Court Opinion

ID: 9965860
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-05-03 17:00:47.534978+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:25:48.030004
License: Public Domain

FOR PUBLICATION

     UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
          FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

DOUGLAS GORDON BRADFORD,                        No. 21-55038

                 Petitioner-Appellant,            D.C. No.
                                               2:17-cv-05756-
    v.                                            JAK-JC

DANIEL PARAMO, Warden,
                                                  OPINION
                 Respondent-Appellee.

         Appeal from the United States District Court
            for the Central District of California
         John A. Kronstadt, District Judge, Presiding

          Argued and Submitted November 15, 2021
                    Pasadena, California

                       Filed May 3, 2024

     Before: Marsha S. Berzon and Johnnie B. Rawlinson,
      Circuit Judges, and John Antoon II,* District Judge.

                 Opinion by Judge Rawlinson;
    Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge Antoon

*
 The Honorable John Antoon II, United States District Judge for the
Middle District of Florida, sitting by designation.
2                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO

                          SUMMARY**

                         Habeas Corpus

    The panel reversed the district court’s denial of Douglas
Bradford’s habeas corpus petition challenging his first-
degree murder conviction, and remanded with instructions
to grant a conditional writ.
    This “cold case” culminated in a conviction, thirty-five
years after a murder, based entirely on circumstantial
evidence after the trial judge excluded exculpatory evidence
of another viable suspect, Joseph Giarrusso, who dined with
the victim on the evening of the murder and was the last
known person to see her alive.
    Applying the standard of review required by the
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, the
panel held that in light of Holmes v. South Carolina, 547
U.S. 319 (2006), the decision of the California Court of
Appeal was both contrary to and an unreasonable application
of clearly established Supreme Court law. The panel held
that the decision was also based on an unreasonable
determination of facts.
    First, the California Court of Appeal did not
acknowledge that under Holmes, the application of a state
evidentiary rule to exclude defense evidence may violate the
federal Constitution. Instead, the state court held that
“[b]ecause the exclusion was consistent with the rules of

**
  This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has
been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     3

evidence, there was no constitutional violation.” The state
court thereby misapprehended the constitutional rule.
    Second, the California Court of Appeal provided reasons
for discounting the Giarrusso evidence, but never weighed
its probative value against any “risk of harassment,
prejudice, or confusion of the issues,” as is required under
Holmes.
    Third, the California Court of Appeal’s conclusion that
the trial court properly considered that Giarrusso “did not in
any way” match a witness’s physical description of the
suspect was an unreasonable determination of the facts, and
one that affected the California Court of Appeal’s ability to
access the relevance and probative value of the Giarrusso
evidence.
    As the California Court of Appeal issued no ruling with
respect to prejudice, the panel applied the actual-prejudice
standard set forth in Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619
(1993), and concluded that the errors likely had a substantial
and injurious effect on the verdict.
    Concurring in part and dissenting in part, District Judge
Antoon agreed with the majority that the state trial court
improperly precluded Bradford from introducing evidence
regarding Giarrusso, but disagreed with the majority on its
determination that the error had substantial and injurious
effect or influence in determining the jury’s verdict. He
would conclude that the error was harmless and affirm the
district court’s denial of habeas relief.
4                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO

                         COUNSEL

Alan S. Yockelson (argued), Law Office of Alan S.
Yockelson, San Diego, California, for Petitioner-Appellant.
Nikhil Cooper (argued), Deputy Attorney General;
Stephanie C. Brenan, Supervising Deputy Attorney General;
Susan Sullivan Pithey, Senior Assistant Attorney General;
Lance E. Winters, Chief Assistant Attorney General; Rob
Bonta, California Attorney General; California Attorney
General’s Office, Los Angeles, California, for Respondent-
Appellee.

                         OPINION

RAWLINSON, Circuit Judge:

    This “cold case” culminated in a conviction thirty-five
years after a murder, based entirely on circumstantial
evidence. Unfortunately, the trial judge erroneously
excluded powerful exculpatory evidence of another viable
suspect, namely the individual who dined with the victim on
the evening of the murder and was the last known person to
see her alive. Under the compelling facts of this case, we are
persuaded that this is one of the rare instances when the state
court’s determination that there was no constitutional error
in excluding third-party evidence was unreasonable.
I.    BACKGROUND
     A. Facts
    In 2014, Douglas Bradford (Bradford) was convicted of
the 1979 murder of Lynne Knight (Knight).
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                             5

    1. The Murder
    On August 30, 1979, at 3:00 a.m., Knight’s neighbor,
Richard Rolleri (Rolleri), was awakened by a scream. He
looked through the window, saw a light go out at Knight’s
home, and noticed that the gate to the property was “wide
open.” Moments later, Rolleri “saw a guy . . . [w]alking
across the street,” and decided to check on Knight. When
Knight failed to respond, Rolleri called the police. The
responding officers discovered Knight’s body lying on a bed
with multiple stab wounds and a garrote1 beneath her body.
Next to Knight’s body was a broken clasp to a necklace and
a gold medallion, but the rest of the necklace was never
found. An invitation for Knight’s sister’s wedding was seen
crumpled up “in or near a trash can.”
    Rolleri described the man he saw walking away as “a
possible white male, approximately 5'9", with “curly Afro-
type dark hair, wearing a beige jacket and pants” and
“carrying a small black unknown-type bag.” With this
description, officers surveyed the area and discovered
Gerardo Juarez (Juarez), approximately a half-mile away.
    2. Investigation of Juarez
    Officers described Juarez as “extremely nervous” and
“very jittery” during their conversation. They noticed “what
appeared to be fresh, moist blood on [Juarez’s] jacket” and
abrasions on his knuckles. When asked about the blood,
Juarez explained that he had been mad and hit a telephone

1
 A garrote is a device used to accomplish strangulation. One form of a
garrote “is a length of wire with wooden handles at the ends, held by the
executioner.”           Garrote,       Britannica          Encyclopedia
https://academic.eb.com/levels/collegiate/article/garrote/36121      (last
visited July 29, 2022).
6                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO

pole. As questioning continued, other officers transported
Rolleri to the scene. Upon his arrival, Rolleri faced Juarez
and expressed uncertainty about whether Juarez was the
person he observed. But once officers directed Juarez to turn
his back, Rolleri immediately said: “That looks like the
guy.” He added that Juarez’s jacket color, pants color, and
hair were “very similar” to that of the person he saw leaving
the location of the murder.
    Juarez was taken to the station, where a criminalist took
his jacket to compare its stains to the blood at the crime
scene. The criminalist ultimately determined that the spots
and stains on Juarez’s clothing were not blood. In a follow-
up interview 24 years later, Rolleri recalled that “upon
reflection immediately afterward,” he realized that Juarez
“was too small to be the person he saw running away” and
that “the only similarity” was his “coat and perhaps the
general look of his hair.” “Rolleri emphasized that he never
saw the face of the person running away and therefore would
not be able to conclusively identify this person.” During the
same follow-up interview, “Rolleri said that he recalled the
events surrounding Knight’s murder ‘like it was yesterday.’”
Rolleri related that after he had called the police on the night
of the murder, he waited at his window and noticed at a
nearby intersection the same “beat up” light blue Volkswagen
that had been parked outside Knight’s home before he went
to bed.
    3. Investigation of Joseph Giarrusso (Giarrusso)
   Herlinda, Rolleri’s wife, stated that Knight told her she
was having a friend over for dinner on the night of the
murder. According to Herlinda, Knight stated that this friend
had previously “punched her in the mouth,” but “the incident
had been a misunderstanding.” On the evening of the
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                                7

murder, between 6:00 and 7:00 p.m., Knight came to the
Rolleris’ home to borrow cooking utensils, at which time
Herlinda looked out her rear window and saw the man she
assumed Knight was entertaining. She described the man as
“white,” “a little older than Knight,” and “on the heavy side
with dark hair that was balding in front.”2
    During an interview with detectives, Giarrusso stated
that he had a dinner date with Knight hours before she was
murdered. He related that he arrived at Knight’s home at
approximately 8:30 p.m. and left for his girlfriend’s home at
approximately 11:50 p.m. Giarrusso informed detectives
that he and Knight had lived together for more than two
years, “broke up,” but remained “very, very, very close
friends.” When asked if he had intercourse with her the night
of the murder, he replied: “Never. I have not made love to
Lynne Knight for at least three years . . . [t]wo and a half.”
Upon learning of Knight’s murder, Giarrusso described
himself as distraught. He also offered to do whatever he
could to aid detectives in their investigation and consented to
a full search of his car and home.
    During the interview, Giarrusso indicated that he knew
what a garrote was, describing a garrote as “piano wire with
two handles” that is “[p]laced around the neck,” resulting in
“strangulation or severing of the jugular veins.” Although
he denied ever making a garrote, he explained that if he were
to make one, “I would make one big enough to loop around
the individual’s neck,” whether it be “two feet” or “18

2
  By contrast, Bradford was 6'1", 155 pounds, 27 years old (a year
younger than Knight), and had a full head of brown hair at the time of
the murder. Giarrusso was 5'9", 164 pounds, and 31 years old (3 years
older than Knight), at the time of the murder, and according to Herlinda
was “balding.”
8                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

inches, I have no idea.” Giarrusso also told detectives that
he had served in the military as an electronic technician
during the Vietnam War.
    When detectives interviewed Giarrusso’s girlfriend,
Marcia Collado (Collado), she told detectives that while
Giarrusso had his own apartment, he frequently stayed with
her. She responded that on the night of the murder, Giarrusso
returned from Knight’s house sometime after 11:00 p.m.
They discussed his evening with Knight, and eventually
went to sleep on her waterbed. She assured detectives that
Giarrusso did not leave the house until the next morning,
explaining that she is a light sleeper and would have noticed
even the slightest movement on the waterbed. Both
Giarrusso and Collado agreed to take a polygraph test. The
polygraph results were inconclusive for Giarrusso, but
reflected that Collado “was not lying on any of the questions
asked of her.” Long after Giarrusso passed away in 1994,
Collado maintained that she was “100% certain” of the facts
regarding his whereabouts.
    4. Investigation of Bradford
    Bradford’s name came up in several interviews with
Knight’s close associates. When asked if Knight told him
about “trouble with any of the men in her life,” Knight’s
boyfriend of five weeks responded that Knight “thought that
Doug was getting too serious.” When the same question was
asked of Knight’s “good friend” Judy Bradley, she stated that
a year or so prior, Knight told her about a man named Doug
Bradford who was “serious.” Knight’s friend Mary Coburn
(Coburn) knew of eight men Knight was dating, but
specifically described Bradford as “sending her roses and the
roses would appear on the table in her apartment.” Coburn
also recalled Bradford buying Knight a necklace. Giarrusso
                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO                         9

recalled trouble between Bradford and Knight, and
particularly described an incident in which Bradford showed
up at Knight’s home and found her with another man. He
reported that Bradford “whipped the screen door off, made a
very horrendous scene and hurt Lynne’s emotional feelings
very, very much, to the point she called [Giarrusso] up.”
Giarrusso said Bradford left after “20 or 30 minutes of
carrying on, calling her a slut, a tramp” and accusing her of
giving him a sexually transmitted disease.3 Knight’s co-
worker Rita Retort also mentioned Bradford, recalling that
Knight told Bradford she did not want him to come over
again unexpectedly because “it was embarrassing to her”
that he had seen her with another man. Rolleri likewise
recalled an incident in which Bradford had “found Knight in
her apartment entertaining another boyfriend” and “angrily
left Knight’s apartment.” When Rolleri later asked her about
this incident, Knight “just laughed it off” and she “expressed
no concern about the incident.”
    Detective Hilton interviewed Bradford, who maintained
that he was sailing a boat the night of the murder from 10:00
p.m. to around 1:30 a.m. When asked by Detective Hilton to
show him the boat, Bradford refused. Bradford said he dated
Knight for several months until they decided in early June,
1979, to no longer see each other. He acknowledged that he
had gone to Knight’s home to return some items to her the
day after they broke up, and saw a male there, which caused
him to become angry and make several unkind statements.
Bradford identified this visit as the last time he saw Knight.

3
  Our colleague in dissent notes that Giarrusso “only relay[ed] what
Knight told him.” See Dissenting Opinion, p. 51, n.4. However, it is
undisputed that Giarrusso reported this incident to detectives.
10                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO

     Detectives later showed Rolleri’s brother, who lived in
the garage adjoining Knight’s home, a photograph of
Bradford and asked when he last saw him. Rolleri’s brother
reported to the police that he saw Bradford approximately
one month prior to Knight’s death, walking on the sidewalk
in front of her apartment.4
    Detectives suspended the murder investigation in 1982
for lack of sufficient evidence. After the case was reopened
in 2000, the police discovered new evidence, including
Bradford’s stalking of a girlfriend following their 2009
breakup, and picture-hanging wire found at Bradford’s
mother’s home 28 years after the murder “of the same class
as” the wire used to create the garrote that was found beneath
Knight after the murder. As the government concedes, the
case against Bradford was entirely circumstantial. There
was no eyewitness identification, no fingerprints, no DNA
evidence, no video surveillance evidence, and no confession.
     B. Procedural History
     1. The State Trial Court’s Exclusion of Third-Party
        Culpability Evidence
    Before trial, the prosecution moved to exclude evidence
related to Giarrusso and Juarez due to insufficient connection
to the murder. This motion encompassed evidence of
Giarrusso’s presence at Knight’s home on the night of the
murder. Citing People v. Hall, 41 Cal.3d 826 (1986) (in
bank),5 the prosecution argued that the evidence failed to

4
  This approximate date of July is not necessarily inconsistent with
Bradford’s statement that he last visited Knight in June.
5
 In Hall, the California Supreme Court considered the application of
California Evidence Code § 352 to third-party culpability evidence.
Section 352 permits trial courts to exclude evidence “if its probative
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                             11

raise a reasonable doubt as to Petitioner’s guilt. The state
trial court agreed with the prosecution, and excluded the
evidence on the basis that there was “nothing to connect
[Giarrusso] there at the time of the perpetration of the
crime.”
     Following this ruling, and during its opening statement
at trial, the prosecution declared: “Now, what’s very clear is
that for several nights leading up to the murder there was one
night when Lynne was home by herself. One night only.
And that was the night that she was murdered.” This
statement would have been directly contradicted if evidence
regarding Giarrusso had not been excluded. Bradford
challenged the prosecution’s statement as misleading the
jury. Bradford argued that it was important for the jury to
know that Knight was not alone on the night of the murder.
The prosecution responded that who Knight had dinner with
that evening was irrelevant, and contended that if the court
were to find this fact relevant, the jury needed an instruction
that “the person that Lynne Knight had dinner with is not a
suspect in this case and you are not to draw any inferences
that he was involved in the homicide.” The court determined
that the prosecution’s statement was not inaccurate because

value is substantially outweighed by the probability that its admission
will (a) necessitate undue consumption of time or (b) create substantial
danger of undue prejudice, of confusing the issues, or of misleading the
jury.” Cal. Evid. Code § 352. The California Supreme Court held that
“[t]o be admissible, the third party evidence need not show ‘substantial
proof of probability’ that the third person committed the act; it need only
be capable of raising a reasonable doubt of defendant’s guilt.” Hall, 41
Cal.3d at 833. The Court clarified, however, that “evidence of mere
motive or opportunity to commit the crime in another person, without
more, will not suffice to raise a reasonable doubt about a defendant’s
guilt: there must be direct or circumstantial evidence linking the third
person to the actual perpetration of the crime.” Id.
12                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO

Knight was alone “during the relevant time period.”
Ultimately, a jury convicted Bradford of first degree murder,
and he was sentenced to 26 years to life in prison.
     2. The Affirmance
    The California Court of Appeal affirmed Bradford’s
conviction. The appellate court concluded that the trial court
did not abuse its discretion in excluding evidence related to
Juarez because “[his] proximity to the murder scene meant
that Juarez had, at most, the opportunity to commit the
crime,” which was not sufficient to constitute third-party
culpability evidence required to be presented to the jury
under Hall. The appellate court remarked that “[t]he only
other evidence linking Juarez to the murder was [Rolleri’s]
statement that Juarez ‘possibly could have been’ the person
leaving Knight’s apartment.” The appellate court deemed
Rolleri’s identification unreliable because it “was based
entirely on seeing him from behind and was later recanted.”
The court added that even if Rolleri’s identification could
have been construed as linking Juarez to the actual
perpetration of the crime, “it is of such minimal probative
value that the trial court did not abuse its discretion in
excluding it under [California Evidence Code] § 352 given
the absence of any other evidence connecting Juarez to
Knight’s murder.”6
    The Court of Appeal also concluded that the trial court
did not err in excluding the third-party culpability evidence
related to Giarrusso “because it reflects, at best, that
Giarrusso had the opportunity to commit Knight’s murder”
but “opportunity is not enough.” The Court of Appeal

6
  Because Juarez was ultimately cleared as a suspect, we do not further
discuss the exclusion of evidence related to him.
                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO                            13

determined that the trial court “properly considered that
Giarrusso did not in any way match the neighbor’s physical
description of the person the neighbor saw leaving Knight’s
apartment.”7 In addition, the court concluded that
Giarrusso’s knowledge of the side entrance to Knight’s
apartment, his knowledge of what a garrote was, that he had
a bandage on his thumb a few days after the murder, and that
he once hit Knight while they dated did not forge a
sufficiently strong link between Giarrusso and Knight’s
murder to constitute third-party culpability evidence under
Hall.
    Ultimately, the state appellate court held that “[b]ecause
the [trial court’s] exclusion [of the evidence concerning
Giarrusso] was consistent with the rules of evidence, there
was no constitutional violation.” The California Supreme
Court summarily denied Bradford’s petition for review.
    3. Federal Court Proceedings
    Bradford filed a Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus in
the United States District Court for the Central District of
California, asserting that the state courts unreasonably
applied Holmes v. South Carolina, 547 U.S. 319 (2006).
    The magistrate judge concluded that the exclusion of
third-party culpability evidence relating to Juarez and
Giarrusso did not involve an unreasonable application of
clearly established federal law, and agreed with the state
appellate court’s reasoning. The magistrate judge
emphasized that evidence of opportunity to commit the

7
  As discussed, the record reflected that Giarrusso’s hair matched
Rolleri’s description of the suspect, his height matched one of Rolleri’s
initial descriptions, and Herlinda’s description of the person she
observed dining with Knight.
14                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

offense “must be coupled with substantial evidence tending
to directly connect that person with the actual commission of
the offense.” (citations and emphasis omitted).
   The district court adopted the magistrate judge’s report
and recommendation, denied Bradford’s petition and
dismissed the action with prejudice.
    The district court granted a certificate of appealability,
see 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c), on a single issue.

         Whether the California courts’ rejection of
         petitioner’s challenge to the exclusion of
         third party culpability evidence regarding Joe
         Giarrusso was contrary to, or involved an
         unreasonable application of, clearly
         established Federal law, as determined by the
         United States Supreme Court.

     Bradford filed a timely appeal to this Court.8
II. STANDARDS OF REVIEW
    We review de novo a district court’s denial of a state
prisoner’s federal habeas corpus petition. Smith v. Ryan, 813
F.3d 1175, 1178-79 (9th Cir. 2016), as corrected.
    Because Bradford filed his habeas petition after the 1996
effective date of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death
Penalty Act (AEDPA), the AEDPA standard governs our
review. See id. at 1179. Under AEDPA, a federal court may
only grant habeas corpus relief when the state court’s ruling
was (1) “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable
application of, clearly established Federal law as determined

8
  We deny Bradford’s request to expand the certificate of appealability to
include uncertified issues.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     15

by the Supreme Court of the United States,” or was
(2) “based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in
light of the evidence presented in the State court
proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1), (2). See Williams v.
Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 402-03 (2000). Although we give
deference to the state court decision, deference does not
equate to abdication. See Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S.
322, 340 (2003); accord Boyer v. Belleque, 659 F.3d 957,
965-66 (9th Cir. 2011) (“AEDPA requires that we treat the
decisions of state courts with deference, but it does not
insulate them totally from our review when federal
constitutional rights are implicated. . .”).
    We review the last reasoned decision of state courts. See
Curiel v. Miller, 830 F.3d 864, 869 (9th Cir. 2016). In this
case, the last reasoned decision is the California Court of
Appeal decision on direct appeal.
III. DISCUSSION
   A. Unreasonable Application of Clearly Established
      Federal Law
    For purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1), clearly
established law refers to “the governing legal principle or
principles set forth by the Supreme Court at the time the state
court renders its decision.” Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U.S. 63,
71-72 (2003) (citations omitted).
    A state court’s decision is contrary to clearly established
federal law “if the state court applies a rule that contradicts
the governing law set forth in [Supreme Court] cases or if
the state court confronts a set of facts that are materially
indistinguishable from a decision of [the Supreme Court] and
nevertheless arrives at a result different from [Supreme
16                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO

Court] precedent.” Id. at 73 (citations and internal quotation
marks omitted).
    “A state court’s decision is an ‘unreasonable application’
of clearly established federal law if the state court identifies
the correct governing legal principle from the Supreme
Court’s decisions but unreasonably applies that principle to
the facts of the prisoner’s case.” Norris v. Morgan, 622 F.3d
1276, 1289 (9th Cir. 2010) (citations, alteration, and internal
question marks omitted).
    In this case, the clearly established federal law concerns
third-party culpability evidence. Third-party culpability
evidence is some of the most powerful evidence a criminal
defendant can offer to the jury. If believed, reasonable doubt
is almost a foregone conclusion. See Lunbery v. Hornbeak,
605 F.3d 754, 762 (9th Cir. 2010). Exclusion of such
evidence is often a considerable blow to the defense. See id.9
    In Holmes, the Supreme Court considered when the
exclusion of third-party culpability evidence violates a
criminal defendant’s constitutional right to present a defense.
Holmes addressed an appeal from a criminal defendant who
had been convicted of murder and related crimes. See 547
U.S. at 322. At trial, the prosecution relied heavily on
forensic evidence. The defendant attempted to refute that
evidence by presenting evidence that another man was in the
victim’s neighborhood on the morning of the assault and
either acknowledged defendant’s innocence or admitted to
committing the crimes himself. See id. at 323. The trial court
excluded this third-party culpability evidence on the basis of
a South Carolina Supreme Court case holding that third-

9
  A statement to this effect by the investigating detective regarding the
lack of forensic evidence was excluded by the trial court.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                      17

party culpability evidence “is admissible if it raises a
reasonable inference or presumption as to the defendant’s
own innocence, but is not admissible if it merely casts a bare
suspicion upon another or raises a conjectural inference as to
the commission of the crime by another.” Id. at 323-24
(citation, alterations, and internal quotation marks omitted).
On appeal, the South Carolina Supreme Court found no error
in the exclusion of the third-party culpability evidence,
concluding that “where there is strong evidence of [a
defendant’s] guilt, . . . the proffered evidence about a third
party’s alleged guilt does not raise a reasonable inference as
to the [defendant’s] own innocence.” Id. at 324 (citation
omitted).
     On review, the United States Supreme Court rejected the
reasoning of the South Carolina courts, because that
reasoning permitted a court to focus on “the strength of the
prosecution’s case” rather than “the probative value or the
potential adverse effects of admitting the defense evidence
of third-party guilt.” Id. at 329. The Supreme Court
determined that the South Carolina “rule seem[ed] to call for
little, if any, examination of the credibility of the
prosecution’s witnesses or the reliability of its evidence.” Id.
    The Supreme Court characterized the issue to be decided
as “whether a criminal defendant’s federal constitutional
rights are violated by an evidence rule under which the
defendant may not introduce proof of third-party guilt if the
prosecution has introduced . . . evidence that, if believed,
strongly supports a guilty verdict.” Id. at 321. The
18                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

prosecution presented strong forensic evidence of the
defendant’s guilt, including:

        • the defendant’s palm print, found above
            the interior door knob of the victim’s
            home
        • fibers consistent with a black sweatshirt
            belonging to the defendant, found on the
            victim’s sheets
        • matching blue fibers, found on the
            defendant’s jeans and the victim’s
            nightgown
        • consistent fibers found on the victim’s
            nightgown and the defendant’s underwear
        • a mixture of the victim’s and the
            defendant’s DNA, found          on   the
            defendant’s underwear
        • a mixture of the victim’s and the
            defendant’s blood,      found   on   the
            defendant’s tank top.

See id. at 322.
    The prosecution also introduced evidence that the
defendant had been spotted in the vicinity of the victim’s
home at the approximate time of the murder. See id.
    The defendant sought to introduce evidence that another
man had committed the crime. Specifically, the defendant
“proffered several witnesses who placed [the other man] in
the victim’s neighborhood on the morning of the [crime],”
and other witnesses “who testified that [the other man] had
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     19

either acknowledged that [the defendant] was innocent or
had actually admitted to committing the crimes.” Id. at 323
(citation and internal quotation marks omitted).
    Despite the strong evidence presented by the prosecution,
the Supreme Court focused on the constitutional guarantee
to criminal defendants of “a meaningful opportunity to
present a complete defense.” Id. at 324 (citation and internal
quotation marks omitted). The Court explained that this
constitutional right is impermissibly “abridged by evidence
rules that infringe upon a weighty interest of the accused and
are arbitrary or disproportionate to the purposes they are
designed to serve.” Id. at 324-25 (citation, alteration, and
internal quotation marks omitted). Holmes recognized that
the third-party culpability evidence, to be admissible, need
not be sufficient to sustain a guilty verdict against the third
party. It need only have the potential, considered along with
other evidence in the record, to raise a reasonable doubt as to
the guilt of the defendant. See id. at 327.
    The Supreme Court identified the South Carolina rule as
one that infringed upon the constitutional right of a criminal
defendant to present a complete defense to the jury. The
Court described the logic of the South Carolina rule as:
“Where (1) it is clear that only one person was involved in
the commission of a particular crime and (2) there is strong
evidence that the defendant was the perpetrator, it follows
that evidence of third-party guilt must be weak.” Id. at 330.
The Supreme Court continued:

       But this logic depends on an accurate
       evaluation of the prosecution’s proof, and the
       true strength of the prosecution’s proof
       cannot be assessed without considering
       challenges to the reliability of the
20                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

       prosecution’s evidence. Just because the
       prosecution’s evidence, if credited, would
       provide strong support for a guilty verdict, it
       does not follow that evidence of third-party
       guilt has only a weak logical connection to the
       central issues in the case. And where the
       credibility of the prosecution’s witnesses or
       the reliability of its evidence is not conceded,
       the strength of the prosecution’s case cannot
       be assessed without making the sort of factual
       findings that have traditionally been reserved
       for the trier of fact and that the South Carolina
       courts did not purport to make in this case.

Id.
    Thus, the state court had erred in excluding the third-
party evidence based on the strong forensic evidence
presented by the prosecution, rather than weighing the
probative value of the third party evidence against its
“potential adverse effects.” Id. at 329.
    In sum, Holmes held that “the Constitution . . . prohibits
the exclusion of defense evidence under rules that serve no
legitimate purpose or that are disproportionate to the ends
that they are asserted to promote.” Id. at 326. At the same
time, Holmes recognized that “well-established rules of
evidence permit trial judges to exclude evidence if its
probative value is outweighed by certain other factors such
as unfair prejudice, confusion of the issues, or potential to
mislead the jury.” Id. (citations omitted). As we recently
summarized under Holmes, a trial court “may, consistent
with the Constitution, exclude defense evidence through the
proper application of evidentiary rules that serve a valid
purpose in a given case, including when proposed evidence
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     21

is ‘only marginally relevant or poses an undue risk of
harassment, prejudice, or confusion of the issues.’” Jones v.
Davis, 8 F.4th 1027, 1036 (9th Cir. 2021) (quoting Holmes,
547 U.S. at 326-27).
    In light of Holmes, the decision of the California Court of
Appeal was both contrary to and an unreasonable application
of clearly established Supreme Court law. The court also
unreasonably determined the facts.
    First, the court did not acknowledge that under Holmes,
the application of a state evidentiary rule to exclude defense
evidence may violate the federal Constitution. Instead, the
court held that “[b]ecause the exclusion was consistent with
the rules of evidence, there was no constitutional violation.”
The state court thereby misapprehended the constitutional
rule.
    Second, the Court of Appeal provided reasons for
discounting the Giarrusso evidence, but never weighed its
probative value against any “risk of harassment, prejudice,
or confusion of the issues,” as is required under Holmes.
Holmes, 547 U.S. at 326-27 (citations, alteration and internal
quotation marks omitted); see also Jones, 8 F.4th at 1036.
    Specifically, the Court of Appeal decided that
Giarrusso’s presence in Knight’s apartment on the night of
the murder, his knowledge of the side entrance to Knight’s
apartment, and his knowledge of what a garrote was, as well
as the fact that he had a bandage on his thumb when police
spoke with him a few days after the crime, and had once hit
Knight while they dated, were facts that did not “forge[] a
greater link between Giarrusso and Knight’s murder” than
the link that would be formed from evidence of opportunity
alone. That assessment is unreasonable: the prior violence,
bandage, presence in the apartment rather than simply the
22                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

opportunity to be there, and knowledge of relevant
circumstances, taken together, add up to more than evidence
of “opportunity alone.”
    Rather than allowing the jury to weigh the evidence, the
Court of Appeal determined for itself that these facts did not
constitute sufficient direct or circumstantial evidence linking
Giarrusso to the “actual perpetration of the crime.” The Court
of Appeal also provided explanations for Giarrusso’s
knowledge of the side entrance and a garrote, as well as the
bandage on his hand.10 This approach adjudged the strength
of the evidence against Giarrusso under the wrong standard–
which, again, is not whether Giarrusso should be found guilty
were he on trial, but whether the evidence was probative –
that is whether the jury could regard the evidence against
Giarrusso, added to the other grounds for reasonable doubt,
as a sufficient basis to find Bradford not guilty.
    The Giarrusso evidence was in no way marginal to the
defense. It therefore may not be excluded unless its
probative value is outweighed by identifiable adverse effects
of admitting it. See Holmes, 547 U.S. at 326-27; Jones 8
F.4th at 1036. The California Court of Appeal identified no
risk of undue prejudice, harassment, or confusion that would
outweigh the potential benefit to the defense of admitting the
evidence. In failing to weigh the potential value of the
Giarrusso evidence against any identifiable adverse effects
of admitting it, the Court of Appeal did not apply the analysis

10
   Our colleague in dissent, in the context of determining prejudice, does
the same regarding Giarrusso’s knowledge of a garrote and his bandaged
thumb. See Dissenting Opinion, p. 67. But of course assessing such
explanations is a question for the jury, not judges. See Holmes, 547 U.S.
at 329. Nevertheless, it is interesting to note that Giarrusso had a cut on
his thumb when a knife was used to murder Knight, and Bradford had no
cut on his hands at all.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                    23

required under Holmes, and its approach was therefore
contrary to and an unreasonable application of Holmes. See
Holmes, 547 U.S. at 326-27.
    The evidence regarding Giarrusso was both relevant and
probative, and so in no way marginal to the defense. The
combination of facts Bradford sought to present had a
tendency to make it possible that Giarrusso murdered
Knight, and so to provide a basis for the jury to find a
reasonable doubt as to Bradford’s guilt. Nor did the evidence
have only a “weak logical connection to the central issues in
the case,” Holmes, 547 U.S. at 330: the facts discounted by
the state court are all circumstances bearing a significant
connection to the crime. For example, Bradford was
reportedly seen on the sidewalk near Knight’s apartment
weeks before the murder, but Giarrusso was in her apartment
the night of the murder, like Bradford, Giarrusso had
knowledge of the side entrance to Knight’s apartment, and
although Bradford had an angry encounter with Knight three
months before the murder, he did not physically attack her,
and there was evidence Giarrusso had assaulted Knight in
the past. The Giarrusso evidence is thus closely analogous
to evidence the prosecution was permitted to introduce
against Bradford in terms of its probative value. Further,
“[t]he jury would not have been confused by such evidence.
It would probably have been led to a state of reasonable
doubt.” Lunbery, 605 F.3d 762.
    Notably, the prosecution’s decision to argue to the jury
that Knight was alone on the night of the murder, confirms
that the undisputed evidence that Giarrusso was with the
victim at her apartment in the hours leading up to her murder,
was centrally connected to the issues before the jury. Yet the
California Court of Appeal completely elided the trial court’s
refusal to admit evidence that would have directly
24                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

contradicted the prosecution’s assertion, in its opening
statement, that Knight was alone on the night of the murder.
    Third, and relatedly, the California Court of Appeal’s
conclusion that the trial court properly considered that
Giarrusso “did not in any way” match Rolleri’s physical
description of the suspect was an unreasonable determination
of the facts, and one that affected the California Court of
Appeal’s ability to access the relevance and probative value
of the Giarrusso evidence.11 Although Rolleri gave varying
descriptions of the person he saw running away from the
murder scene, Giarrusso matched one consistent aspect of
Rolleri’s initial description of the suspect. Rolleri repeatedly
described the suspect as having “dark, curly hair,” “curly
Afro-type dark hair,” or “black, curly hair.” A photograph
of Giarrusso at the time depicted him with dark curly hair.
Herlinda’s description of Giarrusso also referenced dark
hair. Additionally, one of Rolleri’s initial descriptions stated
that the fleeing suspect was approximately 5'9" and
Giarrusso was 5'9." The Court of Appeal improperly ignored
the similarities between these descriptions and Giarrusso.
When combined with the evidence that, when the police
were arriving on the night of the murder, Rolleri spotted
Giarrusso’s car, the evidence that Giarrusso resembled the
fleeing suspect obviously increased the possibility that
Giarrusso was present at the time of the murder, and
increased the probative value of the Giarrusso evidence as a
whole.

11
   An unreasonable determination of facts is a separate basis for granting
habeas relief. See Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 98 (2011)
(explaining that an application for a writ of habeas corpus may be granted
if a decision “was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in
light of the evidence presented in the [s]tate court proceeding”).
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     25

    Accordingly, the state appellate court’s decision was
contrary to and an unreasonable application of clearly
established federal law as set forth by the Supreme Court in
Holmes, and also an unreasonable determination of the facts.
See Bemore v. Chappell, 788 F.3d 1151, 1160 (9th Cir.
2015) (holding that AEDPA relief may be granted “if the last
state court merits decision was . . . contrary to, or involved
an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal
law, as determined by the Supreme Court” or “was based on
an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the
evidence presented in the [s]tate court proceeding.”)
(citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Applying
the legal standard established in Holmes, we conclude that
the exclusion of the Giarrusso evidence violated Bradford’s
constitutional right to present a defense.
   B. Prejudice
    Bradford is “not entitled to habeas relief based on trial
error unless [he] can establish that it resulted in actual
prejudice.” Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 637 (1993)
(citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Actual
prejudice is assessed by inquiring “whether the error had
substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining
the jury’s verdict.” Id. (citation and internal quotation marks
omitted). It is at this stage that the strength of the case
against Bradford or lack thereof becomes important.
    As the California Court of Appeal issued no ruling with
respect to prejudice, we need only apply Brecht, and need not
separately evaluate the issue of prejudice under the AEDPA
standard. See Brown v. Davenport, 596 U.S. 118, 127
(2022).
   Illustrative of the application of Brecht in circumstances
similar to this case is Lunbery, 605 F.3d at 762. Lunbery,
26                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO

similarly to Bradford, was prevented from presenting third-
party culpability evidence. See id. We held that exclusion of
the evidence was prejudicial under Brecht. See id.
    Lunbery’s husband was found dead inside his home,
which was previously occupied by a known drug dealer. See
id. at 755, 756-57. Three days after the murder, a
confidential informant told a detective that “he felt the killing
had been a mistake” and that “[t]he intended victim had been
[the drug dealer] because he had ripped off several people in
town over drug dealings.” Id. at 757 (internal quotation
marks omitted). A neighborhood resident also reported
seeing a car that was later linked to the drug dealer and his
associate outside Lunbery’s home on the morning of the
murder. See id. The detective was informed that an
associate of the drug dealer was heard in a restaurant saying:
“That’s a bummer. My partners blew away the wrong dude.”
Id. In sum, “the police had [multiple] independent sources
connecting the murder to drugs; [a] motive for the murder
had been provided; [a] connection between the intended
victim and [the drug dealer’s associate] had been
established; [and the drug dealer’s associate] had admitted
knowledge of the murderers and of their mistake.” Id.
(cleaned up). Nevertheless, the investigation was closed.
See id.
    Nine years later, the investigation was reopened. See id.
Investigators visited Lunbery at her home, and informed her
that “we think you did it.” Id. After “[t]he interview became
intense” and investigators told Lunbery “a secret witness had
inculpated her,” she confessed. Id. at 757-58.
    Lunbery subsequently repudiated her confession. See id.
at 758. An expert witness interviewed Lunbery and reported
that she had “a well-recognized type of confession-a stress
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                    27

compliant false confession.” Id. Before trial, Lunbery
sought to introduce evidence that the murder had been
committed by the drug dealer’s associates. See id. The trial
court denied introduction of the third-party culpability
evidence. See id. Meanwhile, the prosecution’s “sole
significant evidence against [Lunbery] was her confession.”
Id. at 759.
    Lunbery appealed her conviction to the California Court
of Appeal, challenging the trial court’s exclusion of the
third-party culpability evidence. See id. The Court of
Appeal discounted the strength of the statement that the
associate’s “partners blew away the wrong dude” on the
basis that the statement, “may have been nothing more than
boasting or the mindless remark of someone under the
influence of liquor,” and “deemed the statement
inadmissible.” Id. After excluding that statement, the Court
of Appeal also excluded the evidence of the neighbor seeing
the car in front of Lunbery’s home on the morning of the
murder. See id. The Court of Appeal ultimately determined
that Lunbery’s proffered third- party culpability evidence
“lacked sufficient probative value to raise a reasonable doubt
of defendant’s guilt.” Id.
    On review of the federal district court’s denial of habeas
relief, we first determined that exclusion of the third-party
evidence violated Lunbery’s right to present a defense and
that the trial court’s error had a “substantial and injurious
effect on the verdict.” Id. at 762. We reasoned that:

       Because [Lunbery] was prevented from
       presenting this evidence, she was prevented
       from offering any alternate theory as to who
       might have committed the crime. The jury
       would not have been confused by such
28                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO

         evidence. It would probably have been led to
         a state of reasonable doubt. The murder called
         out for a murderer. The trial as conducted by
         the superior court and as approved by the
         court of appeal left only [Lunbery] in view as
         the murderer.

Id. at 762.
    In this case, the trial court’s rejection of the proffered
third-party culpability evidence likewise amounted to the
total exclusion of any mention during trial of Giarrusso as an
alternate suspect, and, despite the relative weakness of the
case against Bradford, left Bradford as the only viable
suspect. Again, Bradford was prevented from eliciting
testimony that Rolleri saw Giarrusso at Knight’s home early
in the evening on the night of the murder, that Rolleri saw
Giarrusso’s car at Knight’s home before Rolleri went to bed,
as well as at an intersection near Knight’s home just after the
murder12, that Giarrusso had a past relationship with Knight
that involved an incident of physical violence, and that
Giarrusso fit one of the physical descriptions of the fleeing
suspect provided by Rolleri. As we recently recognized,
“[t]he excluded evidence could have provided the missing
link to establish reasonable doubt for the jury: an actual
individual who had knowledge, motive, and opportunity.”
United States v. Espinoza, 880 F.3d 506, 519 (9th Cir. 2018).
As in Espinoza, exclusion of the evidence regarding
Giarrusso “precluded [Bradford] from answering the only
question that mattered,” id. at 518. If Bradford didn’t kill

12
  The dissent discredits this evidence partially due to Rolleri’s “24-year
delay in mentioning it.” Dissenting Opinion, p. 59, n.8. However, the
delay is similar to that of the detective in recalling the wedding invitation.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                    29

Knight, who did? The trial court’s erroneous exclusion of
the exculpatory evidence proffered by Bradford pertaining
to Giarrusso was “compounded and magnified,” Lunbery,
605 F.3d at 762, when the trial court permitted the
prosecution to falsely state to the jury that Knight was alone
on the night of the murder. That, contrary to what the jury
was told, there was a plausible perpetrator seen at Knight’s
home the night of the murder constituted powerful evidence
for the defense that the jury never heard.
    The proffered third-party culpability evidence was
particularly powerful in light of the lack of direct evidence
incriminating Bradford, and the fact that Giarrusso was the
last person known to have seen the victim alive. The
prosecution’s evidence against Bradford consisted of reports
that Knight had broken up with Bradford almost three
months prior to the murder, a crumpled wedding invitation,
statements describing Bradford’s violent reaction after
finding Knight with another man, a missing necklace that
Bradford helped Knight purchase, picture-hanging wire
seized from Bradford’s mother’s home twenty-eight years
after the murder that police determined “had the same
general characteristics” as the wire used in the garrote,
statements from a girlfriend years after the murder
describing Bradford’s menacing (but not personally violent)
behavior, a report from a behavioral crime scene analyst who
opined that Knight’s murder was “motivated by a preexisting
interpersonal conflict,” a photograph of Knight recovered
from a desk drawer in Bradford’s home dated a month before
Knight’s murder, and the fact that Bradford’s alibi about
sailing a two-man boat in the dark seemed unlikely.
    The core of the prosecution’s case was that Bradford was
a jealous boyfriend who lost his temper on one occasion – but
did not physically attack Knight – nearly three months before
30                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

the murder, when he saw Knight with another man one day
after Bradford and Knight had ended their relationship;
Bradford stalked another girlfriend three decades later; and
he had a fairly weak alibi. But the fact that Bradford lost his
temper under the circumstances (seeing his ex-girlfriend
with another man one day after their break-up), on one
occasion months before the murder, is not particularly
probative of murder, even when combined with the other
evidence in the case. As for his actions toward his girlfriend
30 years later, as the California Court of Appeal aptly
observed, Bradford “did not kill [her] and was never violent
with her; his conduct in stalking [his later girlfriend] thus
provides, at most, tepid support for the argument that he had
the propensity to kill Knight.” Moreover, there was no
evidence that Bradford was present at Knight’s apartment the
night of the murder, and the only possible connections
between Bradford and the crime scene were some picture
wire found twenty-eight years after the murder and the
absence of a necklace. Unlike in Lunbery, in which the
defendant confessed and later recanted, there was no
confession; Bradford has always steadfastly maintained his
innocence.
    The evidence against Bradford in itself was weak enough
to raise some doubt in the minds of the jurors. “[W]here the
government’s case is weak, a defendant is more likely to be
prejudiced” by trial court error. United States v. Frederick,
78 F.3d 1370, 1381 (9th Cir. 1996), and especially by the
exclusion of evidence of a different, plausible suspect.
    That the jury was prevented from learning this
information about Giarrusso leaves us in “grave doubt” about
whether the California Court of Appeal’s ruling in conflict
with Holmes had a substantial influence on the guilty verdict.
Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 765 (1946).
                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO                        31

IV. RESPONSE TO DISSENT
    Our colleague in dissent agrees that the trial court erred
in excluding evidence pertaining to Giarrusso, the last known
person to see Knight alive on the evening of her murder.
However, our colleague is of the view that this momentous
error was harmless. The dissent, for the most part, does not
grapple with the strength of the “proof of third-party guilt.”
Holmes, 547 U.S. at 321. Rather the dissent focuses on what
it perceives as “strong evidence of Bradford’s guilt.”13
   The dissent catalogs the following evidence as
“convincing” regarding Bradford’s guilt. Dissenting
Opinion, p. 48.
     A. Bradford’s interview statements, including an alleged
        reference “to [Knight] as being dead.” Id., pp. 48-50.
    The evidence offered by the prosecution in support of its
allegation that Bradford stated during his initial police
interview that Bradford was “dead” was decidedly
underwhelming. The defense denied that Bradford said
Knight was “dead.” The audio recording was unclear, the
detective who conducted the interview did not hear Bradford
say “she” was dead, and the detective never included that
statement in his report. The critical word “she” appeared in
the transcript of the interview and, in one version of the
transcript, was typed in a different font. Importantly, the jury
was instructed that the transcript was not evidence in any

13
   Even so, the prosecution’s evidence in this case was not strong,
considering that there was no confession, no eyewitness, no DNA
evidence, no blood evidence, no fingerprint evidence and no murder
weapon.
32                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO

event.14 And Bradford’s use of the word “dead” was in the
context of explaining that his relationship with Knight was
over, he had moved on and was “busy . . . dating other
people,” and Knight was “history.”
    The dissent also emphasized that during his first police
interview, Bradford “sometimes referred to Knight in the
past tense.” Id., p. 49. But the dissent omits that the police
were asking Bradford about his past interactions with
Knight, during the time they had been dating several months
earlier. In that context, it is not surprising that Bradford
sometimes referred to Knight in the past tense. He also
referred to her in the present tense at times before he was told
of her death – stating, for example, that “[s]he’s pretty
independent. She . . . does things kind of on the spur of the
moment,” and, just before the “dead” reference, “I don’t
have any reason to . . . ever see her again or want to see her
again.”
     In addition, the dissent asserts that Bradford equivocated
during his police interview about whether Knight was seeing
other men while he was dating her, whether he wanted to
marry Knight, and whether the decision to end the
relationship was his idea or Knight’s. Id., pp. 49-50. These
are all highly personal, private topics. Indeed, at one point
during the first police interview, Bradford explained that
“some of the . . . personal things I think, you know that . . .
it’s just kind of hard to talk about it. You know, it was kind
of a personal relationship.” That Bradford may have

14
   The Dissent says that the version with the different font was not
presented to the jury. Dissenting Opinion, p. 49, n.2. But that compounds
the error because it deprived the jury of important information
reinforcing the lack of proof that this statement was actually made by
Bradford.
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                            33

provided a face-saving account of his relationship is hardly
evidence, whether alone or in combination with the other
circumstantial evidence in this case, that he committed
murder.15
     B. Motive
    The dissent discusses in some detail an incident when
Bradford reacted angrily when he saw another man at
Knight’s apartment one day after Bradford and Knight broke
up. See id., pp. 50-52. However, it is undisputed that during
the incident Bradford never engaged in any act of physical
violence against Knight. And the record reflects that
following this incident, Knight expressed that she was
“embarrass[ed],” rather than fearful. In fact, Knight
“laughed off the incident.” And of the two men, Giarrusso
was the only one who had ever physically assaulted Knight.
But of course, the jury never heard that evidence.
     The dissent also emphasizes that there was evidence at
trial that Bradford was seen “in front of the property a week
or two before the murder.”16 Id., p. 52. But that fact pales in
comparison to the undisputed evidence that Giarrusso was
inside Knight’s home having dinner with her hours before her

15
   To the extent the dissent relies on Bradford’s demeanor during his
police interviews, it is worth noting that Giarrusso appeared nervous at
times during questioning by police. For example, when police noticed
the bandage on Giarrusso’s thumb and asked him if they could examine
his hands, they then asked him, “Are you a nervous individual?” Later
in the interview, police told Giarrusso to “relax” and “calm down,”
assuring him “[w]e’re not trying to back you into a corner or nail you
to the wall.”
16
  The same witness gave a varying account to the police, reporting that he
saw Bradford at the property approximately one month before the
murder.
34                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

murder, and his car was spotted at an intersection outside her
home immediately after the crime. Again, the jury never
heard this powerful third-party evidence.
    In addition, the dissent references the crumpled wedding
invitation. See id., pp. 52-53. But there was absolutely no
contemporaneous record of a wedding invitation being
found in Knight’s home. The investigating detective only
remembered a crumpled wedding invitation “in retrospect”
after Knight’s sister insisted that the wedding invitation must
have been there. On a different occasion, the detective stated
“he had no recollection of any crumpled wedding
invitation.” The wedding invitation was never found, but a
copy was sent to the detective “at a much later date” by the
victim’s sister. The prosecution presented a replica of a
crumpled invitation during its Opening Statement for
“demonstrative purposes,” but no invitation was ever
introduced into evidence because no foundation could be
laid. The court ruled that the invitation was not an exhibit.
There was no photograph of the invitation and no mention of
the invitation in the reports of the investigation. From this
sketchy context, the dissent speculates “that Bradford had
crumpled [the invitation] up in anger on the night of the
murder.” Id., p. 53.
      Further, the dissent makes much of a gold chain that was
missing from the crime scene. See id., p. 53. Once again, the
dissent speculates that “Bradford had given Knight the chain
. . . and that he took it back on the night of the murder.” Id.
There is absolutely no evidence in the record to support this
speculation, as no chain was discovered during the search of
Bradford’s vehicle, his home, or his mother’s home.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                      35

   C. Consciousness of Guilt.
    The portion of the dissent concerning consciousness of
guilt focuses primarily on Bradford’s alibi. See id., pp. 53-
55. However, the alibi evidence was not as one-sided as the
dissent would have one believe.
    Bradford told police that he was out sailing that night (a
Wednesday) and came back late, around 3 a.m.; there was
no “wind,” so he had to paddle his way back. He said he had
gone sailing on Monday night as well. He told police where
the boat was moored and gave them driving directions. In
the same interview, when police asked Bradford’s father
whether he remembered Bradford coming home, he
corroborated Bradford’s account in part:

       “I’m sure he came home late. His mother was
       awake . . . . I’ll admit I’d gone to bed. . . .But
       [his mother] mentioned it to me the next
       morning that, that he was late.
       And I said what happened? He said well, I got
       becalmed and that he had to row that thing
       back by himself.”

    Bradford also told police, during the same interview, that
“I sign out on the calendar when [] . . . the boat’s going out.”
He explained that “we keep a calendar” and “we fill in the
name and about the time that we’re leaving and about the
time we’re getting back.” When police recovered the sign-
out calendar, the calendar reflected that for August 29 (the
day in question), there was an entry indicating that someone
named “Doug” had signed the boat out for 10 to 12. The
calendar also indicated that on the previous Monday of the
same week, “Doug” had signed a boat out from 8 to 12.
36                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

    Further, evidence was presented by the defense that there
was no official rule regarding sailing at night, and the sign-
out logs for 1979 indicated that several individuals had sailed
alone at night. And Bradford’s expert stood by his testimony
that the wind readings relied on by the prosecution were
inaccurate.
    Of course, it is much easier to attack the alibi of a
defendant who is the only suspect. However, if the evidence
relating to Giarrusso had been admitted, Bradford’s alibi
would have been considered together with the evidence
pointing to Giarrusso as the murderer.
    Our colleague in dissent minimizes the fact that no
garrote was found in Bradford’s home, because “it was found
under Knight’s body.” Id., p. 56. But it is undisputed that the
detectives were searching in 2007 for evidence of a garrote at
Bradford’s home because they seized “wire and dowelling”
from Bradford’s mother’s garage and home to compare “to
the garrote recovered from the crime scene.” The most they
could say after the comparisons was that some of the picture
wire was “of the same class” as the wire used to make the
garrote found at the crime scene.
    Finally, the dissent focuses on a photograph of Knight in
an envelope found in a desk drawer, not hanging in a
prominent position in the home. See id., pp. 56-57. But there
is nothing incriminating about keeping a photograph of an
ex- girlfriend in an envelope in a desk drawer, together with
other keepsakes, especially when the desk was not one used
regularly. More relevant is what was not found during the
search of Bradford’s home. As with the search of his car, the
search of Bradford’s home failed to uncover a garrote,
wooden handles for a garrote, wire for a garrote, or the chain
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     37

that the dissent speculates Bradford took from the crime
scene.
   D. Bradford’s lack of cooperation.
     Despite the dissent’s characterization of Bradford as not
“entirely cooperative,” id., p. 48, the dissent acknowledges,
as it must, that Bradford consented to a search of his car. See
id., pp. 55-56. It is notable that the search did not uncover
any incriminating evidence — no garrote, no wire for the
garrote, no wooden handles for the garrote, no hair, no fibers,
and no blood, despite the pathologists’ opinion that the
assailant would “have a whole lot of blood on him as a result
of the attack.” The best the dissent can muster is that the car
“‘reeked of Armor All’ and appeared to have been freshly
cleaned.” Id., p. 56. But this observation was made decades
after the fact rather than when the search was conducted.
And despite the dissent’s focus on Bradford’s purported
attempt “to pull off an ‘air swab’” when providing a DNA
sample, id., it is undisputed that a DNA sample was gathered
from Bradford, and there was no match to Bradford’s DNA
at the crime scene.
   E. Giarrusso.
    The dissent ends its factual recitation of the “convincing
evidence” by attempting to minimize the fact that the
description Herlinda gave of Giarrusso, Knight’s dining
companion, more closely matched one of Rolleri’s initial
descriptions of the suspect than Bradford did. Id., pp. 59-65.
The night of the murder, shortly after Rolleri saw the suspect
fleeing, he told the police that the suspect was “a possible
white male, approximately 5'9", with “curly, Afro-type dark
hair.” Police immediately used this description to search the
surrounding area for the suspect shortly after 3 a.m.. If the
Giarrusso evidence were presented to the jury, the jury could
38                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO

conclude that Giarrusso fit the height and hair color of the
suspect described by Rolleri more than Bradford did.17
    Bradford was described by one trial witness as 5'10" or
5'11" with a “slight build” and a “lot of hair” that was
“sandy” in color. Bradford was similarly described at trial
as 5'10" or 5'11" with a “slight, medium to slight” build, and
“sandy features.” Bradford’s mother described him as 6'1"
and “slender.” Bradford weighed 155 pounds.
    In contrast, Giarrusso was described by Herlinda as “on
the heavy side with dark hair that was balding.” He was also
5'9", the height Rolleri gave early on for the suspect.
Giarrusso weighed 164 pounds.
   Herlinda’s description of Giarrusso confirms that
Giarrusso’s physical characteristics matched her husband’s
description of the fleeing suspect. This is especially true in
view of our colleague’s reliance on the existence of “several
descriptions of the suspect” in the record. Id., p. 60.
    Our colleague in dissent questions why the majority
relies on the description in the police report. See id., pp. 61-
62. The answer is easy: because that is the description the
police elected to document. By referencing other
descriptions in an attempt to discount this third-party
evidence the defense could have presented, the dissent once
again strays from our task. If the prosecution elected to
challenge the defense evidence on the bases identified by the

17
   The dissent criticizes the description in the police report because it was
linked to the investigation of Juarez. See id., pp. 60, 62. But it is
undisputed that this report was part of the record and reflected the facts
uncovered by the police while investigating Knight’s murder, including
the height and hair color of the fleeing suspect, which did not match
Bradford.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     39

dissent, the jury would have been called upon to weigh this
conflicting evidence.
    Moreover, the fact that Rolleri provided varying
descriptions of the suspect, some aspects of which matched
Giarrusso more than Bradford, reinforces that the admission
of the Giarrusso evidence quite likely could have tipped the
scales toward reasonable doubt. As the dissent notes, an
officer on the scene relayed to dispatch a description of the
fleeing suspect as being “a white male adult, 25 years, 6 foot,
medium build . . . dark curly hair.” Id., p. 60. The next
morning, Rolleri explained to police that he saw the suspect
from behind and he was unsure if the suspect was white or
black. He again told police that the person he saw fleeing
had “black curly hair.” When asked about the suspect’s
“build,” Rolleri said that the man “wasn’t big,” but he was
“bigger than me.” Rolleri said the man looked “built” or
“strong.” When asked by police, Rolleri responded that his
own height was 5'9". Although Rolleri’s descriptions of the
suspect he saw from behind varied somewhat, he repeatedly
described the suspect as having dark, curly hair, a key detail
that, if credited by the jury, would exclude Bradford but
could inculpate Giarrusso in combination with other
evidence.
    The dissent also questions whether the majority opinion
fairly suggests that Giarrusso had a motive to murder Knight.
See id., pp. 65-66. In fact, Giarrusso’s motive was the same
as that imputed to Bradford. He too had been relegated to
the “friend zone.”
    The dissent speculates that Giarrusso’s circumstance was
different because “the majority apparently assumes that
Knight broke off the relationship with Giarrusso rather than
the other way around.” Id., p. 66. However, we make no
40                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

such assumption. Giarrusso simply stated that he and Knight
“broke up.” And Bradford stated that he and Knight
“decided not to see each other any longer.” Regardless of
who ended each relationship, the result was the same. And
as previously mentioned, Giarrusso, not Bradford, had
physically assaulted Knight before.
     In an effort to avoid the critical impact of the Holmes
opinion, the dissent interprets Holmes and Lunsberry as
requiring Bradford to submit evidence that would “squarely
prove” Giarrusso’s culpability. Id., p. 69.18 Although that
was the quality of the excluded evidence in Holmes and
Lunsberry, that is not the test for harmless error. Rather, the
test for harmless error is whether the wrongfully excluded
evidence likely had a substantial influence on the guilty
verdict. See Kotteakos, 328 U.S. at 765. “If so, or if one is
left in grave doubt, the conviction cannot stand.” Id. At a
minimum, the unrefuted evidence that Giarrusso was dining
with Knight mere hours before she was murdered would
have given the lie to the prosecutor’s outrageous
misrepresentation that Knight was murdered on the only
night when she was alone. Given the choice between
Bradford, who was seen in front of the property a week or
two before the murder and Giarrusso, who was seen inside
Knight’s home mere hours before her murder, the jury could
well have concluded that Giarrusso was the more likely
suspect (or at least a plausible suspect). Given the choice
between Bradford, who did not meet some of the
descriptions of the fleeing perpetrator, and Giarrusso, who
more closely matched some of those descriptions, Giarrusso

18
  The dissent also observes that Holmes was not a habeas case. See
Dissenting Opinion, p. 68. But the precepts and principles set forth by the
Supreme Court in Holmes were not limited to the direct-review context.
                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO                            41

could have been seen as the more likely suspect. Given the
choice between Bradford, who had never physically attacked
Knight and Giarrusso, who had physically attacked Knight
in the past, Giarrusso could have been seen as the more likely
suspect. Even the investigating detective described the lack
of forensic evidence against Bradford as a “blow.”19 The
conclusion is inescapable that Bradford’s “conviction cannot
stand.” Id. Try as he might, our dissenting colleague cannot
muster strong enough evidence of guilt to succeed in
minimizing the evidence in favor of the defense that
Giarrusso could have been the murderer. See Holmes, 547
U.S. at 329.
    At bottom, the majority and dissent’s differing views of
the strength of the evidence against Bradford proves the
point that all of the evidence should have been presented to
the jury for consideration in determining Bradford’s guilt or
innocence in this case based entirely on circumstantial
evidence. Try as he might, our colleague in dissent cannot
marshal from this record sufficient proof of guilt for us to say
with any confidence that the state court’s error in excluding
evidence of third-party guilt should not leave us in “grave
doubt” of “substantial and injurious effect or influence in
determining the jury’s verdict.” Kotleakos, 328 U.S. at 765,
776; Brecht, 507 U.S. at 638.
V. CONCLUSION
    In a murder case built entirely on circumstantial
evidence, preventing a defendant from presenting evidence
of another possible suspect who admitted to being at the

19
  The investigative detective described the complete lack of forensic
evidence tying Bradford to the crime as a “severe blow” but the statement
was excluded by the trial court.
42                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

victim’s home on the night she was killed, and who had
previously subjected the victim to physical violence at his
hands violated the defendant’s right to present a defense. The
California Court of Appeal’s decision otherwise was
contrary to and an unreasonable application of the Supreme
Court’s decision in Holmes.
    In addition, the California Court of Appeal unreasonably
determined the facts. See Taylor v. Maddox, 366 F.3d 992,
1005, 1018 (9th Cir. 2004) (granting habeas relief after a
state court admitted a confession but ignored testimony
explaining that the confession was a result of intimidation),
overruled on other grounds by Murray v. Schriro, 745 F.3d
984, 999-1000 (9th Cir. 2014); see also Lunbery, 605 F.3d
at 762 (commenting that deprivation of the right to present a
defense “was compounded and magnified by factual
mistakes made by the court of appeal in the course of
disposing of the evidence offered”). As we have explained,
the errors likely had a substantial and injurious effect on the
verdict.
    Accordingly, we reverse the decision of the district court
and remand with instructions to grant a conditional writ of
habeas corpus, ordering Bradford’s release unless the state
of California notifies the district court within thirty days of
the issuance of this court’s mandate that it intends to retry
Bradford without excluding the evidence pertaining to
Giarrusso, and commences Bradford’s retrial within seventy
days of issuance of the mandate. See Taylor, 366 F.3d at
1018; see also Lunbery, 605 F.3d at 763.
     REVERSED and REMANDED.
                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO                      43

Antoon, District Judge, concurring in part and dissenting in
part:
    I agree with the majority that the state trial court
improperly precluded Douglas Bradford from introducing
evidence regarding Joe Giarrusso. This violated Bradford’s
constitutional right to present a defense, and the California
Court of Appeal’s approval of the exclusion was contrary to
clearly established federal law. But I respectfully part
company with the majority on its determination that the error
“had substantial and injurious effect or influence in
determining the jury’s verdict.” Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507
U.S. 619, 637 (1993) (quoting Kotteakos v. United States,
328 U.S. 750, 776 (1946)). Based on my review of the
record, I conclude that the error was harmless under Brecht,
and for that reason I would affirm the district court’s denial
of habeas relief.
    I. Harmless Error Principles
    The determination that a state court committed
constitutional error does not, of course, complete the
required analysis in a § 2254 case. If the error was harmless,
no relief is to be granted. And an error is not harmful on
habeas review unless it “resulted in actual prejudice”—
meaning that it “had substantial and injurious effect or
influence in determining the jury’s verdict.” Brecht, 507
U.S. at 637 (quoting Kotteakos, 328 U.S. at 776). It is not
enough that “there is a ‘reasonable possibility’ that [the] trial
error contributed to the verdict.” Id. (distinguishing the
standard established in Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18,
24 (1967), that applies on direct review).
    Assessing whether an error had such an effect is a serious
and sometimes difficult fact-intensive undertaking, but
reviewing courts are not without guidance. As the Supreme
44                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

Court explained in Brecht, “[t]rial error . . . is amenable to
harmless-error analysis because it ‘may . . . be quantitatively
assessed in the context of other evidence presented in order
to determine [the effect it had on the trial].’” Id. at 629 (all
but first and second alterations in original) (emphasis added)
(quoting Arizona v. Fulminante, 499 U.S. 279, 307–08
(1991)). Courts thus should examine harmlessness “in light
of the record as a whole.” Id. at 638 (emphasis added). In
doing so, judges “will often make numerous independent
evaluations about the weight and sufficiency of the various
items of evidence, the inferences to be drawn, and the
different theories of the case.” Inthavong v. Lamarque, 420
F.3d 1055, 1060–61 (9th Cir. 2005).
     Two years after Brecht, the Supreme Court instructed
that a judge evaluating harmlessness in a habeas case should
ask, “Do I, the judge, think that the error substantially
influenced the jury’s decision?” O’Neal v. McAninch, 513
U.S. 432, 436 (1995). If the answer to that question is “yes,”
or if the judge “is in grave doubt as to the harmlessness of an
error,” then there is “actual prejudice” under the Brecht
standard and habeas relief is warranted. Id. at 436–37. If the
answer is “no,” the error is harmless and relief must be
denied.
    The question whether the exclusion of the Giarrusso
evidence was harmless does not turn on how off base the
state court’s evidentiary ruling was. Instead, we must
engage in the arduous task of assessing the excluded
evidence in the context of all the evidence of record,
including the trial transcript and evidence proffered by both
sides. Having done so, I disagree with the majority’s
conclusion that the Giarrusso evidence was “powerful.”
And I do not think that its exclusion “substantially
influenced the jury’s decision,” nor am I in “grave doubt”
                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO                    45

about whether it did so. Indeed, I am convinced that it did
not. Thus, I would find the error harmless under Brecht.
   II. Discussion
    As the majority notes, the state’s case against Bradford
was circumstantial. But this does not mean that the evidence
of guilt was unconvincing. Cf. Brecht, 507 U.S. at 639
(finding error harmless where “the State’s evidence of guilt
was, if not overwhelming, certainly weighty”). It is not
unusual for direct evidence of a crime to be lacking, and
many defendants are convicted based on circumstantial
evidence alone. As the trial court instructed the jury here
using a California pattern instruction: “Both direct and
circumstantial evidence are acceptable types of evidence to
prove or disprove the elements of the charge including intent
and mental state and acts necessary to a conviction and
neither is necessarily more reliable than the other. Neither
is entitled to any greater weight than the other.” Continuing
with another California pattern instruction, the judge
cautioned the jury:

       [B]efore you may rely on circumstantial
       evidence to find the defendant guilty you
       must be convinced that the only reasonable
       conclusion supported by the circumstantial
       evidence is that the defendant is guilty. If you
       can draw two or more reasonable conclusions
       from the circumstantial evidence and one of
       those reasonable conclusions points to
       innocence and another to guilt you must
       accept the one that points to innocence.
           . . . [W]hen considering circumstantial
       evidence you must accept only reasonable
46                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

        conclusions and      reject   any    that   are
        unreasonable.

By its verdict, the jury in this case obviously determined that
the only reasonable conclusion from the circumstantial
evidence was that Bradford was guilty. And I am convinced
that had the Giarrusso evidence been introduced, the only
reasonable conclusion would have remained the same.
     A. The Evidence Against Bradford
     1. The Murder Scene
     Shortly before 3 a.m. on Thursday, August 30, 1979,
Lynne Knight, a 28-year-old neonatal nurse, was brutally
murdered in her Torrance, California backlot apartment.
The trial evidence showed that the murderer first attempted
to strangle Knight with a homemade garrote fashioned from
two dowel-like pieces of wood (the handles) connected by
metal picture-hanging wire. The assailant did not succeed in
killing Knight with the garrote but sawed through her trachea
in attempting to do so. The murderer then repeatedly
stabbed Knight with a large knife, eventually severing the
femoral artery in her left leg. At least one of the stab wounds
was ten inches deep. Knight quickly bled to death. The
police discovered the garrote beneath Knight’s body in a
pool of blood; the knife was never found.
    Knight’s nude body was found on her bed. “Both [of]
her legs were splayed with the knees pointing outward” and
“[h]er right hand was positioned directly above her vaginal
area.” A behavioral crime scene analyst explained that the
assailant “may have posed her into this sexually demeaning
position” because “[h]e wanted her humiliated even in
death.” Knight also suffered several cuts to her left breast
that the medical examiner explained were consistent with
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                            47

intentional post-mortem mutilation by the assailant—
“getting her where it hurts.” See Test. of Christopher
Rogers. It was also the opinion of the crime scene analyst
that the post-mortem breast wounds “further validate the
level of resentment [the assailant] felt for [Knight].”
    Screams had awakened Knight’s landlord, Richard
Rolleri, who lived with his family in the adjacent main
house. A few minutes later, Rolleri looked out his front
window and saw a man running away from the property,
though he was unable to see the man’s face. Rolleri called
the police at 2:53 a.m. The officers who responded to the
scene relayed to dispatch the description that Rolleri
provided of the fleeing man: “a white male adult, 25 years,
6 foot, medium build, wearing light brown coat, light brown
pants, dark curly hair.” Although not disclosed to the jury,
within half an hour the police detained eighteen-year-old,
five-foot-eleven Gerardo Juarez, but they later ruled him out
as a potential perpetrator of the crime.1

1
  The police took Rolleri to the location where Juarez was detained, and
Rolleri was unable to identify him from the front. But when the police
turned Juarez around so that Rolleri could view him from the back,
Rolleri said, “that looks like the guy.” Rolleri later retracted this
identification, saying that he realized that Juarez was “too small” to be
the man he saw at his house and that the only similarity was “the general
look” of Juarez’s hair. Spots on Juarez’s clothing that officers initially
thought were blood were determined not to be blood, and the police were
unable to connect Juarez to Knight or the crime in any way other than
Rolleri’s recanted identification.
     In his habeas petition, Bradford challenged—in addition to the
exclusion of the Giarrusso evidence—the exclusion of evidence
regarding Rolleri’s identification of Juarez. He also raised several other
issues. The district court rejected the petition in full and granted a
certificate of appealability only on the issue of the excluded Giarrusso
48                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

     2. Bradford’s Statements and Demeanor
    Because of the manner in which Knight was killed and
the path used by the murderer—an 18-inch-wide
passageway leading to the back of Knight’s apartment that
is not obvious from the street—it appeared that the murderer
both knew Knight and was familiar with how to access her
apartment without having to venture through the Rolleris’
backyard, where they kept their Siberian husky, Rocky.
Bradford, an engineer who was 27 years old in 1979, had
met Knight while skiing in January or February 1979 and
dated her until June 3 of that year, when Knight ended the
relationship. Bradford was one of the initial suspects in the
murder based on statements that he and others provided to
investigators. But the case went cold in the early 1980s, and
Bradford was not charged with the murder until thirty years
after Knight’s death.
    Knight was known to date several men at the same time,
and detectives explained at trial that all of the boyfriends
they contacted after the murder were entirely cooperative
except one—Bradford. Bradford was willing to answer
some questions, but he repeatedly cut interviews short when
he did not like what he was being asked.
     During trial, the jurors heard tape recordings of
investigators’ September 3 and September 6, 1979
interviews of Bradford, and the prosecution provided them
with transcripts of those interviews as aids in their
understanding of the recordings. The investigators did not
tell Bradford until after the first interview that Knight had
been murdered. Yet during that interview, Bradford

evidence. This appellate panel has not expanded the certificate to include
the Juarez identification or any other issue raised in the petition.
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                             49

sometimes referred to Knight in the past tense, (“she was a
nurse”); (“I just kind of put the whole thing out of my mind.
She was uh—you know, really uh—just uh something I
wanted to put out of my mind entirely.”), and at one point he
apparently referred to her as being dead: “I don’t have any
reason to—to ever see her again, or want to see her again.
You know, she’s just dead2 and something I want to put out
of my mind. . . . I’m busy uh with dating other people um.
She’s history.” On the very next page of the interview
transcript, Bradford asked the investigators, “you still
haven’t found her?”
    Bradford also equivocated during the interview about
whether Knight was dating other men (or at least about
whether he was aware of it) during their relationship. When
asked, he said, “not to the best of my knowledge,” “I guess
she might have gone out with some men,” “I don’t think she
would . . . really dat[e] anybody else during the time that uh
she was seeing me,” and “she may have been seeing other
people.” And he described the man he saw at Knight’s
apartment the day after their breakup as “just uh one of her
boyfriends, I guess.” He also equivocated about whether the
breakup was Knight’s idea or a mutual decision. He said,
“we decided that we uh weren’t getting along very well and
uh we decided that we should go our own ways” but then
stated, “I think that Lynne was more decisive” about
breaking off the relationship and he “was just kind of going
along uh with it and . . . kind of saw that the relationship was

2
  The parties vigorously debated at trial—and argued to the jury about—
whether Bradford said “she’s just dead” or “it’s just dead” at this point
in the interview. The jurors listened to the tapes and were told to
determine for themselves what was said. The “she’s just dead” quotation
is from the transcript provided to the jurors, which was not the “different
font” transcript described by the majority, see Maj. Op. at 31–32.
50                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

gonna come to an end. And so that was just a convenient
stopping point for it.”
    On the latter point, several witnesses testified that Knight
broke up with Bradford because he wanted to get married
and was “getting too serious,” while she wanted to date other
people.3 Bradford was inconsistent in the interviews about
whether he ever considered marrying Knight. (“Q. [D]id
you uh ask her to marry you at any time? A. No. No, I had
no intention. She . . . certainly didn’t want to get married
and I didn’t.”); (“[I]f things had worked out, we might have
uh, you know. We talked about it a little bit, in the future,
but there was never any real serious talk about it. . . . [W]e
both talked. She said, yeah, well, some day, yeah. But uh,
no, there was never any real serious talk about getting
married.”).
     3. Motive and Anger
    The state presented evidence contradicting Bradford’s
description of his reaction to the breakup. Several witnesses
testified at trial about an incident that occurred at Knight’s
apartment on June 4, 1979—the day after Knight and
Bradford broke up. Another suitor, Richard Frank, was
visiting Knight at her apartment that day when Bradford
showed up. Upon seeing Frank, Bradford reacted violently,
tearing the screen off the door to Knight’s apartment, cursing
at Knight, throwing a lamp at her, and calling her vile

3
 For example, Jan Olsen testified that Knight told him that Bradford
“wanted to be serious and . . . she did not[,] [s]he wanted to date other
people,” and Knight’s sister testified that Knight told her that she broke
up with Bradford because “Doug had become too serious, wanted to get
married, and she didn’t.”
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                             51

names.4 See, e.g., Test. of Richard Frank; Bradford
interviews. One of Rolleri’s brothers, who was a teenager in
1979, testified that he “was outside and [his] mom told him
to go inside” when she observed Bradford’s demeanor. And
when Bradford departed the property, he kicked over trash
cans on his way back to his Datsun 280Z, which he drove
away recklessly, with “tires screeching.”5 Rolleri testified
that he thought Bradford “was going to kill himself the way
he drove away the car” and that Bradford “almost hit the
pole” on the corner of a nearby intersection as he left.
    Bradford acknowledged this incident during his
September 3 and September 6 interviews, admitting that he
had “called [Knight] a god damn whore,” and “left[] in a big
roar,” but backpedaling about being angry, (“[S]he was uh
there with another guy. And uh I got mad at her because uh
they uh—well I don’t know if I was really mad. I was just
more upset about it.”). Discussing the June 4 incident,
Bradford stated: “I didn’t make any threats. I, you know, I
had too much to lose to . . . you know, to go—she was
worried, I guess, that I’d come back and beat her up, or
something. . . . I had no—no wish to do anything more with
her, you know. I was thoroughly disgusted with her at that
point. Just uh, you know, go away. I don’t want to hear
from you again.” Bradford himself thus opined in his
interview statements that Knight was afraid of him. This is
consistent with Richard Frank’s trial testimony that Bradford

4
  The majority opinion describes this as an incident that was relayed by
Giarrusso—suggesting, perhaps, that he had a reason to shift suspicion
toward Bradford. See Maj. Op. at 8–9. Although Giarrusso did describe
this incident in an interview with investigators, he did not witness it and
was only relaying what Knight told him.
5
 See Test. of Richard Frank; Test. of Richard Rolleri; Test. of Carlos
Vasquez; Test. of Maximino Vasquez.
52                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

“was incredibly upset” during the June 4 incident, that “it
was scary,” and that Knight “was scared” that day. And of
course, Bradford’s conduct provided a rational basis for
Knight’s fearing him.
    And although Bradford denied ever seeing Knight again
or going back to her apartment after June 4, one of Rolleri’s
brothers who witnessed Bradford’s stormy June 4 departure
testified that he saw Bradford again in front of the property
a week or two before the murder. See Test. of Carlos
Vasquez. Bradford also saw him, and when they made eye
contact Bradford walked “really fast . . . to his car” and
“took off.”
    A detective who arrived on the scene within an hour of
the murder testified that he observed a “wrinkled up”
wedding invitation near a wastepaper basket in Knight’s
apartment. It was an invitation to the wedding of Knight’s
sister, Donna, which was scheduled for mid-September 1979
in Canada. Knight and Donna were very close, and Knight
was to be Donna’s maid of honor. While Knight and
Bradford were dating, Knight had told Donna that Bradford
would be attending the wedding with her, but after they
broke up Knight planned to attend alone. Donna testified
that Knight never would have crumpled up the invitation and
thrown it away. In light of the cancelled plans for Bradford
to attend the wedding with Knight, the state’s theory was that
Bradford had crumpled it up in anger on the night of the
murder.
   Additionally, Donna had given Knight a gold medallion
from Greece as a gift, and Knight habitually wore it on a gold
chain as a necklace. The medallion and a broken clasp to a
necklace were found at the crime scene, but the chain itself
was not. See Maj. Op. at 5. According to one of Knight’s
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                     53

friends, Bradford had bought Knight a necklace, see id. at 8,
and during a police interview Bradford acknowledged
having done so, though he was unable to describe it. The
prosecution’s theory was that Bradford had given Knight the
chain she wore with the medallion and that he took it back
on the night of the murder. A crime scene analyst opined
after assessing descriptions and photos of the horrific crime
scene and other evidence “that Knight’s murder was
‘motivated by a preexisting interpersonal conflict.’” Maj.
Op. at 29. The missing gold chain fit into that theory
because, said the analyst, removal of it (but not the
medallion) from the murder scene suggested that the chain
had “significance to the offender” and that the offender “may
have given [it] to the victim.”
   4. Consciousness of Guilt
    Perhaps the strongest evidence of consciousness of guilt
is Bradford’s far-fetched alibi. The majority opinion states
that the story Bradford told investigators about his
whereabouts on the evening of Knight’s murder “seemed
unlikely” and was “fairly weak.” Maj. Op. at 29–30. But
this is an understatement because that alibi was so absurd
that it severely undermined Bradford’s credibility. The
alibi—that Bradford went sailing alone in Long Beach on a
30-foot, 4600-pound sailboat at 10:00 p.m. at low tide
without any wind, returning home to Costa Mesa, where he
lived with his parents and several of his siblings, at 3:00
a.m., only minutes after the murder and five hours before he
was due to be at work—was proved at trial to be absolutely
unworthy of credence, even by Bradford’s own expert
witnesses. At trial, one of those experts ultimately explained
that Bradford’s sailing story was completely incredible and
that no sensible sailor would reserve a sailboat for 10:00 p.m.
54                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

in the first place or, if so, proceed without wind and with an
incoming tide. See Garth Hobson Test.6
    Bradford first provided his sailing alibi on September 6,
1979, during his second police interview, with his parents
present. When asked whether anyone saw him sailing that
night, Bradford unequivocally responded, “Not a soul,” and
stated that he didn’t think anybody was awake when he got
home “a little after 3.” But Bradford’s mother was indeed
awake, and she stated that “it must have been about 1:30”
when Bradford got home. When Bradford—seemingly
uncomfortable with that answer—asked his mother, “It was
later than that, wasn’t it?” Mrs. Bradford responded, “I don’t
know, Doug.” There is nothing in the interview transcripts
to suggest that the detectives told Bradford exactly when
Knight was killed, yet Bradford seemed intent on
establishing that he was at his parents’ Costa Mesa house at
3:00 a.m. and could not have been in Torrance at the time of
the murder.
    A detective called Bradford three days after the second
interview and asked Bradford to meet him in Long Beach to
show him the boat and sailing club’s reservation calendar,

6
  Even assuming that it is possible for someone to sail a Shields boat—
the type of sailboat Bradford allegedly sailed—alone at night, it was not
plausible that Bradford happened to do so on the night of the murder.
Bradford’s expert explained that it is well-known that there is typically
very little wind in Alamitos Bay at nighttime in the summer, and thus it
made no sense to him that a sailor would plan to go out at 10:00 at night.
And the expert was unable to think of any reason other than a
competition or an emergency that a qualified Shields skipper—which
Bradford was presumed to be—would choose to take the boat out alone.
The expert’s position is summed up by his agreement on cross-
examination that if someone told him, “Last night I decided to take my
Shields boat out at night by myself,” he would “yell B.S.” on that “pretty
quick.”
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                      55

which was at a separate location. Bradford told the detective
that he did not want to do that and that he did not like all the
questions he was being asked. When the detective was
nevertheless able to obtain the sign-out calendar the next
day, the calendar did include notations of “Doug 10–12” on
August 29 and “Doug 8–12” on Monday, August 27.
Neither entry indicated whether it was for morning or
evening, and as explained at trial by both the detective and
the man who kept the calendar on his unlocked back porch
in August 1979, Bradford would have had enough time to
write in these “reservations” after the detective inquired
about them on September 9 and before he obtained them on
September 10. See Test. of Detective Hilton; see also Test.
of Arthur Harrison that “[i]t would be easy” to backdate the
calendar because anyone who knew where the calendar was
kept could access it at any time.
    Bradford did consent to a search of his car about a week
after the murder, and a detective who was present during the
September 6, 1979 search testified at trial that although no
blood was found in the car, it “reeked of Armor All” and
appeared to have been freshly cleaned. The majority notes
that no garrote was found in Bradford’s car or house. See
Maj. Op. at 36. But as explained earlier, the garrote was not
missing; it was found under Knight’s body. The majority
also discounts the trial testimony about the smell and
appearance of the car, characterizing these as “observation[s
that were] made decades after the fact rather than when the
search was conducted.” Id. at 37. But the detective testified
that he was present when the car was searched, and thus he
observed the odor and appearance of the car using his senses
of smell and sight in 1979, not thirty-five years later. And
when the police searched Bradford’s house and his mother’s
house—where Bradford lived at the time of the murder—
56                  BRADFORD V. PARAMO

they were not looking for a garrote. They instead were
searching for materials that could have been used to make
the garrote found at the murder scene. At the mother’s
house, the police did find wire consistent with that used to
construct the garrote.
    Another detective recounted Bradford’s refusal to
voluntarily provide a DNA mouth swab in 2007. When the
police then presented Bradford with a search warrant
compelling compliance, Bradford tried to pull off an “air
swab” by moving the swab around the inside of his mouth
without making any contact. Although investigators did
ultimately obtain Bradford’s DNA, his attempt to avoid
providing a true swab is yet more evidence of consciousness
of guilt.
    And despite having attested in his September 3, 1979
interview that Knight was just “something [he] wanted to put
out of [his] mind entirely,” a 2009 search of Bradford’s
residence turned up an envelope containing a 5x7
enlargement of a photograph of Knight standing in snow
wearing skiing attire. The order form for the enlargement
was with the photograph, and the photograph had a date
stamp on the back indicating that it was printed in July
1979—a month after the breakup and a month before the
murder. And although the majority claims that “there is
nothing incriminating about keeping a photograph of an ex-
girlfriend in an envelope in a desk drawer,” Maj. Op. at 36,
Bradford’s purchase of the enlarged photograph after the
breakup was not consistent with his statement that he
“wanted to put [Knight] out of [his] mind entirely” and it
further undermined his credibility.
    Still more of Bradford’s untruthfulness was made known
to the jury through the testimony of Jerilyn Seacat, a nurse
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                              57

Bradford dated from 1996 until 2009. Seacat ended her
relationship with Bradford after a detective revealed to her
that Bradford was suspected of Knight’s murder and had
married another woman several years earlier. Seacat
recounted that Bradford told her early in their relationship
that “in the late seventies” he almost married “a neonatal
nurse” who “was the love of his life” but that she had “died
of a terminal illness.” And although Seacat met Bradford’s
mother early in their relationship, Bradford later told Seacat
that his mother had died, though she had not. Seacat also
testified that after she broke up with Bradford, he repeatedly
showed up at her house—even inside her house—
unannounced, attempting to reconcile. In an effort to do so,
he assured Seacat that “he had hired O.J. [Simpson]’s
murder team” and “this case was going to go away.”7
    The California Court of Appeal determined that
Bradford’s “conduct in stalking Seacat” was not admissible
to show “propensity to kill Knight” but was “strong evidence
of how he fixates on a woman after rejection and thus
provides compelling evidence of his intent, common scheme
or plan, and thus identity.” The court also explained that
“the fact that [Bradford] lied to Seacat about the mutuality
of affection between himself and Knight is what gives rise
to the inference of a consciousness of guilt.”
    B. The Excluded                 Giarrusso         Evidence        and
       Harmlessness
    Giarrusso and Knight had lived together a few years
before Knight’s murder and remained very close friends
after ending their romantic relationship. Knight invited

7
  The first part of this statement was partially true in that Robert Shapiro
represented Bradford at trial.
58                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

Giarrusso over to her apartment for dinner on the evening of
August 29, 1979. Knight had told Rolleri’s wife, Herlinda,
about the dinner plans, and the Rolleris saw Giarrusso there
with Knight that evening. When the police questioned
Giarrusso the next morning, he told police that he left
Knight’s apartment shortly before midnight and then spent
the night at the home of his then-girlfriend, Marcia Rubin—
arriving there during The Tonight Show with Johnny
Carson. Rubin corroborated this alibi both in 1979 and in
2008; in the interim, Rubin and Giarrusso married in 1981
but divorced in 1986, and Giarrusso died in 1994. In 2003—
twenty-four years after the murder—Rolleri for the first time
reported having seen what “looked to him like” Giarrusso’s
VW Beetle at a nearby stoplight in front of an arriving police
car just after Rolleri called the police on the night of the
murder.8 The defense was precluded from presenting this
and other evidence regarding Giarrusso to the jury.
     1. Physical Characteristics
    In finding the error here harmful, the majority opinion
places much stock in two physical characteristics of
Giarrusso and Bradford, contending that Giarrusso’s height
and hair matched Rolleri’s descriptions of the fleeing suspect
more closely than Bradford’s did. But in view of the record
as a whole, I cannot agree.
    On the date of the murder Giarrusso was 5' 9" tall and
weighed 164 pounds, and Herlinda—who observed him
dining with Knight on the night of the murder—described
him as “on the heavy side with dark hair that was balding in

8
 The trial court was troubled by Rolleri’s 2003 report regarding the car,
due not only to the 24-year delay in mentioning it but also to the fact that
Giarrusso’s car was “an old blue beat up Volkswagen,” “a pretty
common car, especially back in the late seventies.”
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                              59

front.” See Maj. Op. at 7 & n.2. And “[a] photograph of
Giarrusso at that time depicted him with dark curly hair.”
Maj. Op. at 24. Indeed, as Bradford states in his opening
brief, that “[p]hotograph[] shows[] [Giarrusso] with dark,
curly hair down to his collar.” See Opening Brief at 8.
    Bradford described himself in September 1979 as “about
6 feet” tall and weighing “about 160.” Other descriptions of
him in the record are similar regarding his height and weight.
See Maj. Op. at 38. And Bradford “had a full head of brown
hair at the time of the murder,” Maj. Op. at 7 n.2, and a trial
witness described his hair as “sandy,” id. at 38.
    The majority maintains that “Giarrusso fit the height and
hair color of the suspect described by Rolleri more than
Bradford did,” Maj. Op. at 38, and asserts that “dark, curly
hair . . . would exclude Bradford but could inculpate
Giarrusso in combination with other evidence,” Maj. Op. at
39. But in reaching its conclusion about whose height
matched       better,  the   majority—while        eventually
acknowledging that Rolleri gave several descriptions of the
suspect—relies solely on an outlier description that appears
in Juarez’s police report. The record as a whole, however,
does not support the conclusion that Rolleri’s hair
descriptions “inculpate Giarrusso” and “exclude Bradford.”
     Within minutes of the murder, Rolleri provided a
description of the fleeing suspect to the responding officers
at the murder scene that the officers then relayed to dispatch.
That dispatch recording was transcribed: “a white male
adult, 25 years, 6 foot, medium build, . . . dark curly hair.”9
Detective Hilton, who arrived at the scene about an hour

9
 I have omitted here the clothing description, which is not at issue in this
discussion.
60                   BRADFORD V. PARAMO

after the murder, documented in his report that Rolleri told
investigators that the fleeing man “was approx 6-0” and “had
dark curly hair, the hair was not long and . . . the back of the
hair was trimmed to the neck above the collar.” A few hours
later, detectives interviewed Rolleri and at that time he
described the fleeing man as having “black, curly hair,”
being “bigger than” Rolleri, who is 5' 9", and looking
“strong” and “built.” Two days later, on September 1, 1979,
Rolleri again spoke to the police, who documented his
description of the suspect as “approx 5-11 to 6-0, possibly
black curly hair, trimmed close to head, not bushy.”
     After the case was closed and reopened decades later, the
police again interviewed Rolleri in October 2003. On that
occasion, Rolleri described the suspect as “tall, 6 feet or
more, with an athletic type build (not fat or skinny) and
bushy or curly hair.” He also remembered that Juarez—who
is listed in his booking report as 5' 11" tall—was “too small
to be the person he saw running away” and stated that the
only similarity between Juarez and the fleeing man was
“perhaps the general look of his hair.” And in another
interview in 2010, “Rolleri agreed that it was dark and he
only saw the suspect from behind while he was running.”
“Rolleri also agreed that there was not much more he could
say about the suspect aside from the fact that he had curly
hair . . . and was approximately 6 feet tall.”
    Thus, in interview after interview over the years, Rolleri
repeatedly described the suspect as taller than 5' 9" and as
six feet tall. Yet the majority chooses to focus on the lone 5'
9" description in Juarez’s booking report. The majority
explains that it does so “because that is the description the
police elected to document.” Maj. Op. at 38. But as just
recounted, the investigators repeatedly documented their
                         BRADFORD V. PARAMO                              61

interviews of Rolleri, and again and again he described the
fleeing suspect as six feet tall or as “bigger than” 5' 9".
     I do not dispute that the 5' 9" description appears in
Juarez’s booking report, but it is not clear how it made it into
that report, which was typed up approximately seven hours
after the murder.10 And although Rolleri initially identified
Juarez at a field showup, Rolleri later realized that Juarez—
listed in the booking report as 5' 11" tall—was “too small”
to be the man he saw fleeing. This further undercuts the
notion that Rolleri ever stated that the fleeing man was 5' 9".
   Moreover, even without the Giarrusso or Juarez evidence
having been admitted, defense counsel could have asked
Rolleri at trial how tall the fleeing man appeared to be or
how tall Rolleri had reported him to be.11 But defense

10
   The majority also claims that the 5' 9" description was the one that
police dispatch distributed to officers out in the field immediately after
the murder so that they could look for the murderer. See Maj. Op. at 5
(“With this description, officers surveyed the area and discovered
Gerardo Juarez . . . .”); Maj. Op. at 37 (“Police immediately used this
description to search the surrounding area for the suspect shortly after 3
a.m.”). Although the way the booking report is written may suggest this,
it cannot be squared with the fact that the officers at the scene relayed to
dispatch a “six foot” description. Why, and how, then, would a 5' 9"
description have been broadcast? That would have required that
sometime between 3:00 a.m.—when Rolleri provided the “six foot”
description—and 3:20 a.m.—when Juarez was detained—Rolleri
changed his description to 5' 9" and officers at the scene transmitted that
new description to dispatch. There is no record evidence of that
occurring.
11
   Just before Rolleri testified, defense counsel asked the trial judge
outside the jury’s presence “whether or not [he] c[ould] ask Mr. Rolleri
the description he gave the police of” the fleeing suspect. The prosecutor
agreed that “any description that [Rolleri] gave to the police that doesn’t
involve Mr. Juarez’[s] showup they have a right to present that.”
62                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO

counsel—doubtless aware of the multiple recorded instances
of Rolleri describing the fleeing suspect as six feet tall and
as taller than 5' 9"—opted not to pursue that line of
questioning and instead focused on the suspect’s hair.12
    The majority asserts that “[b]y referencing other
descriptions,” I “stray[] from our task” and that if the
prosecution had challenged the 5' 9" description on the bases
I identify, “the jury would have been called upon to weigh
this conflicting evidence.” Maj. Op. at 38–39. While I am
certainly keenly focused on the task at hand—applying the
Brecht harmless error analysis—I agree that “the jury would
have been called upon to weigh this conflicting evidence.”
But in my view, upon doing so the jury would have had little
trouble rejecting a purported 5' 9" description—the source of
which is unknown—in the face of the overwhelming
evidence to the contrary.
    I reach the same conclusion regarding Rolleri’s
descriptions of the killer’s hair. Although Bradford was
described as having “sandy” hair, witnesses—including
Rolleri—also described him as having “bushy/curly” hair,
“curly hair” and “a lot of hair”—attributes that did match
Rolleri’s descriptions of the suspect and arguably were
easier for Rolleri to discern in the dark as he observed the
fleeing man from a distance of 65–165 feet while the suspect
was between two distant street lights. See report describing
October 9, 2003 interview of Rolleri; Trial Test. of Richard
Frank; report describing December 7, 2010 interview of

12
   And during a sidebar later in the trial, Bradford’s lawyer did not claim
that Rolleri ever described the fleeing man as 5' 9". Rather, counsel
stated: “Rolleri gives three different descriptions. One is the person is
six-feet tall. One is the person is taller than I am, which is five-foot-nine.
And one is the person is five-foot-eleven to six-feet tall.”
                      BRADFORD V. PARAMO                        63

Rolleri. Furthermore, defense counsel cross-examined
Rolleri at trial about the fleeing man’s hair. Rolleri did not
recall ever stating “that the person clearly had dark hair.”
When questioned about his September 1, 1979 description,
Rolleri acknowledged saying “black curly hair” at that time
but stated that it was “very hard for [him] to really see.” He
“tried” to give an accurate description of the hair “but it was
too dark. . . . It was too dark for [him] to see exactly whether
[the hair] was light or dark.” Thus, the issue of “sandiness”
was presented to and considered by the jury. Additionally,
although not revealed to the jury, Rolleri pointed out to
police in his 2003 and 2010 interviews that his general
description of the suspect matched Bradford, with whom
Rolleri was familiar because he frequently saw Bradford at
Knight’s apartment while the two were dating. The hair
descriptions thus do not “exclude” Bradford. On the other
hand, Rolleri’s “not long” and “trimmed to the neck above
the collar” descriptions would exclude Giarrusso, whose hair
was long and down to his collar rather than trimmed above
it.
    Additionally, Rolleri described the fleeing man as
“strong,” “built,” “athletic,” and “fast.” These adjectives fit
Bradford13 much better than Giarrusso, who was described
by Rubin as being “out of shape,” “not athletic,” “not a
muscular person,” and having a “bit of a belly (perhaps as
much as a 36 inch waist),” and by Herlinda as “on the heavy
side.”
   In sum, I do not agree with the majority that the physical
characteristics of Bradford and Giarrusso, when compared

13
   For example, Bradford explained during the September 3, 1979
interview that his hobbies included snow skiing, bicycling, tennis,
sailing, and scuba diving.
64                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

to Rolleri’s descriptions, support a finding of harmful error
under Brecht.
     2. Other Evidence
    The majority opinion suggests that Giarrusso had a
motive to kill Knight. See Maj. Op. at 28 (“As we recently
recognized, ‘[t]he excluded evidence could have provided
the missing link to establish reasonable doubt for the jury:
an actual individual who had knowledge, motive, and
opportunity.’” (alteration in original) (quoting United States
v. Espinoza, 880 F.3d 506, 519 (9th Cir. 2018))).14 But the
majority’s suggestion that Giarrusso had the same motive as
Bradford because “[h]e too had been relegated to the ‘friend
zone,’” id. at 39, is not supported by my reading of the
record.
    First of all, multiple trial witnesses testified, and
Bradford acknowledged in an interview, that Knight was the
one who ended their relationship. And yet the majority
apparently assumes that Knight broke off the relationship
with Giarrusso rather than the other way around.15 I find no
evidence supporting such an assumption, and there is a 2010
police report to the contrary. That report recounts a
statement by Giarrusso’s friend and coworker that Knight
“wanted a firmer commitment” but Giarrusso “was not

14
  Espinoza was a methamphetamine-importation case before the Ninth
Circuit on direct appeal rather than on habeas review. The Espinoza
court rejected the government’s harmless error argument there because
the defense theory that was excluded was “certainly plausible” under a
much lower standard than Brecht’s “actual prejudice” standard.
Espinoza, 880 F.3d at 519 (quoting United States v. Liera, 585 F.3d
1237, 1244 (9th Cir. 2009)).
15
  I also disagree with the majority’s suggestion that “[r]egardless of who
ended each relationship, the result was the same.” Maj. Op. at 40.
                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO                   65

interested in marriage, and [Knight] eventually moved out.”
See Summary of Witness Statement of Michael Nihill.
There simply is nothing in the record to suggest any reason
for Giarrusso to want to viciously murder Knight and pose
her in a sexually demeaning position.
    Moreover, it is beyond dispute that Knight and Giarrusso
had—like Knight and some of her other ex-boyfriends—
remained close friends for years after ending their romantic
relationship, but there is no evidence that Knight and
Bradford shared any such friendship after their June 3
breakup and Bradford’s June 4 rampage. And although
Herlinda did state in a 2003 interview that Knight told her
Giarrusso had once hit her—apparently years earlier when
they were dating—and brushed it off as “a
misunderstanding,” Giarrusso was described by witnesses as
a dear friend of Knight who was “very distraught” over her
death, and he was completely cooperative with investigators.
The same cannot be said of Bradford.
    Additionally, much of the evidence regarding Giarrusso
that the majority finds supportive of Bradford’s petition is
refuted by innocent explanations in the record. For example,
Giarrusso’s “knowledge of what a garrote was,” Maj. Op. at
13, came from watching James Bond movies, and Giarrusso
explained the reason for the “bandage on his thumb,” Maj.
Op. at 13, to interviewing detectives hours after the
murder—while rolling up his shirtsleeves and holding up his
hands for the detectives’ inspection—as a days-old cut from
a test tube in the lab where he worked.
   Moreover, Giarrusso’s girlfriend described him as “not
‘handy’ around the house or with tools,” and “not
mechanically inclined as a builder,” and he “possessed no
major tools (such as a hand drill)” like what was used to
66                  BRADFORD V. PARAMO

construct the garrote. Bradford, on the other hand, was an
engineer who, according to his mother, “had an
aptitude . . . for making and building things” in 1979. And
it is highly improbable that the jury would have disbelieved
Giarrusso’s alibi, which was corroborated by a woman who
eventually married him—not a likely course of action for
someone who thinks her beau murdered an ex-girlfriend in
cold blood. She repeated the same account after she and
Giarrusso divorced.
     3. Prosecution’s Opening Statement
    During his opening statement, the prosecutor stated,
“Now, what’s very clear is that for several nights leading up
to the murder there was one night when [Knight] was home
by herself. One night only. And that was the night that she
was murdered.” The majority contends that “[t]his statement
would have been directly contradicted if evidence regarding
Giarrusso had not been excluded,” Maj. Op. at 11, and that
the error in excluding the Giarrusso evidence “was
‘compounded and magnified’” when the trial court allowed
the prosecution to make this statement, Maj. Op. at 29
(quoting Lunbery, 605 F.3d at 762).
    But in making the statement that Knight was alone that
one night, the prosecutor was arguing that the killer took
advantage of the only night she was at home by herself
without an overnight guest. And as the trial court found, the
prosecutor’s statement was not entirely inaccurate because
Knight was alone “during the relevant time period here.”
The fact that Giarrusso had dinner with her a few hours
before the murder does not alter this fact. When Knight was
killed, there was no one at the apartment but Knight and the
murderer. Thus, I disagree that the prosecutor’s statement
“compounded” error here.
                        BRADFORD V. PARAMO                          67

     4. Application of the Brecht Harmlessness Standard
    The majority relies in part on Holmes v. South Carolina,
547 U.S. 319 (2006), to support its conclusion that the error
here was not harmless. But Holmes was not a habeas case,
and the Court did not analyze the harmlessness of the error
there under the Brecht standard.16 Moreover, in Holmes, the
petitioner proffered third-party culpability evidence “that, if
believed, squarely proved that [another man], not petitioner,
was the perpetrator.” 547 U.S. at 330. The same is true of
the other case discussed by the majority, Lunbery v.
Hornbeak, 605 F.3d 754 (9th Cir. 2010). In contrast, the
Giarrusso evidence does not “squarely prove” anything.
This is not to say that Holmes and Lunbery “requir[e]
Bradford to submit evidence that would ‘squarely prove’
Giarrusso’s culpability.” Maj. Op. at 40. Indeed, the
Supreme Court cautions that judges should not “try to put
the [harmlessness] question in terms of proof burdens,”
O’Neal, 513 U.S. at 436–37, and instead must assess it
“without benefit of such aids as presumptions or allocated
burdens of proof that expedite fact-finding at . . . trial,” id. at
437 (quoting R. Traynor, The Riddle of Harmless Error 26
(1970)). But the third-party culpability evidence excluded
in Holmes and Lunbery was far stronger than the evidence
excluded in this case in both caliber and effect. So was the
evidence in this court’s two other published post-Brecht
opinions awarding § 2254 relief in this context. See Cudjo
v. Ayers, 698 F.3d 752 (9th Cir. 2012) (third party’s
confession); Gable v. Williams, 49 F.4th 1315 (9th Cir.

16
  I concede that because of the strength of the third-party culpability
evidence in Holmes, the Court likely would have found the error harmful
even if it had applied Brecht.
68                       BRADFORD V. PARAMO

2022) (same).17 In contrast to the facts in these cases, the
Giarrusso evidence is weak, and I disagree with the
majority’s reference to it as “powerful,” see, e.g., Maj. Op.
at 4, 29 & 34.
     III. Conclusion
   In sum, the evidence against Bradford is stronger—in my
view, much stronger—than the majority opinion suggests,
especially considering the overwhelming evidence of
Bradford’s consciousness of guilt. And although I agree that
Bradford was entitled to present evidence regarding Joe
Giarrusso, exclusion of that evidence did not have
“substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining
the jury’s verdict.” Brecht, 507 U.S. at 637 (quoting
Kotteakos, 328 U.S. at 776).
    The prosecution presented extensive evidence of
Bradford’s guilt, including but not limited to his lack of
cooperation, his motive, his hair-trigger violent temper, his
untruthfulness, and his suspicious presence in front of
Knight’s apartment a week or two before the murder.
Bradford’s alibi was completely incredible, and, like other
evidence, its utter implausibility demonstrates Bradford’s
consciousness of guilt and calls into question exculpatory
statements he gave investigators. See, e.g., United States v.
Holbert, 578 F.2d 128, 129–30 (5th Cir. 1978) (“[F]alse
exculpatory statements may be used . . . as substantive
evidence tending to prove guilt. When a defendant
voluntarily and intentionally offers an explanation and this

17
  The court also decided Alcala v. Woodford, 334 F.3d 862 (9th Cir.
2003), which affirmed the district court’s conditional grant of a § 2254
petition based on cumulative error that included ineffective assistance of
counsel, exclusion of third-party culpability evidence, and other
evidentiary rulings.
                     BRADFORD V. PARAMO                      69

explanation is shown to be false, the jury may consider
whether the circumstantial evidence points to a
consciousness of guilt . . . .” (citations omitted) (citing,
among other cases, United States v. Pistante, 453 F.2d 412,
413 (9th Cir. 1971))); see also United States v. Obi, 239 F.3d
662, 665 (1st Cir. 2001).
    Most, if not all, of the reasons that the majority discounts
the various pieces of evidence against Bradford and credits
his alibi were presented to the jury. Nevertheless, the jury
disbelieved Bradford’s alibi and was persuaded by the state’s
case against him. Even if Bradford had presented evidence
regarding Giarrusso’s presence at Knight’s apartment on the
evening of the murder, that evidence would have been
countered by the prosecution. Giarrusso had an alibi, was
completely cooperative with authorities, was a dear friend of
Knight’s, and lacked any motive to kill her. I am convinced
that even if the jury had been told about Giarrusso, it still
would have reached the only reasonable conclusion
supported by the evidence—that Bradford was guilty of
Knight’s murder.
    “The writ of habeas corpus is an ‘extraordinary remedy’
that guards only against ‘extreme malfunctions in the state
criminal justice systems.’” Shinn v. Ramirez, 142 S. Ct.
1718, 1731 (2022) (quoting Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S.
86, 102 (2011)). And “[t]he Brecht standard reflects the
view that a ‘State is not to be put to th[e] arduous task [of
retrying a defendant] based on mere speculation that the
defendant was prejudiced by trial error; the court must find
that the defendant was actually prejudiced by the error.’”
Davis v. Ayala, 576 U.S. 257, 268 (2015) (second and third
alterations in original) (quoting Calderon v. Coleman, 525
U.S. 141, 146 (1998)). As stated above, even “a ‘reasonable
70                    BRADFORD V. PARAMO

possibility’ that [the] trial error contributed to the verdict” is
not enough for habeas relief. Brecht, 507 U.S. at 637.
    With the Brecht standard in mind, my esteemed
colleagues and I have reviewed the extensive record in this
case, each asking, “Do I think the error substantially
influenced the jury’s decision?” Having done so, we have
come to different conclusions. I do not believe Bradford is
entitled to the extraordinary habeas corpus relief he seeks
because the exclusion of the Giarrusso evidence did not
result in actual prejudice under Brecht. I therefore
respectfully dissent and would affirm the district court’s
denial of Bradford’s habeas petition.