Michael T. Cooper-Smith v. Joan Palmateer

397 F.3d 1236, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS 2653, 2005 WL 356974
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
DecidedFebruary 16, 2005
Docket03-35794
StatusPublished
Cited by83 cases

This text of 397 F.3d 1236 (Michael T. Cooper-Smith v. Joan Palmateer) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Michael T. Cooper-Smith v. Joan Palmateer, 397 F.3d 1236, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS 2653, 2005 WL 356974 (9th Cir. 2005).

Opinion

T.G. NELSON, Circuit Judge.

Michael Cooper-Smith appeals the district court’s denial of his writ of habeas corpus for alleged ineffective assistance of counsel. The district court denied Petitioner’s habeas petition after declining to expand the record under Rule 7 of the Rules Governing 28 U.S.C. § 2254 cases. Petitioner objects to this decision. Petitioner also presents the uncertified issue that his sentence violated Apprendi v. New Jersey. 1 We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2253. We affirm the district court's denial of Petitioner’s habeas petition and its decision not to expand the record under Rule 7. We decline to expand the Certificate of Appealability in order to reach Petitioner’s Apprendi issue.

I. Procedural History and Facts

A. Procedural History

Petitioner Michael Cooper-Smith sought federal habeas relief on the basis that, inter alia, (1) his state trial counsel (“Counsel”) rendered ineffective assistance when he failed to pursue a motion to suppress evidence seized from Petitioner’s home and to suppress eyewitness identifications; (2) Counsel rendered ineffective assistance when he failed to call Petitioner’s doctor, Dr. True, as a witness at Petitioner’s sentencing hearing; and (3) the trial court violated Petitioner’s constitutional rights under the Fifth, Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments when it imposed a dangerous offender sentence without the predicate facts being proven to a jury.

The district court analogized the ineffectiveness claim for Counsel’s failure to pursue the suppression motion to similar claims in the guilty plea context. The district court reviewed the claim unconstrained by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1) 2 because the Oregon post-conviction trial court applied a standard that was “con *1239 trary to” Supreme Court precedent. The Oregon court applied a “more probable than not” standard rather than the Strickland v. Washington 3 “reasonable probability” standard. Applying Strickland, the district court denied the claim because Petitioner failed to demonstrate prejudice. The district court also declined to expand the record under Rule 7 to include a declaration from the Petitioner because he had not satisfied the requirements of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2). 4

The district court also denied the ineffective assistance claim based on Counsel’s failure to call Dr. True at the sentencing hearing because Petitioner had failed to establish prejudice. The district court concluded that Petitioner had failed to rebut the findings of fact of the post-conviction trial court that: (1) the sentencing judge considered Dr. True’s report and the information that was available to Dr. True at the time of his report; (2) the sentencing judge considered the Pre-Sentence Investigation Report; (3) the sentencing judge considered the report and testimony of Dr. Colbach; (4) Petitioner is exactly the kind of offender for which the dangerous offender statutes are written; and (5) Petitioner failed to show his sentence would have differed had Dr. True been called to testify on his behalf. 5 Accordingly, the district court concluded that Petitioner had failed to establish prejudice as the result of Counsel’s failure to call Dr. True, and that the post-conviction court’s rejection of his claim was not contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, Supreme Court precedent. The district court also declined to expand the record under Rule 7 to include an affidavit from Dr. True because of Petitioner’s failure to make the showing required by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2).

Finally, the district court denied Petitioner’s Apprendi claim as meritless because the Apprendi decision has not been made retroactive to collateral proceedings.

After the district court denied Petitioner’s habeas petition, Petitioner received a Certificate of Appealability (“COA”) as to the ineffective assistance of counsel claims from the district court. In conjunction with these claims, Petitioner challenges the district court’s refusal to expand the record under Rule 7. Petitioner also presents his Apprendi claim as an uncertified issue. With this procedural posture in mind, we now turn to the relevant facts from Petitioner’s state court proceedings.

B. Facts

Petitioner was indicted for four counts of rape, four counts of sodomy, two counts of attempted sodomy, three counts of kidnapping, and two counts of robbery in connection with a string of sexual assaults *1240 that occurred in the Portland, Oregon area during the summer of 1987. Prior to Petitioner’s arrest, police seized clothing, jewelry, photographs, and a machete pursuant to a search warrant covering Petitioner’s home and car. Petitioner was arrested and counsel was appointed to represent him.

Counsel filed motions to suppress the evidence seized from Petitioner’s home and to suppress eyewitness identifications from a photo montage. 6 During the hearing on the motion to suppress eyewitness identifications, three of the four victims testified and a police officer summarized the information the fourth victim provided. The victims recounted how they had met Petitioner and detailed the sexual assaults. All three of the victims identified Petitioner as their attacker. At the conclusion of the hearing, the judge approved the propriety of the photo montage and denied the motion to suppress the eyewitness identification.

After this hearing, Petitioner agreed to waive his right to a jury trial on the rape charges and to try each of his cases to the court upon stipulated facts. Because of the stipulation, Counsel abandoned the outstanding motion to suppress evidence before the court held a hearing on that motion. In exchange for the stipulation, the state agreed to dismiss the other charges. Based upon the facts to which Petitioner stipulated, the court found Petitioner guilty of four counts of rape in the first degree and ordered a dangerous offender evaluation for sentencing purposes.

Prior to the sentencing hearing, doctors for both the state and Petitioner evaluated Petitioner to determine whether he should be classified a dangerous offender. The state’s doctor, Dr. Colbach, concluded from his evaluation that petitioner had an antisocial personality and met the requirements of the dangerous offender statute. He testified to that effect at the hearing. Petitioner’s doctor, Dr.

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397 F.3d 1236, 2005 U.S. App. LEXIS 2653, 2005 WL 356974, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/michael-t-cooper-smith-v-joan-palmateer-ca9-2005.