Court Opinion

ID: 9499506
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:50:29.441647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:59:33.498333
License: Public Domain

RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
The majority sets forth two rationales for its conclusion that the two-year statute of limitations on Cooey’s 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim accrued at the end of the direct review of his conviction and sentence by the Ohio Supreme Court. First, the majority expresses concern that the district court’s accrual date — at the point when the inmate’s execution is imminent and all state and federal remedies, including post-conviction proceedings, have been exhausted, — “subverts the purpose of statutes of limitations, which are designed to promote judicial economy and protect defendants’ rights.” (Maj. Op. at 419) (citation and quotation marks omitted). The majority’s other rationale is that the district court’s accrual date “adds a significant period of delay to a state’s ability to exercise its sovereign power and to finalize its judgments, which disrupts the vital yet delicate balance between state and federal relations.” (Maj. Op. at 419). In essence, however, I believe that these two reasons boil down to the single assertion that the habeas process “takes too long.” I find this rationale disturbing for the following reasons:
*425A. Justice and judicial efficiency
Timeliness is important, but justice is more important. Although the common saying is that “justice delayed is justice denied,” there are situations in which the adage does not hold true. I believe that this is one of those situations. Judges in criminal cases are allowed to apply the “ends of justice” exclusion to permit certain delays in a criminal prosecution, notwithstanding the defendant’s right to a speedy trial. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(8)(A); see also United States v. Monger, 879 F.2d 218, 221-22 (6th Cir.1989) (finding that the magistrate judge properly granted an “ends of justice” continuance in a complex criminal trial involving a large quantity of wiretap evidence and multiple coconspira-tors). I believe that the “ends of justice” principle is equally applicable to Gooey’s § 1988 challenge.
Cooey and the intervenors in his complaint allege that the lethal-injection protocol used in Ohio will violate their Eighth Amendment right to be free of cruel and unusual punishment. Specifically, they contend that the ultra-short acting anesthetic, thiopental sodium, may fail to induce unconsciousness and that, as a result, they may be conscious when the paralytic agents, pancuronium bromide and potassium chloride, are administered. They assert that if that happens, they will likely suffer excruciating pain from the resulting death by suffocation and a chemically induced heart attack, but that, because the pancuronium bromide paralyzes their voluntary muscles, they will be unable to move or speak.
The interests of justice are great where, as here, the § 1988 claimants challenge only the method by which their death sentences are carried out, not the validity of their sentences. Ensuring that executions comply with the Constitution of the United States is a paramount duty for the courts, despite the human and financial costs of protracted postconviction litigation. “[Wjhile justice delayed may be justice denied, prompt injustice is not the answer.” Haitian Refugee Ctr. v. Smith, 676 F.2d 1023, 1040 n. 43 (5th Cir.1982) (emphasis added).
The majority looks to AEDPA in its analysis of the statute-of-limitations question. I think this blurs the distinction between federal habeas proceedings and § 1983 actions, and misapprehends the distinction between the two causes of action. AEDPA imposes a one-year statute of limitations for filing a federal habeas petition. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1)(A). This one-year period promotes finality in state-court judgments. Duncan v. Walker, 533 U.S. 167, 179, 121 S.Ct. 2120, 150 L.Ed.2d 251 (2001) (“This provision reduces the potential for delay on the road to finality by restricting the time that a prospective federal habeas petitioner has in which to seek federal habeas review.”). But a § 1983 action is not an attack on the validity of the death-sentenced inmate’s conviction or sentence. Cooey concedes in his complaint that he “does not seek injunctive relief ... as a means of attacking his underlying conviction or death sentence.” His sentence became final on March 31, 2003, when the Supreme Court declined to review this court’s denial of Cooey’s federal habeas petition. Cooey v. Coyle, 538 U.S. 947, 123 S.Ct. 1620, 155 L.Ed.2d 489 (2003). Instead, he raises a claim that the state’s method for executing the death sentence will violate his constitutional rights.
The majority faults Cooey for fading to bring his method-of-execution challenge earlier, such as in 1993, when Ohio made lethal injection one of the methods of execution used in the state, or in 2001, when Ohio made lethal injection the sole method of execution. But prior to the Supreme Court’s decision in Nelson v. Campbell, *426541 U.S. 637, 124 S.Ct. 2117, 158 L.Ed.2d 924 (2004), method-of-execution challenges under § 1983 were barred in this circuit. See In re Sapp, 118 F.3d 460 (6th Cir.) (holding that a method-of-execution challenge sounded in habeas, not as a civil rights action), cert. denied sub mom., McQueen v. Sapp, 521 U.S. 1130, 117 S.Ct. 2536, 138 L.Ed.2d 1035 (1997). In fact, this court reiterated that position shortly before the Supreme Court decided Nelson. See In re Williams, 359 F.3d 811 (6th Cir.2004) (concluding that a § 1983 method-of-execution challenge should be construed as an motion for leave to file a successive habeas petition, which was denied).
Despite the above caselaw, the majority in the present case asserts that “[t]his Circuit’s precedent did not prevent Lewis Williams and John Roe from filing their lethal injection § 1983 actions.” Maj. Op. at 9. I agree with the district court’s response to this line of argument: “[The majority] is correct that Williams and Roe tried [to bring a § 1983 claim. The majority] neglect[s] to point out, however, that Williams and Roe failed. Their § 1983 action, consistent with In re Sapp, was construed as an unauthorized successive habeas petition and was never fully heard on the merits.” Williams and Roe unsuccessfully sought rehearing en banc before this court and their request for review by the United States Supreme Court was denied. Williams v. Taft, 540 U.S. 1206, 124 S.Ct. 1478, 158 L.Ed.2d 129 (2004).
In the present case, the district court declined the State’s invitation to hold that Cooey was required to bring his § 1983 method-of-execution challenge prior to Nelson. I agree. Even if Cooey could have brought his civil rights complaint before 2004, which I find dubious, I see no justification for holding that he was required to do so.
I am of the opinion that the district court’s analysis of Cooey’s complaint and of the State’s motion to dismiss is thorough, compelling, and frankly more persuasive than the majority’s analysis. After carefully considering the evidence before it, the district court articulated a reasoned basis for setting the accrual point for statute-of-limitations purposes at the time when a prisoner’s execution becomes imminent and the prisoner knows or has reason to know of the facts giving rise to his § 1983 claim. The district court fixed the point at which an execution becomes imminent as the time “when all other legal challenges to the validity of a death sentence come to an end, i.e., when the plaintiff has exhausted all of his state and federal avenues of relief.”
A death-sentenced inmate knows or has reason to know of the facts of his method-of-execution challenge when he learns the details of the protocol that will be used for his execution. Collyer v. Darling, 98 F.3d 211, 220 (6th Cir.1996) (“Under federal law as developed in this Circuit, the statute of limitations period begins to run when the plaintiff knows or has reason to know that the act providing the basis of his or her injury has occurred.”). This latter consideration poses a greater difficulty for ensuring judicial efficiency and stability in Ohio because the lethal-injection protocol is a creature of the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) and is not established by statute or administrative rule or regulation. The ODRC can change the protocol at any time, regardless of whether an inmate is scheduled for execution.
This concerns me because, as has been evidenced in the aftermath of the Joseph Clark execution, Ohio is free to periodically change its lethal-injection protocol. See Reginald Fields, Ohio revamps lethal-injection procedure, Cleveland Plain Dealer, *427June 29, 2006, at B 1 (describing the extended effort to execute Joseph Clark after prison officials were unable to find a vein in one arm, the vein in the other arm collapsed shortly after the execution began, and Clark informed correctional staff that “this isn’t working”). No statutory framework determines when or how such changes may occur. Nor is there a framework governing when, or even if, such changes will be publicized.
The majority asserts that the protocol changes resulting from the Clark execution do not relate to Cooey’s “core complaints” and were not implicated as a basis for his assertion that he may experience pain. Ohio law, however, does not require the ODRC to publish any changes to the lethal-injection protocol. The ODRC deems some information about the protocol to be public information and on that basis will provide it to the public upon request. But the ODRC considers other information nonpublic.
Moreover, I am not convinced that Ohio’s 2006 protocol changes were merely “refinements” to the procedure as the state describes them. The switch from high-pressure saline injections to a low-pressure saline drip to flush the IV tubing and maintain its “viability” raises concerns about adequately flushing the tubing between injections so that the drugs do not react with one another before they reach the inmate’s arm. I see nothing in the protocol or its amendments that addresses the risk of such an occurrence, or what steps would be taken to prevent or remedy it. As we have learned from reading the sometimes voluminous literature that accompanies even the simplest prescription, drug interactions can dramatically alter the efficacy or safety of pharmaceuticals. Without any further evidence in the record regarding how the changes affect the risk of violating a death-sentenced inmate’s constitutional rights, I am unwilling to agree with the majority that the recent protocol changes do not relate to Cooey’s core complaint.
B. When Cooey had reason to know of the grounds for his claim
The majority also contends that Cooey was aware of the lethal-injection drug combination and the equipment that would be used as of at least 2002. This assertion rests on the inclusion with Cooey’s complaint of a letter dated April 19, 2002 from James S. Haviland, then the Warden of the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility, where Ohio’s only death chamber is located, disclosing information about the lethal-injection protocol. Haviland’s letter, however, is addressed to no one and carries no address information for any recipient. From my reading of the letter, I cannot ascertain to whom it was addressed or when Cooey might have learned of its contents.
In the April 19, 2002 letter, Warden Haviland provided the names of the intravenous equipment used in executions and the generic names of the pharmaceuticals used to execute the inmate. He did not disclose the amounts of the drugs to be used, or any information about the form in which they were purchased, stored, or administered. Further, he did not state whether the drugs were administered individually or all at once, and, if individually, in what sequence. There was also no information provided about the length of the IV tubing used, whether any death-chamber personnel monitored the tubing for kinks or blockages, or whether the tubing was flushed between the drags.
In a letter dated May 30, 2002, Vincent Lagaña, ODRC Staff Counsel, responded to an unidentified recipient’s request for additional information about the lethal-injection protocol by noting that “informa-. *428tion about [lethal-injection] training, procedures, and procurement .... falls outside the scope” of the Ohio Public Record Law. Nonetheless, Lagaña provided some information about the procedure because “the Department recognizes [that] the public has legitimate interests in this subject.” This information revealed that the three drugs in the lethal-injection protocol were administered in “normal saline concentration,” that the thiopental sodium and pan-curonium bromide were purchased from “a local pharmacy” by the correctional institution pharmacy, and that the drugs were kept by the Warden in accordance with procedures developed by the Ohio State Board of Pharmacy and the Drug Enforcement Agency.
I note, however, that the letter also includes potentially misleading information. For example, it states that “[a] Medical Doctor has pronounced death.” Although this might be true to the extent that a medical doctor pronounced the death of an inmate at some point after the execution was completed, it fails to acknowledge that several associations of medical professionals, including the American Medical Association (AMA) and the Society of Correctional Physicians (SCP), direct their members not to be involved in a legally authorized execution. The AMA permits physicians to “certifyf] death, provided that the condemned has been declared dead by another person.” Am. Med. Ass’n, Code of Ethics E-2.06 (2000). Under the SCP Code of Ethics, “[t]he correctional health professional shall not be involved in any aspect of execution of the death penalty.” Soc’y of Corr. Physicians, Code of Ethics (1998), http://www. corrdocs.org/ethics.html (last visited Feb. 16, 2007).
I take the facts in the light most favorable to Cooey, as I must when reviewing a denial of a motion to dismiss under the de novo standard. See Miller v. Currie, 50 F.3d 373, 377 (6th Cir.1995). After reviewing the letters from ODRC officials, which purport to set out the lethal-injection policy that was in place in 2002, I am unable to conclude that Cooey had reason to know of the facts underlying his claim prior to that time. The ODRC’s response to requests for information has been grudging and incomplete, and it apparently has unfettered discretion in determining whether the requested information is or is not to be made public.
Even having read the letters, I can see how a reasonable person would still be uninformed as to Ohio’s death-penalty protocol or how it might support a civil rights action. At best, Cooey’s knowledge of the protocol as of May of 2002 would have been murky; it would have been totally opaque at any time prior to that date. The point of all this is that the majority’s assertion that Cooey had reason to know of the basis for his complaint in the 1990s is not supported by the record. And although I recognize that May of 2002 represents a point more than two years before Cooey in fact filed his § 1983 complaint, this is only one part of the necessary analysis. The other part is to determine when Cooey’s execution date became imminent. This did not occur until March 31, 2003, when the Supreme Court denied his petition for certiorari in his habeas proceeding. He filed his present complaint on December 8, 2004, which was 21 months later.
C. When Cooey’s execution became imminent
Almost every death-sentenced inmate challenges his or her conviction and sentence through habeas proceedings. Under the majority’s rationale, however, virtually every death-sentenced litigant will be barred from bringing a § 1983 action chai-*429lenging the constitutionality of the method of execution chosen by the State. Habeas proceedings have become, for good or for ill, a routine part of the process of carrying out a death sentence in our criminal justice system. To require a petitioner to file a § 1983 action three to five years before his or her execution in order to obtain legal review of the lethal-injection protocol strikes me as counterintuitive, unduly harsh, and just plain wrong. Yet that is what the majority’s rationale will require.
Moreover, both the petitioners and the courts will have to manage the cognitive dissonance and inefficiency of simultaneously deciding (1) habeas petitions attacking the validity of the conviction and sentence, and (2) § 1988 actions challenging the constitutionality of the procedure used to carry out the sentence. The majority will thus force death-sentenced prisoners to pursue their habeas claims that assert their lack of culpability or, in some instances, their actual innocence, while simultaneously implying their guilt by requesting that the sentence imposed upon them be carried out in a constitutionally compliant manner.
Statutes of limitations are intended to “promote judicial economy and protect defendants’ rights.” John Hancock Fin. Servs., Inc. v. Old Kent Bank, 346 F.3d 727, 734 (6th Cir.2003). But the concept of judicial economy contemplates more than just the minimization of temporal delay between the imposition of a capital sentence and an inmate’s execution. Although the Fifth Circuit has held that a method-of-execution challenge can be raised at any time after an inmate’s sentence became final on direct review, Neville v. Johnson, 440 F.3d 221, 222 (5th Cir.2006) (per curiam), this analysis is incomplete. The majority defends its adoption of the Neville accrual point as “the most logical,” but I consider even more logical the analysis of the district court in the present case that fixes the statute of limitations accrual date at the point when a petitioner’s execution becomes imminent and he has reason to know of the facts giving rise to his claim.
This accrual date provides clarity and certainty to both the death-sentenced inmate and the State that the sentence is final and not susceptible to attack, that the execution date is set, and that the protocol for that execution is likely fixed. Such clarity also aids the judicial process and increases the efficiency of judicial proceedings by ensuring that the federal courts are not overseeing simultaneous but contradictory arguments from the parties.
Contrary to the majority, I see nothing in the Supreme Court’s February 21, 2007 opinion in Wallace v. Kato, — U.S.-, 127 S.Ct. 1091, — L.Ed.2d - (2007), that bears on the issue of when the statute of limitations should accrue in the case before us. Wallace is a civil rights case that turned on the well-recognized point that “[t]he cause of action accrues even though the full extent of the injury is not then known or predictable.” Id. at 1097. Here, Cooey had no reasonable basis to know if he would have any injury at all (in terms of the lethal-injection protocol) until his execution date became imminent. I therefore conclude that Cooey’s § 1983 action is not barred by Ohio’s two-year statute of limitations.
D. Equitable arguments to forestall delay
Because I believe that the statute of limitations should not begin to run until an execution becomes imminent, and because Ohio will almost always move promptly to set an execution date, I would envision that the statute of limitations would rarely, if ever, be an issue in these § 1983 cases. The crucial issue for federal courts to de*430cide, then, is not the statute of limitations, but whether equitable considerations should bar a prisoner from bringing a last-minute § 1983 claim. This is a concern that Ohio makes much of in the present case. Although there is undoubtedly some merit to this concern, I see no reason to diverge from the Supreme Court’s position in Hill v. McDonough, — U.S.-, 126 S.Ct. 2096, 165 L.Ed.2d 44 (2006), that “inmates seeking time to challenge the manner in which the State plans to execute them must satisfy all of the requirements for a stay, including a showing of a significant possibility of success on the merits.” Id. at 2104. This includes applying “a strong equitable presumption against the grant of a stay where a claim could have been brought at such a time as to allow consideration of the merits without requiring entry of a stay.” Nelson v. Campbell, 541 U.S. 637, 650, 124 S.Ct. 2117, 158 L.Ed.2d 924 (2004).
The district court, with its ability to hear and weigh the evidence, necessarily has the greatest information available to it from which to balance the equities when considering a death-sentenced prisoner’s request for a stay of execution. As we have seen in the present case, the district court has capably engaged in that very task, despite the sometimes inconsistent guidance received from this court. Compare Gooey (Lundgren) v. Taft, No. 06-4374 (6th Cir. Oct. 23, 2006) (summarily vacating the stay of execution for Jeffrey Lundgren, who had an execution date of October 24, 2006), with Cooey (Henderson) v. Taft. No. 06-4527 (6th Cir. Dec. 1, 2006) (reversing the district court’s denial of Jerome Henderson’s motion to stay his execution).
The district court also considered and addressed the concern that death-sentenced inmates might seek to use § 1983 actions as a delaying tactic, cautioning would-be plaintiffs that “nothing ... should be construed as guaranteeing or even suggesting that a plaintiff who waits too long to file his § 1983 action raising a method-of-execution claim will be entitled to a preliminary injunction.” This concern about excessive delay was underscored by the Supreme Court’s decision in Hill, which stated that equity requires that inmates seeking a stay of execution to raise a § 1983 claim must meet all the requirements for a stay. 126 S.Ct. at 2104. “[E]q-uity must be sensitive to the State’s strong interest in enforcing its criminal judgments without undue interference from the federal courts.” Id.
Factors that may play a persuasive or even dispositive role in a court’s determination of whether to grant a stay of execution might include such considerations as (1) whether the protocol has recently been changed, (2) whether the petitioner has been diligent in pursuing his or her claim, (3) whether the petitioner has taken reasonable steps to ascertain what the protocol is (and I note that past ODRC letters in response to requests for information about the protocol have been shown to be incomplete and terse to the point of being uninformative), and (4) whether the traditional factors involved in the balancing test for granting a preliminary injunction weigh in favor of a stay. A conclusory statement by a petitioner with no factual support or development is unlikely to result in the entry of a stay in this or any other matter. Petitioners who have been diligently pursuing their method-of-execution claims, in contrast, will likely include affidavits from a medical expert in support of their arguments. If reasonable jurists could debate whether a well-documented claim could result in the relief that the petitioner seeks, then equitable considerations, barring other persuasive evidence to the contrary, would weigh in favor of granting a stay.
*431I again wish to emphasize that the relief sought here is not to be spared the death penalty, but rather to be spared from cruel and unusual punishment in the administration thereof. Because I am convinced that Cooey brought his § 1983 claim within the two-year statute of limitations period as properly defined, I respectfully dissent.