduct was performed. State v. Koput, 418 N.W.2d 804, 811-12 (Wis. 1988). So, the mental responsibility phase of the bifurcated trial “is dispositional in nature and has nothing to do with whether the defendant is guilty.” Id. at 812. Balsewicz’s success on a properly entered plea of not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect, then, would have affected only the nature and location of his custody, not his actual innocence under Wisconsin law. As previously recognized, this Court must follow the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s interpretation of this exact point of Wisconsin law. Leach v. Kolb, 911 F.2d 1249, 1256 (7th Cir. 1990) (citing Hicks v. Feiock, 485 U.S. 624 (1988)).