Court Opinion

ID: 9445422
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:28:41.66247+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:15.651164
License: Public Domain

JAMES ALGER FEE, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
This case is completely unique on its facts. No previous precedent is controlling.
The salient point in this case is not the utter unsubstantiality of the allegations of the petitions, but the course of these two petitions, virtually identical in form and content, praying release of Simpson on habeas corpus. One of these was lodged in the Supreme Court of California. Its twin was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. The Supreme Court of California, who had intimate knowledge of the whole record owing to the previous automatic appeal, dismissed the petition. The District Court held the twin petition in abeyance pending grant or denial of certiorari to the California Court by the United States Supreme Court. It is set up in the petitions that perjured testimony was used by the *892State in the main trial, but the Supreme Court of California had theretofore accepted this testimony as true. People v. Simpson, 43 Cal.2d 553, 275 P.2d 31. There is an allegation of perjury coerced by a Deputy District Attorney, a variation of which is given in each petition. Obviously, petitioner does not claim to be present at the time. However, he suggests no one else who will testify to the fact. Moreover, simply because the Supreme Court did not mention the matter in the published opinion is of no consequence. The state court had again accepted this questioned testimony as true. The allegations of neither petition would be sufficient to require a trial court to grant a new trial. In the light of the complete record, the Supreme Court of the state found no basis for disturbing the conviction on petition for habeas corpus.
The United States Supreme Court denied certiorari to the Supreme Court of California, the petition for which was based upon the denial by the latter of a petition for habeas corpus, virtually identical with the one filed in the District Court. Thereafter, the twin petition for habeas corpus was denied by the District Court, and this matter is now before us upon appeal.
The judges of the Supreme Court of California are bound by the United States Constitution, as is the District Court and as we ourselves are. It cannot be assumed that these judges violated their duty or the rights of this defendant. Any question in this regard arising from the denial of a virtually identical petition could have been raised before the Supreme Court of the United States upon petition for certiorari. The Supreme Court of the United States disregarded the matter alleged in the petition before them, apparently owing to the previous complete review of the trial by the state court. The assumed error was as patent then as now.
It would be presumptuous for this Court to order the District Court to take testimony upon the same petition which the highest California court has denied, especially since certiorari to that tribunal was refused by the Supreme Court of the federal system.