PINHOLSTER v. WOODFORD
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals today released an opinion in PINHOLSTER v. WOODFORD, No. 03-99003, a habeas corpus appeal. The panel consisted of Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge, Raymond C. Fisher and Richard C. Tallman, Circuit Judges.
TALLMAN, Circuit Judge:
Scott Lynn Pinholster faces a death sentence in California for murdering Thomas Johnson and Robert Beckett on January 9, 1982, robbing Johnson and Beckett with intentional infliction of great bodily injury and with personal use of a knife, robbing Todd Croutch with a firearm, and burglarizing Michael Kumar’s residence. The jury found two special circumstances: Pinholster, in the same proceeding, was convicted of more than one murder, Cal. Penal Code § 190.2(a)(3) (1984), and he committed the murders during a robbery and a burglary, id. § 190.2(a)(17)(i), (vii). The jury fixed Pinholster’s penalty at death, and on June 4, 1984, the Los Angeles County Superior Court so sentenced him. On automatic appeal, the California Supreme Court, in an opinion written by Justice Stanley Mosk, set aside one multiple-murder special-circumstance finding but otherwise affirmed the judgment. See People v. Pinholster, 824 P.2d 571 (Cal. 1992). Pinholster sought a writ of habeas corpus. He challenged his convictions and death sentence. The California Supreme Court summarily denied Pinholster’s state petition for habeas corpus. Pinholster filed a federal habeas corpus petition but the district court dismissed it when the parties stipulated that the petition contained unexhausted claims. Pinholster returned to state court to exhaust those claims. On October 1, 1997, the California Supreme Court denied Pinholster’s second habeas petition. Pinholster then filed an amended federal habeas petition and requested an evidentiary hearing on several claims. The district court granted the State’s motion for summary judgment on Pinholster’s claims challenging the constitutionality of his convictions. Pinholster appeals the district court’s denial of his request for an evidentiary hearing on his guilt phase ineffective assistance of counsel claims. However, the . . .
FISHER, Circuit Judge, dissenting:
I respectfully dissent. This case is controlled by a trio of recent Supreme Court decisions holding that petitioners’ Sixth Amendment rights were violated when their lawyers failed to present available mitigating evidence during the penalty phases of their capital trials. See Rompilla v. Beard, 545 U.S. 374 (2005); Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510 (2003); Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362 (2000). The majority’s attempts to distinguish these cases are not persuasive. Pinholster’s counsel performed at least as deficiently as the lawyers in the Court’s recent decisions; and Pinholster was prejudiced as a result since the mitigating evidence that could have been introduced on his behalf was at least as strong as that in Williams, Wiggins and Rompilla, and the aggravating evidence against him was if anything weaker than that in Williams and Rompilla. Binding Supreme Court precedent therefore compels the conclusion that the state court’s summary denial of Pinholster’s penalty phase ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC) claim was objectively unreasonable. I would therefore remand for the district court to issue a writ vacating Pinholster’s sentence, unless within a reasonable time set by the court the State conducts a new penalty phase trial or imposes a lesser sentence consistent with law. I. Before addressing the majority’s penalty phase analysis, I pause to note my partial disagreement with its resolution of Pinholster’s guilt phase IAC claim. I agree that the district . . .