Williams v. Head

• Decision Date: 26 August 1999
• Docket Number: No. 97-8983,97-8983
• Citation: 185 F.3d 1223
• Parties: (11th Cir. 1999) Alexander E. WILLIAMS, IV, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Frederick J. HEAD, Warden, Respondent-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1223

185 F.3d 1223 (11th Cir. 1999)

Alexander E. WILLIAMS, IV, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Frederick J. HEAD, Warden, Respondent-Appellee.

No. 97-8983.

United States Court of Appeals Eleventh Circuit.

Aug. 26, 1999.

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia. (No. 92-209-CV-1), Dudley H. Bowen, Jr., Judge.

Before ANDERSON, Chief Judge, and CARNES and BARKETT, Circuit Judges.

CARNES, Circuit Judge:

Alexander Williams is a Georgia death row inmate. We have previously addressed and disposed of most of his appeal from the denial of his 28 U.S.C. 2254 petition. See Williams v. Turpin, 87 F.3d 1204 (11th Cir.1996). Our prior decision summarizes some of the facts relating to his crime and gives a fairly detailed account of the procedural history of the case up to that point. Assuming familiarity with that opinion we will not duplicate everything said there, but we will set the stage for this opinion by summarizing briefly what we did in the earlier one.

In our previous opinion we affirmed the denial of habeas relief to Williams as to all but one of the claims relating to his conviction and sentence. The sole exception was Williams' claim that his trial counsel, an attorney named O.L. Collins, had rendered ineffective assistance at the guilt and sentence stages of the trial. That claim was first raised by another attorney, Richard Allen, who represented Williams at a motion for new trial hearing in state court. See Williams, 87 F.3d at 1206-07. The state courts rejected the claim on the merits. See Williams v. State, 258 Ga. 281, 286-90, 368 S.E.2d 742, 747-50 (1988).

Although Williams has not explicitly abandoned the ineffective assistance claim relating to the guilt stage or to other aspects of counsel's performance at the sentence stage, the principal thrust of his argument is the ineffective assistance claim relating to the investigation and presentation of mitigating evidence at the sentence stage. That claim led to our remand and to the evidentiary hearing that followed. To the extent Williams still contends that attorney Collins rendered ineffective assistance in any regard other than the investigation and presentation of mitigating circumstances at sentence stage, we affirm the district court's rejection of that claim for the reasons stated in the district court's pre-remand opinion and in the state court opinions dealing with those issues.

We also conclude, as Williams' present counsel seem to recognize, that his claim that trial counsel Collins rendered ineffective assistance regarding mitigating circumstances cannot succeed if the only evidence considered is that which attorney Allen presented to support that claim in the new trial hearing. See Williams v. State, 258 Ga. at 289-90, 368 S.E.2d at 750. Instead of relying on the new trial hearing record, Williams' present counsel have brought forward a substantial amount of new evidence which they say should have been considered by the district court in deciding whether trial counsel Collins was ineffective at the sentence stage.

As we explained in our prior opinion, the additional evidence in question may be considered in this federal habeas proceeding only if Williams can show cause and prejudice for failing to present the evidence in the new trial hearing in state court. See Williams, 87 F.3d at 1208 (citing Keeney v. Tamayo-Reyes, 504 U.S. 1, 11-12, 112 S.Ct. 1715, 1721, 118 L.Ed.2d 318 (1992)). Williams' sole theory of cause to excuse his failure to present this evidence at the hearing on the motion for new trial is that his attorney there, Richard Allen, rendered ineffective assistance in connection with that proceeding. That is the issue the present appeal turns on. We recognized in our earlier opinion that a Georgia capital defendant has a right to effective assistance of counsel in a new trial proceeding, which is where ineffective assistance claims are decided under Georgia's Unified Appeal Procedure. See Williams, 87 F.3d at 1209-10.

Accordingly, we remanded the case to the district court with instructions for it to examine the evidence Williams proffered about Allen's performance in connection with the new trial proceeding. The court was to determine whether the evidentiary proffer about Allen's performance was sufficient to support a finding of cause and prejudice for the failure to present in the new trial proceeding the additional evidence that trial counsel (Collins) had rendered ineffective assistance at the sentence stage of the trial. If the district court found the proffer sufficient, it was to hold an evidentiary hearing on the cause and prejudice issues. And if it found cause and prejudice, the district court was then to consider the new evidence relating to Collins' performance and decide whether Collins had rendered ineffective assistance at the sentence stage. See Williams, 87 F.3d at 1211.

On remand, the district court skipped the question about the adequacy of the proffer and proceeded with an evidentiary hearing on the cause and prejudice issues. After hearing testimony from Allen and considering all of the evidence the parties wished to present, the district court found that Williams had failed to show Allen's performance in the new trial proceeding had been ineffective; therefore, the court concluded that Williams had not established cause for his failure to present in that proceeding the additional evidence relating to Collins' sentence stage performance. For that reason, the district court did not consider the additional evidence in deciding whether Collins had rendered ineffective assistance at sentencing, and the court reiterated its rejection of that claim and its denial of Williams' habeas petition.

We now review the district court's decision that Allen did not render ineffective assistance in his representation of Williams in connection with the new trial motion. Our review of the district court's legal holdings and ultimate conclusion is de novo, but we review its findings of fact only for clear error. See, e.g., Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 698, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 2070, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984). Before getting to the specific facts involving Allen's performance at the new trial hearing, some preliminary matters need to be discussed.

THE OPERATIVE PRESUMPTION

One preliminary matter involves the lens through which we view ineffective assistance claims. In the seminal decision on modern ineffective assistance law, the Supreme Court instructed us that "[j]udicial scrutiny of counsel's performance must be highly deferential." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 2065. Not only that, but "a court must indulge a strong presumption that counsel's conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance." Id. More specifically, courts should "recognize that counsel is strongly presumed to have rendered adequate assistance and made all significant decisions in the exercise of reasonable professional judgment." Id. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 2066.

Speaking en banc, we have explained that "[b]ecause constitutionally acceptable performance is not narrowly defined, but instead encompasses a 'wide range,' a petitioner seeking to rebut the strong presumption of ineffectiveness bears a difficult burden." Waters v. Thomas, 46 F.3d 1506, 1512 (11th Cir.1995) (en banc). That is why " 'the cases in which habeas petitioners can prevail on ineffective assistance claims are few and far between,' " id. at 1511 (quoting Rogers v. Zant, 13 F.3d 384, 386 (11th Cir.1994)), and "[c]ases in which deliberate strategic decisions have been found to constitute ineffective assistance are even fewer and farther between." Spaziano v. Singletary, 36 F.3d 1028, 1039 (11th Cir.1994).

The strong presumption that counsel rendered effective assistance and made all significant decisions in the exercise of reasonable professional judgment is particularly important in this case. The district court found attorney Allen's recollection of the relevant events, which occurred ten years before he testified at the federal evidentiary hearing, was severely hampered by the loss of his case file. After the new trial proceeding and appeal, Allen turned the file over to someone else who was to represent Williams thereafter and the file was lost. It has never been found.¹ Allen explained that he could not recall many of his thought processes concerning the case, which is understandable. As the district court vividly described Allen's situation, "It's like asking somebody to put a blindfold on and grope around in a dark room where they had been maybe ten years ago to recall what he did or did not do."

Given the passage of so much time, and without his file, Allen's testimony in the district court was, in that court's words, "guarded and, understandably, he often hedged his answers," expressing an "unwillingness to speculate about what he might have done or not done, heard or not heard, and his recollection of specific details was often hazy, which is also understandable." Recognizing the strength and applicability of the presumption that counsel rendered effective assistance, the district court correctly refused to "turn that presumption on its head by giving Williams the benefit of the doubt where it is unclear what Allen did or did not do because Allen turned his file over to someone on Williams' legal team." Following the Supreme Court's instructions, we will "indulge a strong presumption that [Allen's] conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance," and that he "made all significant decisions in the exercise of reasonable professional judgment." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689-90, 104 S.Ct. at 2065-66. That means where the record is incomplete or unclear about Allen's actions, we will presume that he did what he should have done, and that he exercised reasonable professional judgment.

ALLEN'S EXPERIENCE AND THE EXPERIENCED HELP THAT HE R...