Caraffa v. Arizona, State of

• Court: District Court, D. Arizona
• Decided: March 30, 2020
• Docket: 2:20-cv-00598
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 WO MDR 2 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA 8 9 Alfred E. Caraffa, No. CV 20-00598-PHX-MTL (ESW) 10 Petitioner, 11 v. ORDER 12 State of Arizona, 13 Respondent.

14 15 On March 24, 2020, Petitioner Alfred E. Caraffa, who is confined in a Maricopa 16 County Jail, filed a pro se “Motion for: Habeas Co[rpu]s Motion for Subp[oe]na” (Doc. 1) 17 and a “Motion for: Injunction for Termination of Illegal Prosecution (Habeas 18 Corpus)” (Doc. 2). On March 25, 2020, he filed a Motion to Support Habeas 19 Corpus (Doc. 4). The Court will dismiss the Motion for Habeas Corpus, deny the Motion 20 for Injunction, deny as moot the Motion to Support Habeas Corpus, and dismiss this action. 21 I. Relief Unavailable under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 22 Petitioner’s state court criminal case discussed in the Petition, Maricopa County 23 Superior Court case #CR-2019-155732, is ongoing.1 Relief is therefore unavailable 24 pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, which requires that a person be in custody pursuant to a 25 judgment of a state court. 26 . . . . 27

28 1 See http://www.superiorcourt.maricopa.gov/docket/CriminalCourtCases/caseInfo. asp?caseNumber=CR2019-155732 (last visited Mar. 26, 2020). 1 II. Younger Abstention and 28 U.S.C. § 2241 2 Section 2241, 28 U.S.C., provides an avenue for habeas corpus relief for a pretrial 3 detainee in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws and treaties of the United States. 4 “As an exercise of judicial restraint, however, federal courts elect not to entertain habeas 5 corpus challenges to state court proceedings until habeas petitioners have exhausted state 6 avenues for raising [a] federal claim.” Carden v. Montana, 626 F.2d 82, 83 (9th Cir. 1980). 7 Moreover, the abstention doctrine set forth in Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 8 37 (1971), prevents a federal court in most circumstances from directly interfering with 9 ongoing criminal proceedings in state court. Absent special circumstances, such as 10 “proven harassment or prosecutions undertaken by state officials in bad faith without hope 11 of obtaining a valid conviction and perhaps in other extraordinary circumstances where 12 irreparable injury can be shown,” a federal court will not entertain a pretrial habeas corpus 13 petition. Carden, 626 F.2d at 84 (quoting Perez v. Ledesma, 401 U.S. 82, 85 (1971)). 14 “[O]nly in the most unusual circumstances is a defendant entitled to have federal 15 interposition by way of injunction or habeas corpus until after the jury comes in, judgment 16 has been appealed from and the case concluded in the state courts.” Id. at 83-84 (quoting 17 Drury v. Cox, 457 F.2d 764, 764-65 (9th Cir. 1972)). 18 Petitioner has failed to show special or extraordinary circumstances indicating that 19 he will suffer irreparable harm if this Court abstains from hearing his claims until after he 20 has a chance to present his claims to the state courts. See Younger, 401 U.S. at 45-46; 21 Carden, 626 F.2d at 83-84. This Court, therefore, will abstain from interfering in 22 Petitioner’s ongoing state-court criminal proceedings and will dismiss without prejudice 23 the Motion for Habeas Corpus, which includes requests for a subpoena for his criminal 24 case file and for an inmate grievance form he submitted in jail. For the same reason, the 25 Court will deny Petitioner’s Motion for Injunction, which seeks “an Injunction to stop the 26 current illegal prosecution of the [Petitioner] . . . .” 27 Because the Court is dismissing the Motion for Habeas Corpus, the Court will deny 28 as moot the Motion to Support Habeas Corpus. ITIS ORDERED: 2 (1) Petitioner’s “Motion for: Habeas Co[rpu]s Motion for Subp[oe]na” (Doc. 1) and this action are dismissed without prejudice. 4 (2) Petitioner’s “Motion for: Injunction for Termination of Illegal 5 | Prosecution” (Doc. 2) is denied without prejudice. 6 (3) Petitioner’s Motion to Support Habeas Corpus (Doc. 4) is denied as moot. 7 (4) The Clerk of Court must enter judgment accordingly and close this case. 8 (5) | The Court declines to issue a certificate of appealability because reasonable jurists would not find the Court’s procedural ruling debatable. See Slack v. McDaniel, 529 10| U.S. 473, 484 (2000); Wilson v. Belleque, 554 F.3d 816, 825 (9th Cir. 2009) (“a state 11 | prisoner who is proceeding under § 2241 must obtain a COA under § 2253(c)(1)(A) in order to challenge process issued by a state court’). 13 Dated this 30th day of March, 2020. 14

Michael T. Liburdi 17 United States District Judge 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 -3-