Opinion ID: 39680
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Pete Ronald Martinez

Text: Pete Ronald Martinez was indicted for the felony offense of aggravated robbery. He pleaded guilty to aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon on January 22, 1998. The state trial court found sufficient evidence substantiating Martinez’s guilt and placed him on ten years deferred adjudication community supervision. Martinez violated the terms of his community supervision, and on August 28, 2000, the state trial court adjudicated Martinez guilty pursuant to his earlier guilty plea. The state trial court sentenced him to forty-five years imprisonment. Martinez filed a motion for a new trial in September 2000. The trial court denied the motion for a new trial, and Martinez appealed, complaining of the effectiveness of his attorney at the original plea hearing. The court of appeals dismissed the appeal in October 2001 for lack of jurisdiction, reasoning that Martinez’s ineffective assistance claim had to be raised in an appeal from the imposition of deferred adjudication probation.5 Martinez filed a state writ of habeas corpus in July 2002. The Texas Court of Criminal appeals denied the application without written order. Martinez filed his federal writ petition 5 See discussion Part II.A infra. 5 on December 5, 2002, raising issues relating to his guilty plea. Unlike the magistrate judge’s determination in Caldwell’s case, the federal district court concluded that AEDPA’s one-year statute of limitations began to run from the judgment adjudicating guilt, entered after the trial court revoked Martinez’s deferred adjudication community supervision. Thus, according to the district court’s order, the AEDPA one-year limitations period began to run thirty days after the assessment of the forty-five year sentence. However, the district court found that Martinez’s petition was nevertheless time-barred since it concluded that Martinez’s state court application for habeas relief did not toll AEDPA’s statute of limitations.6 Martinez timely filed his notice of appeal. The district court granted Martinez a certificate of appealability on whether his conviction became final after the expiration of the time for appealing his guilty plea and the deferred adjudication, or if his conviction became final after the expiration of time for appealing the state court’s judgment adjudicating guilt. 6 Because under the district court’s order, Martinez’s federal habeas petition would have been time barred regardless of when AEDPA’s statute of limitations began to run, respondent argues that Martinez’s claim is moot. However, in Foreman v. Dretke, we held that a timely appeal to state court, dismissed for want of jurisdiction, tolls AEDPA’s statute of limitations. 383 F.3d 336, 340 (5th Cir. 2004). Therefore, whether the statute of limitations began to run at the time the order deferring adjudication was issued or at the time Martinez’s guilt was adjudicated is outcome determinative in Martinez’s case. 6