Harmon v. McCollum

652 F. App'x 645
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
DecidedJune 14, 2016
Docket16-6080
StatusUnpublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 652 F. App'x 645 (Harmon v. McCollum) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Harmon v. McCollum, 652 F. App'x 645 (10th Cir. 2016).

Opinion

ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY *

Mary Beck Briscoe, Circuit Judge

Pro se litigant 1 Sonny Lauren Harmon seeks a Certificate of Appealability (COA) from the district court’s denial of habeas corpus relief from his state convictions. Exercising jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we deny a COA, deny Harmon’s motion to proceed in forma pauper-is, and dismiss the matter.

I

The convictions at issue arise from Harmon and his son Tommy breaking into and stealing items from a home, a school, and a farm-supply store in 2001. Harmon was convicted in Garvin County, Oklahoma of three counts of second degree burglary and one count of felonious possession of a firearm. Harmon also pled guilty in Ponto-toc County to knowingly concealing property which was stolen in those burglaries. 2 For reasons not relevant here, Harmon’s Garvin County convictions were vacated and remanded for a new trial. In 2006, upon remand, Harmon was again convicted of three counts of second degree burglary, after a bench trial. Harmon again appealed his convictions, alleging nine errors of state and federal law. The OCCA affirmed the convictions and sentence.

Harmon initiated post-conviction proceedings in Garvin County state court in 2009. In his post-conviction application for relief, Harmon raised eight new issues in addition to the nine issues raised in his direct appeal. The state trial court appointed counsel for Harmon and held an eviden-tiary hearing, but denied Harmon’s application. Harmon filed a notice of intent to appeal on September 8, 2009. His counsel was then permitted to withdraw, and the court appointed the Oklahoma Indigent *647 Defense System (OIDS) to represent Harmon in the post-conviction appeal to the OCCA. On September 22, OIDS filed a motion with the OCCA to withdraw, citing Harmon’s ineligibility for the service at that stage of the litigation. On October 9, after Harmon’s thirty-day period to file his petition expired without filing his petition, the OCCA dismissed Harmon’s case on procedural grounds. It did not rule on OIDS’s motion to withdraw, stating the motion was moot. The OCCA instructed Harmon that he could file an application in the Oklahoma trial court for a post-conviction appeal out of time if he could show that his default was through no fault of his own. Harmon did not immediately file for an appeal out of time.

Instead, in 2010, Harmon filed a petition for habeas corpus relief in federal district court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. In his petition, he asserted his original nine claims of error from his direct appeal of his bench trial, as well as his additional eight claims raised in post-conviction proceedings. The State moved for dismissal of the post-conviction claims because Harmon failed to exhaust those claims before the OCCA. The district court, concerned about OIDS’s withdrawal from the post-conviction appeal, administratively closed the ha-beas proceedings to allow Harmon to exhaust his state-court remedies and seek an appeal out of time in Oklahoma state court.

Harmon then filed a motion for appeal out of time in Garvin County state court. The court found that he had been denied his post-conviction appeal through no fault of his own and permitted Harmon to file an out-of-time post-conviction appeal in the OCCA. Harmon was given thirty days to file this appeal, but failed to do so. Over the next two years, however, Harmon filed a series of motions for writs of mandamus in Garvin County and the OCCA, seeking various forms of relief from his default. These motions were unsuccessful, and the OCCA ruled in 2012 that Harmon abandoned his out-of-time post-conviction appeal, and therefore had exhausted his available state remedies.

Following these rulings, the federal district court reopened Harmon’s habeas proceedings. A magistrate judge prepared a report and recommendation, recommending Harmon’s petition be denied, which the district court adopted. Harmon filed a request for a COA from the district court and a motion to proceed in forma pauperis, which were both denied. The district court also certified that the appeal was not taken in good faith. Harmon now seeks a COA from this court.

II

Harmon cannot appeal the district court’s denial of his petition for habeas relief “[u]nless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1). “A certificate of ap-pealability may issue ... only if the applicant has made a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” Id. § 2253(c)(2). In a § 2254 petition for habe-as relief from a state court conviction, “[w]e look to the District Court’s application of [§ 2254] to petitioner’s constitutional claims and ask whether that resolution was debatable amongst jurists of reason,” including the district court’s denial of a habeas petition on procedural grounds. Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336, 123 S.Ct. 1029, 154 L.Ed.2d 931 (2003); Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484, 120 S.Ct. 1595, 146 L.Ed.2d 642 (2000). If the state court did not decide the issue on the merits, and the claim is not procedurally barred, “the district court then decides the issue in the first instance, and we review its conclusions of law de novo and its findings of fact for clear error.” Fairchild v. *648 Trammel, 784 F.3d 702, 712 (10th Cir. 2015).

Ill

For purposes of his request for a COA, Harmon has waived six of the seventeen grounds 3 for habeas relief he asserted in the district court. Eleven grounds for relief remain: seven issues first raised in Harmon’s direct appeal to the OCCA, and four issues first raised in his post-conviction proceedings.

A. Ground 1: Admission of Prior Conviction

Harmon argues that his burglary convictions should be reversed because the trial court admitted evidence of his prior conviction for knowing concealment of stolen property, in violation of Oklahoma evidentiary rules. Admission of prior bad act evidence under state-law rules has “no part of a federal court’s habeas review of a state conviction,” Estelle v. McGuire, 502 U.S. 62, 67, 112 S.Ct. 475, 116 L.Ed.2d 385 (1991), unless the error “resulted in a fundamentally unfair trial,” Knighton v. Mullin, 293 F.3d 1165, 1171 (10th Cir.2002).

Here, although Harmon mentions the Fourteenth Amendment in passing, he does not argue that admission of his prior conviction resulted in fundamental unfairness. Nor can we discern any fundamental unfairness from the record.

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Bluebook (online)
652 F. App'x 645, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/harmon-v-mccollum-ca10-2016.