Zappulla v. New York

• Decision Date: 17 November 2004
• Docket Number: Docket No. 03-2793.
• Citation: 391 F.3d 462
• Parties: Guy ZAPPULLA, Petitioner-Appellant, v. People of the State of NEW YORK, Respondent-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

391 F.3d 462

Guy ZAPPULLA, Petitioner-Appellant, v. People of the State of NEW YORK, Respondent-Appellee.

Docket No. 03-2793.

United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.

Argued: July 15, 2004.

Decided: November 17, 2004.

Amended: December 7, 2004.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Brian Sheppard, New Hyde Park, N.Y. for Petitioner-Appellant.

Camille O'Hara Gillespie, Assistant District Attorney, Kings County (Charles J. Hynes, District Attorney, Victor Barall, and Leonard Joblove, Assistant District Attorneys, on the brief), Brooklyn, NY, for Respondent-Appellee.

Before: POOLER, SACK, and RAGGI, Circuit Judges.

Judge RAGGI dissents in a separate opinion.

POOLER, Circuit Judge.

Petitioner-Appellant Guy Zappulla appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York (Weinstein, J.), entered October 10, 2003, denying his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. His petition sought to challenge a judgment of the New York Supreme Court, Kings County (Kreindler, J.), rendered on March 30, 1999, convicting him after a jury trial of murder in the second degree. The New York State Appellate Division, Second Department ("Appellate Division"), affirmed Zappulla's murder conviction while concluding that the wrongful admission of Zappulla's confession, taken in violation of his Miranda rights, was harmless error. We find that the Appellate Division applied the harmless error review in an "objectively unreasonable" manner, and that the erroneous admission of his confession requires us to vacate his conviction.

BACKGROUND

The facts of the case are derived largely from the factual account in the district court decision, which in turn was drawn from the Appellate Division's decision affirming Zappulla's conviction. Zappulla v. New York, 296 F.Supp.2d 309, 311 (E.D.N.Y.2003) ("Zappulla"); People v. Zappulla, 282 A.D.2d 696, 724 N.Y.S.2d 433 (2d Dep't 2001) ("People"). On March 17, 1998, at approximately 12:30 a.m., Zappulla was arrested at the Golden Gate Inn in Brooklyn, New York, based on a police report that he had stolen his girlfriend's fur coat and jewelry. Zappulla, 296 F.Supp.2d at 311. At the time of his arrest, the arresting officers read him his rights pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), and then attempted to question him about the theft. Zappulla refused to talk about the theft but spoke about other matters. During this time, the police found a motel room key on Zappulla's person and went to the corresponding room. Inside the room, the police officers discovered the fur coat that was reported stolen and the dead body of a prostitute, Jennifer Scarpati, a.k.a. Jennifer Imparato ("Jennifer"), hidden under one of the motel beds. In the meantime, Zappulla momentarily escaped from police custody and, while attempting to flee, was hit by a car and taken to the hospital. Upon his return to police custody the following day, Zappulla was again questioned, although this time he was not warned about his Miranda rights and was questioned about the more serious crime of murder. Zappulla initially stated that he wanted a lawyer, and the officers responded, "If you want a lawyer, we can't speak to you any further." Zappulla, 296 F.Supp.2d at 312. Zappulla then confessed to the police about the murder and signed a statement memorializing his confession. In this confession, Zappulla admitted that an individual named "Teamo or Aaron" (a.k.a. Aaron Cohen) rented a motel room for him and he stayed there for three days "getting high." Jennifer, a close friend of Cohen's, joined Zappulla at the motel room and smoked crack with him and Cohen. Zappulla's confession indicated that he later became angry when he realized that Jennifer had stolen jewelry from him to purchase more crack. According to the confession, he then got into an argument with Jennifer about the jewelry, choked her, and left the room.

The trial court rejected Zappulla's motion to suppress the confession and permitted the prosecutor to use the confession at trial. Zappulla's first trial for Jennifer's murder resulted in a mistrial after the jury deliberated for three days without being able to reach a verdict, despite the reading of an Allen charge. At the second trial, the prosecutor relied more heavily on Zappulla's confession, mentioning it as the first piece of evidence in the prosecution's case. At summation, the prosecutor again discussed the circumstances and details of Zappulla's confession. The prosecutor emphasized how the confession was credible and tied in with other evidence in the case and how it provided vital evidence of motive. On March 10, 1999, the court delivered a charge to the jury on intentional murder, and the jury retired to deliberate at approximately 9:30 a.m. The jury requested and received numerous items, including Zappulla's signed confession. At 5:15 p.m., the jury returned with a verdict, finding Zappulla guilty of intentional murder. On March 30, 1999, the court sentenced Zappulla to a prison term of 25 years to life.

The Appellate Division affirmed Zappulla's conviction on direct appeal even though it found that the trial court erred in admitting Zappulla's confession. People, 282 A.D.2d at 697, 724 N.Y.S.2d 433. The court found that the confession was defective because 24 hours had elapsed between the initial questioning of Zappulla, where Miranda warnings were given, and the subsequent interrogation, where the officers questioned him without Miranda warnings about a different crime and custody was not continuous. The court, however, found that failure to suppress the confession was harmless in light of the "overwhelming evidence of his guilt." Id. at 698. Specifically, the court found:

A witness testified that the defendant was with [Jennifer] in Room 234 at the Golden Gate Inn in the days and hours immediately before the crime. Surveillance videotape from the motel showed the defendant leaving and then reentering the motel shortly before the police arrived and arrested him on March 17, 1998. Expert testimony indicated that [Jennifer's] death occurred sometime between the evening of March 16 and the early morning of March 17. The key to Room 234, the room where [Jennifer's] body was found, was recovered from the defendant's person after his arrest. D.N.A. testing of blood found on the defendant's clothing revealed that the blood was [Jennifer's]. In addition, the defendant admitted to an inmate, who was incarcerated with the defendant pending trial, that when he choked [Jennifer] "blood came out." In light of this overwhelming evidence, there is no reasonable possibility that the error of admitting the defendant's statement into evidence might have contributed to his conviction.

Id. A judge of the New York Court of Appeals denied Zappulla's application for leave to appeal. People v. Zappulla, 96 N.Y.2d 909, 730 N.Y.S.2d 808, 756 N.E.2d 96 (2001). No state collateral proceedings were initiated.

Having sufficiently exhausted his avenues for relief under state law, in June 2002, Zappulla, pro se, filed a habeas petition in the district court for the Eastern District of New York. On September 30, 2003, the district court denied Zappulla's petition by holding that, although the confession was erroneously admitted, admission of the confession was harmless in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt. Zappulla, 296 F.Supp.2d at 319. In so holding, the district court specifically adopted the reasoning of the Appellate Division, set forth above, with little additional analysis. Id. The district court, however, granted Zappulla a certificate of appealability on the question of whether the erroneous admission of the confession was harmless. Id. at 320. On December 22, 2003, this Court appointed counsel to represent Zappulla in this appeal.

DISCUSSION

"This Court reviews de novo the District Court's denial of the petition [for habeas corpus]." Francolino v. Kuhlman, 365 F.3d 137, 140 (2d Cir.2004).

I. Harmless Error Standard

Where a confession has been erroneously admitted in violation of the defendant's Miranda rights, this constitutional error is subject to a harmless error analysis. See Arizona v. Fulminante, 499 U.S. 279, 310, 111 S.Ct. 1246, 113 L.Ed.2d 302 (1991); Brown v. Keane, 355 F.3d 82, 91 (2d Cir.2004) ("A habeas petitioner is entitled to relief only if the constitutional error at trial was not harmless.").

Prior to the enactment of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 ("AEDPA"), Pub.L. No. 104-132, 110 Stat. 1214, the Supreme Court held in Brecht v. Abrahamson that, on collateral review of a state conviction, an error is harmless if it did not have a "substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the jury's verdict." 507 U.S. 619, 637, 113 S.Ct. 1710, 123 L.Ed.2d 353 (1993) (internal quotation marks omitted). In Chapman v. California, the Court held that on direct review of a criminal conviction an error may be overlooked only if it is "harmless beyond a reasonable doubt." 386 U.S. 18, 24, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967). Under AEDPA, a federal habeas court may grant the writ if the state court's decision constitutes an "unreasonable application" of "clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States." 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). We have previously noted that it remains "an open question in this circuit whether, following the passage of AEDPA, the applicable test on habeas review of a state conviction remains the one set forth in Brecht, or instead should be a determination [of] whether the state court's decision was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of Chapman." Brown, 355 F.3d at 91 (quoting Noble v. Kelly, 246 F.3d 93, 101 n. 5 (2d Cir.2001)) (internal quotation marks omitted).

Recently, the Supreme Court arguably resolved this uncertainty. Mitchell v. Esparza, 540 U.S. 12, 124 S.Ct. 7, 157 L.Ed.2d 263 (2003) (per curiam). In Mitc...