Opinion ID: 202724
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Barresi v. Maloney

Text: 16 In Barresi, we held that, where a claim has not been abandoned before the state's highest court, the exhaustion analysis includes an examination of the `backdrop against which [] later filings [must] be viewed,' 296 F.3d at 52 (second alteration in original) (quoting Scarpa v. DuBois, 38 F.3d 1, 7 (1st Cir.1994)), and that backdrop includes the pleadings and filings submitted . . . to lower state courts, id. 6 Barresi also recognized the continued validity of the four corners rule, see Mele, 850 F.2d at 821-23, and held that the backdrop materials could only be consulted under certain circumstances. 296 F.3d at 52. 17 At that time, we did not specify what those limited circumstances might be. However, in Barresi itself, the ALOFAR at issue included claims regarding the right to confront adverse witnesses and due process, both of which are claims that may be grounded either in state law or federal law or both, and cited state court cases that relied upon federal law. Id. at 53-54. Therefore, we found that Barresi's ALOFAR minimally satisfied the exhaustion requirement. As part of the explanation for that conclusion, we noted that the same claims had been raised in the intermediate appellate brief, where Barresi had directly cited federal precedents. Id. at 55-56. 18 We have subsequently said that the Barresi backdrop rule applies only in cases where the ALOFAR (or other petition to a state supreme court) was ambiguous about the federal nature of a claim, as it was in Barresi. See Josselyn v. Dennehy, 475 F.3d 1, 3-4 (1st Cir.2007) (noting that Barresi's backdrop principle applies when there is ambiguity in the ALOFAR regarding the federal nature of the claim); Goodrich, 448 F.3d at 48 (reviewing the petitioner's lower court briefs as part of the exhaustion analysis, because the ALOFAR relied primarily on state cases, but was somewhat ambiguous about the source of the legal claim). 19 Because this case involves an ALOFAR that was not ambiguous, the Barresi backdrop principle, assuming it is still valid, provides no assistance to Clements. We add that qualifier about the continuing validity of the backdrop principle because of the Supreme Court's decision in Baldwin v. Reese. 20 In Baldwin, 541 U.S. at 32, 124 S.Ct. 1347, the Court held that, where a federal claim was not included in a petition, the exhaustion analysis could not encompass materials beyond the petition or brief filed with the state's highest court. In that case, the defendant had filed a petition seeking discretionary appellate review by the Oregon Supreme Court and had argued some claims based on federal law and other claims based only on state law. The defendant later filed a habeas petition and argued that at least one of the claims which was presented on state law grounds could be deemed exhausted because a review of the intermediate appellate court opinion showed that he had made federal law arguments on that claim below. Pursuant to Oregon's procedural rules, Oregon's Supreme Court justices had access to the lower court opinions in cases for which a petition was filed, but their rules did not require them to review such opinions. Id. at 31, 124 S.Ct. 1347. Rather, the rules required a party seeking review to assert all claims in the appellate brief. 21 At the outset of its analysis, the Supreme Court noted its assumption that the defendant's petition by itself did not properly alert the Oregon Supreme Court to the federal nature of the claim. Id. at 30, 124 S.Ct. 1347. 7 The Court then reasoned that, in such a context, permitting the exhaustion inquiry to include a review of the lower court opinion simply because the state court judges had an opportunity to review it would effectively mean that those judges must read the lower court opinions — for otherwise they would forfeit the State's opportunity to decide that federal claim in the first instance. Id. at 31, 124 S.Ct. 1347. The Supreme Court found that burden incompatible with the considerations of federal-state comity that the exhaustion requirement seeks to promote. Id. at 32, 124 S.Ct. 1347. Therefore, the Court held that ordinarily a state prisoner does not `fairly present' a claim to a state court if that court must read beyond a petition or a brief ... that does not alert it to the presence of a federal claim in order to find material ... that does so. Id. 22 The Barresi approach to the exhaustion analysis may be incompatible with Baldwin. Barresi permits us to consider lower court pleadings or opinions where the state court did not (and was not required to) consider them itself. However, as we have explained, we subsequently limited the Barresi backdrop principle to cases in which there is an ambiguity in the ALOFAR about the federal nature of the claim. Whether Baldwin forecloses consideration of backdrop materials even in cases of ambiguous petitions is a question we need not decide here because Clements' joint venture claim is unmistakably couched only in state law terms. We therefore reserve the issue of the continuing validity of Barresi's backdrop principle for a case in which it is directly raised.