Court Opinion

ID: 9480712
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 07:56:12.484922+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:47:51.207483
License: Public Domain

THORNBERRY, Circuit Judge,
specially concurring:
While I concur in the majority’s decision to deny habeas relief, I do so with a different reasoning process to reach that conclusion. As the majority indicates, the state court’s findings are not very credible, but I would not avoid them by labeling them mixed questions of fact and law.
At his state habeas corpus proceeding, Micheaux submitted affidavits containing proposed findings of fact. The state did not challenge these affidavits, and the judge signed them as the court’s findings of fact. The judge did not even cross out the word “proposed” on Micheaux’s affidavits.
The controversy in this case focuses on four of the state judge’s findings:
7. Petitioner entered guilty pleas in the mistaken belief that he could receive as little as five years in prison, when in fact the least that he could receive was 15 years in prison.
*10938. Petitioner was misled by the improper admonishment on the range of punishment at the time he entered the guilty pleas.
9. Had petitioner known that the least he could receive was 15 years in prison, he would not have waived his right to trial by jury and entered pleas of guilty, but would have exercised said right to trial by jury.
10. Petitioner relied upon the court’s admonishment as to the minimum range of punishment, as he had a right to do, in entering the guilty pleas. Petitioner also relied upon the court’s representation to him at the time of the pleas that the court would consider the entire range of punishment, including the minimum of five years, in determining what the proper punishment would be. However, the court could not lawfully consider a punishment of less than fifteen years.
The federal district court treated these findings as “findings of fact entitled to the stringent presumption of correctness under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d),” but concluded “that petitioner would not have gone to trial even if properly admonished.” In other words, even assuming that Micheaux would not have pled guilty had he known the actual range of his potential sentence, his guilty plea was still voluntary.
I. VOLUNTARINESS OF MICHEAUX’S GUILTY PLEA
If the statements quoted above are findings of fact, both this Court and the district court must presume those findings to be true unless the state court did not conduct a sufficient hearing or unless one of the statutory exceptions applies. See 28 U.S. C.A. § 2254(d) (West 1973). The district court’s holding contradicts the state court’s findings and, therefore, the holding is wrong if the presumption of section 2254(d) is applied. See ante at 1087.
I too am reluctant to give a presumption of correctness to unopposed affidavits stating what Micheaux would have done had he been properly admonished. However, this Circuit repeatedly has held that a finding of fact by a state court based solely on affidavits or on the record is entitled to the section 2254(d) presumption. See Buxton v. Lynaugh, 879 F.2d 140, 144 (5th Cir.1989), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 110 S.Ct. 3295, 111 L.Ed.2d 803 (1990); Uresti v. Lynaugh, 821 F.2d 1099, 1101 (5th Cir.1987); Craker v. Procunier, 756 F.2d 1212, 1214 (5th Cir.1985); Smith v. Estelle, 711 F.2d 677, 681-82 (5th Cir.1983), cert. denied sub nom. Smith v. McKaskle, 466 U.S. 906, 104 S.Ct. 1685, 80 L.Ed.2d 159 (1984). The majority correctly points out that even “the Texas habeas appellate court did not find these findings controlling, because it dismissed Micheaux’s application without opinion.” See ante at 1086. But the unwillingness of a state appellate court to recognize a trial court’s findings does not diminish the significance that a federal court must give to them. See Craker, 756 F.2d at 1213 (holding that district court did not err in giving section 2254(d) presumption to Texas trial court’s findings even though these findings were rejected by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals).
To avoid the section 2254(d) presumption, the majority holds that the state court’s findings go to the ultimate issue of volun-tariness and, therefore, are not findings of fact at all but instead are mixed questions of fact and law. “Having cleared the presumption of correctness hurdle,” the majority disregards the affidavits completely and has no problem finding that Micheaux’s plea was voluntary under traditional constitutional analysis. See ante at 1088-1090.
The Supreme Court has never established a clear rule to determine when the section 2254(d) presumption applies. Miller v. Fenton, 474 U.S. 104, 113, 106 S.Ct. 445, 451, 88 L.Ed.2d 405 (1985). Therefore, the only way to decide whether a state’s finding is entitled to the presumption is to compare that finding with those of prior cases.
To support its classification, the majority relies on Marshall v. Lonberger, 459 U.S. 422, 103 S.Ct. 843, 74 L.Ed.2d 646 (1983). In Marshall, the respondent was indicted by an Ohio grand jury for murder. To obtain the death penalty against the respondent, the indictment alleged that the *1094respondent previously had pled guilty to another violent crime in Illinois.1 See id. at 425-26, 103 S.Ct. at 846-47. Before admitting the indictment into evidence, the Ohio trial court conducted a hearing to determine whether the guilty plea to the Illinois charge had been voluntary. Id. at 428, 103 S.Ct. at 847-48. At the conclusion of the hearing, the court found “that the defendant [was] an intelligent individual, well experienced in the criminal process and well represented at all stages of the proceedings by competent and capable counsel in Illinois,” and, therefore, that the plea was voluntary. Id. at 428-29, 103 S.Ct. at 847-48. Notwithstanding this result, the Sixth Circuit granted the habeas petition. See id. at 430, 103 S.Ct. at 848-49.
The Supreme Court reversed. The Court held that “the governing standard as to whether a plea of guilty is voluntary for purposes of the Federal Constitution” is not a factual question, see 459 U.S. at 431, 103 S.Ct. at 849, but that any questions of historical fact determined by the state court are entitled to the presumption and must be used in analyzing the validity of the guilty plea under the federal standard, see id. at 431-32, 103 S.Ct. at 849-50. The Court determined that the Ohio court's assessment of the Illinois guilty plea was a factual finding, entitled to a presumption of correctness, and that the conclusion that the respondent’s Illinois plea had been voluntary was an inference “fairly deducible from” this finding. Id. at 435, 103 S.Ct. at 851. See also Hawkins v. Lynaugh, 844 F.2d 1132, 1137 (5th Cir.), cert, denied, 488 U.S. 900, 109 S.Ct. 247, 102 L.Ed.2d 236 (1988).
The governing constitutional standard is analogous to a federal mathematical formula. The state court supplies all of the data, and the federal court applies the federal formula to determine whether the guilty plea was voluntary. The federal court has no power to alter the state data. See Robbins, Whither (or Wither) Habeas Corpus?: Observations on the Supreme Court’s 1985 Term, 111 F.R.D. 265, 272 (1986) (noting that “the Court has held the following questions to be ones of fact only — to which the presumption does apply: voluntariness of a guilty plea”). In other words, there is a distinction between disputing the facts in Micheaux’s affidavit and disputing the constitutional significance of those facts. See Sumner v. Mata, 449 U.S. 539, 556-57, 101 S.Ct. 764, 773-74, 66 L.Ed.2d 722 (1981) (Brennan, J., dissenting).
The state court found that Micheaux would not have pled guilty had he known the actual range of his sentence. The majority does not apply the constitutional standard to this finding but instead uses an acid test and concludes that we can disregard this finding because it “directly touches on the voluntariness of the plea.” Ante at 1087. But “an issue does not lose its factual character merely because its resolution is dispositive of the ultimate constitutional question.” Miller, 474 U.S. at 113, 106 S.Ct. at 451. The majority also notes that this finding is a mixed question of fact and law because it concerns Mi-cheaux’s state of mind. Ante at 1088. But a finding of an individual’s mental state is entitled to the same deference as any other factual finding. See Miller, 474 U.S. at 113, 106 S.Ct. at 451; Patton v. Yount, 467 U.S. 1025, 104 S.Ct. 2885, 81 L.Ed.2d 847 (1984) (finding as to juror impartiality presumed correct); Rushen v. Spain, 464 U.S. 114, 120, 104 S.Ct. 453, 456, 78 L.Ed.2d 267 (1983) (holding that “[t]he substance of the ex parte communications and their effect on juror impartiality are questions of historical fact entitled to this presumption”); Mayo v. Lynaugh, 882 F.2d 134, 137-38 (1989) (holding that determinations of the credibility of witnesses and evaluations of demeanor are entitled to the presumption of correctness), opinion revised on other grounds on reh’g, 893 F.2d 683 (5th Cir.1990).
By contrast, when considering a habeas petition, a federal court does not owe the same deference to a state’s findings regarding the voluntariness of a defendant’s *1095confessions as it does to findings regarding the voluntariness of a guilty plea. See Miller, 474 U.S. at 113 & 117, 106 S.Ct. at 451 & 453 (contrasting the deference to state findings required by Marshall with the level of independent federal determination that is permissible in confession cases); id. at 118, 106 S.Ct. at 453-54 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). In evaluating the voluntariness of a defendant’s confession, a federal court is not limited to applying the “governing standard” of constitutional law, but it may also consider the totality of the circumstances surrounding the confession. See id. at 110,106 S.Ct. at 449-50. An acid test is appropriate in confession cases; certain datum supplied by the state can be inherently flawed, from a constitutional perspective.2
Therefore, the state’s determination that Micheaux was misled and that he would have gone to trial had he known the actual minimum range of his sentence was a finding of fact, not a mixed question of fact and law. This is consistent not only with Marshall but also with prior examples of findings that this Circuit has classified as factual. E.g., Loyd v. Smith, 899 F.2d 1416, 1424-25 (5th Cir.1990) (finding that defendant’s counsel was deficient); Kelly v. Lynaugh, 862 F.2d 1126, 1131 & n. 7 (5th Cir.1988) (finding that the defendant voluntarily waived his right to remain silent); Meeks v. Cabana, 845 F.2d 1319, 1322-23 (5th Cir.1988) (state’s determination that the defendant had waived his right to appeal); Lavernia v. Lynaugh, 845 F.2d 493, 499-500 (5th Cir.1988) (reliability of witness’ testimony as to a pre-trial identification procedure was a question of fact, but whether the witness’ identification testimony was constitutionally admissible was a mixed question of fact and law).
But the habeas statute does not require federal courts to presume that all factual findings by a state court are correct. Section 2254(d) provides a mechanism for disregarding a state’s factual findings if they are inherently untrustworthy. See Sumner v. Mata, 449 U.S. 539, 548-49, 101 S.Ct. 764, 769-70, 66 L.Ed.2d 722 (1981); Smith v. Black, 904 F.2d 950, 961 (5th Cir.1990). But see Bouchillon v. Collins, 907 F.2d 589, 592-94 & 593 n. 12 (5th Cir.1990) (refusing to apply section 2254(d) because state proceedings were deficient). I am uncertain why the majority explicitly circumvents this statutory mechanism. See ante at 1088 n. 7.
Neither this court nor the district court must presume that a state’s determination of a factual issue is correct if “the factfind-ing procedure employed by the State court was not adequate.” 28 U.S.C.A. § 2254(d)(2). The facts provided in the affidavits are based on the demeanor and credibility of Micheaux, something that the state court could not determine on the basis of the affidavits alone. Therefore, the district judge did not have to presume that those findings were correct; he was free to substitute his own findings, which were based on his personal observations of the witnesses. See Cabana v. Bullock, 474 U.S. 376, 388 n. 5, 106 S.Ct. 689, 698 n. 5, 88 L.Ed.2d 704 (1986), partially overruled on other grounds, Pope v. Illinois, 481 U.S. 497, 107 S.Ct. 1918, 1922 n. 7, 95 L.Ed.2d 439 (1987); Buxton, 879 F.2d at 146.
The magistrate found that Micheaux's goal in pleading guilty was to receive less than the forty years offered by the prosecutor. Ante at 1088 & n. 8. He accomplished that goal. Once the magistrate’s conclusions are substituted for those of the state court, Micheaux’s plea easily crosses the threshold of constitutionality. See ante at 1088-1090.
II. ASSISTANCE OF COUNSEL
The district court did not make factual findings on Micheaux’s ineffective assistance of counsel claim. The majority, how*1096ever, addresses Micheaux’s claim and dismisses it because Micheaux failed to prove that his defense was prejudiced under the test of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984). See ante at 1091.
Micheaux argues that his counsel was constitutionally deficient for two reasons. First, he contends that his attorney should have properly advised him (and the trial judge) of the minimum range of the sentence. If the four findings by the state court are presumed correct, Micheaux would have been prejudiced because one of those findings was that he would not have pled guilty had he known of the minimum range of the sentence. But after an evi-dentiary hearing, the district court concluded that Micheaux would have pled guilty to the charges even if he had been properly admonished.
My objection to the majority’s treatment of this prong of Micheaux’s ineffective assistance claim is identical to my objection regarding its treatment of the voluntariness of Micheaux’s guilty plea. Like the majority, I would substitute the district court’s findings for those of the state court, but I would do so because the fact-finding procedure used by the state was inadequate. See § 2254(d)(2). I would not do so by characterizing those findings as mixed questions of fact and law. See ante at 1090.
Micheaux’s second contention is that his attorney failed to investigate the validity of the information used to increase Mi-cheaux’s minimum sentence from five to fifteen years. Micheaux pled “true” to the enhancement paragraphs, which stated that he had been convicted of a prior offense of using a stolen credit card. But he now states that this conviction was based on a defective information and, therefore, was void, and that if his attorney had properly advised him, he would not have pled “true,” the enhancement paragraphs would have been dismissed, and Micheaux’s sentencing would have been within the range he was advised.
The majority dismisses Micheaux’s contention, see ante at 1091 n. 9, but its reasoning is needlessly ambiguous. After the federal district court dismissed Micheaux’s petition for habeas relief, Micheaux filed another habeas application in the state court and argued that his conviction was based on a defective information and was void. The state court specifically addressed this argument and concluded that the information was sufficient to support Micheaux’s conviction. See Ex Parte Micheaux, No. C-2-1478-8748-B (Crim. Dist.Ct. February 22, 1989). This was a factual determination entitled to a presumption of correctness. See 28 U.S.C.A. § 2254(d).
Because the state decided that the information was valid, Micheaux could not have been prejudiced by his attorney’s failure to investigate its validity. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694, 104 S.Ct. at 2068. Therefore, I concur in the majority’s decision to dismiss the second portion of Micheaux’s ineffective assistance claim.
III. CONCLUSION
I respectfully disagree with the analysis the majority uses to subjugate the state’s findings to those of the district court, but I agree with the underlying tenet of the majority’s opinion: the federal district court’s findings are far more credible than those of the state court. Therefore, I concur in the decision to affirm the district court’s refusal to deny Micheaux’s habeas petition.

. The use of the prior conviction to obtain the death penalty is similar to the enhancement paragraph used to increase Micheaux’s minimum sentence from five to fifteen years.

. In Miller, the Supreme Court was faced with two conflicting lines of authority. On one hand, the line of cases interpreting section 2254(d) had restricted federal review to applying the relevant constitutional standard. See Miller, 474 U.S. at 118, 106 S.Ct. at 453-54 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). On the other hand, cases decided by the Court on direct appeal had held that evaluating the voluntariness of a confession required an independent federal determination. See id. at 110-11, 106 S.Ct. at 449-50. The Court followed the latter ratio decidendi.