Gray v. Swenson

302 F. Supp. 1162, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 9918
District Court, W.D. Missouri·Decided July 22, 1969·No. No. 1392·Published·Cited by 10 cases

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER GRANTING HABEAS CORPUS

JOHN W. OLIVER, District Judge.

I.

The state prisoner involved in this habeas corpus case is before this Court for a second time. In Gray v. Swenson (W.D.Mo.1967) 271 F.Supp. 912, we determined that petitioner had been deprived of his federally protected right to appellate counsel. Consistent with the established practice of this Court, we stayed the issuance of the writ in order to permit the State of Missouri to take appropriate steps to set aside and vacate the Supreme Court of Missouri’s affirmance of petitioner’s original conviction on direct appeal as reported in State v. Gray, 360 S.W.2d 642, to appoint appellate counsel, and to afford petitioner a new direct appeal in accordance with the command of Douglas v. California, 372 U.S. 353, 83 S.Ct. 814, 9 L.Ed.2d 811 (1963).

Appropriate procedural steps were taken to comply with the conditions of this Court’s stay order. Petitioner’s second direct appeal in the Supreme Court of Missouri was consolidated with an appeal which was also then pending in that court from a denial of an earlier Missouri Supreme Court Rule 27.26, V. A.M.R. motion. After hearing, petitioner’s original conviction was again affirmed by the Supreme Court of Missouri in State v. Gray, Mo.Sup.Ct.Div. 3, 1968, 432 S.W.2d 593.

In the second habeas proceeding in this Court, petitioner alleged and proved that the representation afforded petitioner by counsel appointed by the state trial court to represent him on his second direct appeal in the Supreme Court of Missouri was so inadequate and ineffective that his federal constitutional right to the effective assistance of counsel was again violated. The factual situation is undisputed. Counsel for respondent states with commendable candor and responsibility that “respondent would be lacking in credibility and candor before this Court and amiss in the fulfillment of his professional obligation to attempt to contend that petitioner was the recipient of effective assistance of counsel under the facts and circumstances presented.” 1

Both parties agree that under the undisputed factual situation presented that petitioner was, as a matter of law, deprived of rights guaranteed him by the Constitution of the United States in connection with his second direct appeal in the Supreme Court of Missouri. We state that conclusion of law in language suggested by respondent’s counsel, namely, “that the representation afforded petitioner by his court-appointed counsel was such that it constituted inadequate and ineffective representation by counsel in contravention of the guarantees of the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.”

[1164] II.

The parties are not, however, agreed in regard to what relief should now be granted. Petitioner contends that this Court’s writ of habeas corpus should now be issued directing petitioner’s permanent release from custody. Respondent’s first contention is that this Court should grant the writ but that a stay order substantially identical to that entered in August, 1967 be again entered to afford the State still another opportunity to vacate and set aside its second affirmance of petitioner’s direct appeal, and to appoint new appellate counsel to represent petitioner on what would be a third direct appeal. As a second alternative, respondent suggests that, at most, “petitioner be accorded a new trial, if the State desires to retry him for the offense charged, and, otherwise that he be released from custody.”

This Court is under duty to dispose of this case “as law and justice require,” Section 2243, Title 28, United States Code. We believe that the flexibility of remedy contemplated by that section affords, under the particular circumstances of this case, alternatives of relief which do not require this Court to make the hard choice between an unconditional grant of the writ and conditioning its stay order in a manner which would require a third direct appeal in the Supreme Court of Missouri.

We have concluded, for reasons we shall state, that an appropriate order be entered to allow the State of Missouri a reasonable time to afford petitioner an appropriate Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964), hearing in the state trial court, or a new trial, failing either of which, petitioner would then be entitled to his release.

III.

The unique and most unfortunate factual circumstances involved in this case tend to obscure the principles applicable to this Court’s exercise of its habeas corpus jurisdiction. Those circumstances, when viewed with appropriate judicial objectivity, merely require this Court, in order to dispose of the matter as law and justice require, to make an ultimate finding that, within the meaning of Section 2254(b), Title 28, United States Code, circumstances in fact exist which rendered the “available State corrective * * * ineffective to protect the rights of the prisoner.”

Under Section 2254(b), a federal habeas court may not properly refuse to exercise its habeas jurisdiction if either (1) there is “an absence of available State corrective process,” or (2) the factual situation presented in a particular case establishes “the existence of circumstances rendering such [available State corrective] process ineffective to protect the rights of the prisoner.”

Cases both before and after the Supreme Court’s 1963 habeas trilogy, Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 83 S.Ct. 745, 9 L.Ed.2d 770 (1963); Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391, 83 S.Ct. 822, 9 L.Ed.2d 837 (1963) and Sanders v. United States, 373 U.S. 1, 83 S.Ct. 1068, 10 L.Ed.2d 148 (1963), make clear that the second exception to the exhaustion rule codified in Section 2254 is as important as the first. See Woods v. Nierstheimer, 328 U.S. 211, 66 S.Ct. 996, 90 L.Ed. 1177 (1946); Young v. Ragen, 337 U.S. 235, 69 S.Ct. 1073, 93 L.Ed. 1333 (1949) and Jennings v. Illinois, 342 U.S. 104, 72 S.Ct. 123, 96 L.Ed. 119 (1951), for examples which make inquiry into whether any “available State corrective process” in fact existed in Illinois at that particular time, within the meaning of the first exception to the exhaustion rule.

And see United States ex rel. Mercer v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, (3rd Cir.1962) 310 F.2d 25; Hunt v. Warden, Maryland Penitentiary, (4th Cir.1964) 335 F.2d 936, 940; Harvey v. Mississippi, (5th Cir.1965) 340 F.2d 263, 268; and Smith v. Kansas, (10th Cir.1966) 356 F.2d 654, for cases which make inquiry into the second exception of whether the available state remedy was [1165] rendered ineffective under the particular facts of those cases.

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Gray v. Swenson, 302 F. Supp. 1162, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 9918 (W.D. Mo. 1969).

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