Opinion ID: 755608
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Timing of the Procedural Default

Text: 24 Our recent opinion in Liegakos v. Cooke, 106 F.3d 1381 (7th Cir.1997), controls our analysis in the present case. Liegakos concerned the following facts: Prior to 1994, Wisconsin had allowed criminal defendants to present any constitutional contention on collateral attack regardless of whether they had presented the claim on direct appeal. See id. at 1384. In 1994, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin changed the rule and held that if an issue was not raised on direct appeal, petitioners must show a sufficient reason for this omission before the issue would be heard on collateral review. See id. Liegakos' conviction for murder was affirmed in 1987, and he collaterally challenged his conviction in 1994 without providing any reason why he omitted the specific challenge from his direct appeal. See id. The Wisconsin court held that the rule announced in 1994 applied to his case, and therefore he must have alleged some sufficient reason that he had omitted the specific challenge on direct review. See id. Because his petition did not allege any such reason, the Wisconsin court denied his petition. See id. 25 On habeas review, we held that the 1994 rule was not an adequate state ground barring our review. See id. at 1385. We considered the operative default not when Liegakos failed to allege a sufficient reason in his post-conviction petition, but instead at the time when Liegakos took his direct appeal and failed to assert the ground at issue. See id. We noted that it mattered not whether Liegakos actually relied on the old rule when formulating his direct appeal, stating that the inquiry was an objective one. See id. [A]ll that matter[s][is] what the announced rules were on the date of the act or omission said to work the forfeiture.... Whether or not Liegakos relied on [the old rule] in 1987, he could have presented his constitutional claims to the state courts between 1988 and 1993.... [T]he [1994 rule] is not an 'adequate' state ground for appeals briefed before its announcement. Id. 26 Moore's situation is similar to the one Liegakos faced. Prior to the state courts hearing his collateral attack, the state Supreme Court changed the rule governing collateral review. While before this change Moore could have challenged his habitual offender status for insufficient evidence, now he was required to show factual innocence--not just that the government had not proven its case, but that his prior convictions had not, in fact, been committed in the proper sequence for an habitual offender finding under state law. 27 Liegakos instructs us that when a rule changes the standard for collateral review based on the failure to raise a claim on direct appeal, the default occurs at the time of the direct appeal. For Moore, this holding means his default occurred at the time he filed his direct appeal and omitted the sufficiency challenge to the habitual offender charge. Thus his default occurred at the latest in 1984, years before the Indiana Supreme Court's Weatherford decision. Because at the time of his default, Moore could not have been deemed to be apprised of [the rule's] existence, Weatherford does not stand as an adequate state ground to bar to our review. Thus we may address the merits of his petition.