Cesar Flores-Ramirez v. Brian Foster, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Case No. 15-1594, 1/22/16 (per curiam) Flores-Ramirez is not entitled to a certificate of appealability in his challenge to the denial of his second federal habeas petition because two of his claims should have been brought in his first petition and the third claim doesn’t… Read more
B. Federal
“DIGs” as in “dismisse[s] as improvidently granted,” that is, leaving the Seventh Circuit’s grant of habeas relief intact. The case is Duncan v. Owens, USSC No. 14-1516 (dig that case number!). The issue (described here) was whether the Seventh Circuit “violated 28 U.S.C. § 2254 and a long line of this Court’s decisions by awarding habeas relief… Read more
Questions presented: I. Whether the District Court was in error when it denied relief on Petitioner’s §2255 motion to vacate, which alleged that a prior Florida conviction for “sudden snatching,” did not qualify for ACCA enhancement pursuant to 18 U.S.C. §924(e). II. Whether Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015), announced a new… Read more
Bernard McKinley v. Kim Butler, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Case No. 14-1944, 1/4/16 McKinley failed to raise an Eighth Amendment claim in his state court challenges to the sentence he received for a murder he committed at the age of 16. That means he procedurally defaulted the claim for purposes of his federal habeas challenge… Read more
Gregory Jean-Paul v. Timonty Douma, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals No. 14-3088, 12/31/15 The Wisconsin Court of Appeals reasonably concluded that Jean-Paul validly waived his right to appellate counsel based on the waiver form he signed and his correspondence with his appellate lawyer. Jean-Paul initially told his appellate lawyer he wanted to represent himself, but… Read more
White v. Wheeler, USSC No. 14-1372, 2015 WL 8546240, 12/14/15 (per curiam), reversing Wheeler v. Simpson, 779 F.3d 366 (6th Cir. 2015); docket The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals failed to give proper deference to the state courts’ rulings when it granted habeas relief on the ground that the state courts unreasonably applied Supreme Court precedent regarding removal of a… Read more
Chester O’Quinn v. Tom Spiller, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Case No. 14-1836, 11/25/15 The state appellate court reasonably applied Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514 (1972), the controlling Supreme Court precedent for Sixth Amendment speedy‐trial claims, when it rejected O’Quinn’s claim that the 42-month delay in holding his trial violated his constitutional right to… Read more
Vernard Crockett v. Kim Butler, 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Case No. 14-2320, 11/17/15 Crockett procedurally defaulted his insufficient evidence and confrontation clause claims by failing to preserve the claims at various stages of his direct appeals in state court. In his state court appeal of his murder and attempted armed robbery convictions Crockett argued there was insufficient evidence to… Read more
