Tucker v. Palmer

• Decision Date: 04 September 2008
• Docket Number: No. 07-1408.,07-1408.
• Citation: 541 F.3d 652
• Parties: Raymond TUCKER, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Carmen PALMER, Respondent-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

541 F.3d 652

Raymond TUCKER, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Carmen PALMER, Respondent-Appellant.

No. 07-1408.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: June 12, 2008.

Decided and Filed: September 4, 2008.

ARGUED: Laura A. Cook, Office of the Michigan Attorney General, Lansing, Michigan, for Appellant. J. Philip Calabrese, Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Laura A. Cook, Office of the Michigan Attorney General, Lansing, Michigan, for Appellant. J. Philip Calabrese, Howard J.C. Nicols, Squire, Sanders & Dempsey, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellee.

Before: KEITH and SUTTON, Circuit Judges; ACKERMAN, District Judge.^*

ACKERMAN, D. J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which SUTTON, J., joined. KEITH, J. (pp. 661-71), delivered a separate dissenting opinion.

OPINION

ACKERMAN, District Judge.

This case involves the conviction of a man for second-degree home invasion based exclusively upon the testimony of the homeowner, who saw the defendant climbing over the back yard fence and running away from the house. Here, we face the sobering issue of whether a man was unconstitutionally deprived of his liberty. We recognize that such an issue should never be addressed lightly, and so we have endeavored to carefully and thoroughly review, with the appropriate level of deference, the evidence adduced at trial. Having engaged in such review, we conclude that the state court conviction of Raymond Tucker for second-degree home invasion is supported by sufficient evidence, albeit circumstantial. For the following reasons, we will reverse the District Court's grant of Tucker's habeas petition.

I.

At trial, the prosecution's only witness, Nicholas Sutliff, testified to the following facts. On August 18, 2003, Sutliff was mowing his yard in Dearborn Heights, Michigan when he saw a man jump over a low fence out of Sutliff's back yard and into Sutliff's side yard where Sutliff was located. Sutliff recognized the man as Defendant Raymond Tucker, someone with whom he was familiar because Tucker's family lived next door to Sutliff.¹ After clearing the fence, Tucker ran in Sutliff's general direction and passed within six feet of Sutliff, at which point the two men made eye contact before Tucker continued running without exchanging a word with Sutliff.

After this incident, Sutliff went into his back yard, and as he approached his back door, noticed that it was ajar. This fact is significant because Sutliff remembered having locked the front door, and closed, but not locked, the back door. He remembers having closed the door completely because his air conditioning was on in the house. Sutliff entered his house, did not notice anything unusual, then left his house to ask his neighbors if they had seen Tucker that day. After returning to his house, Sutliff noticed that his dresser drawer was open where previously it had been closed. In addition, Sutliff noticed that where he had left two rings and a watch on top of the dresser, only the watch remained.

Police arrested Tucker on September 24, 2003 in connection with the incident at Sutliff's home. Tucker refused to answer the court's questions at arraignment, and consequently the court entered a plea of not guilty on Tucker's behalf. On February 3, 2004, after signing and filing a waiver of trial by jury, Tucker was tried in a bench trial, and convicted of second-degree home invasion, in violation of Michigan Comp. Laws § 750.110a(3). On February 26, 2004, the trial judge sentenced Tucker to 7 to 15 years imprisonment.

After his conviction in this case, Tucker filed an appeal with the Michigan Court of Appeals, which issued a summary order on May 13, 2005 denying his appeal: "The Court orders that the application for leave to file a delayed appeal is DENIED for lack of merit in the grounds presented." (JA at 95.) On November 29, 2005, the Michigan Supreme Court similarly denied Tucker's appeal: "On order of the Court, the application for leave to appeal the May 13, 2005 order of the Court of Appeals is considered, and it is DENIED, because we are not persuaded that the question presented should be reviewed by this Court." (JA at 96.)

On January 19, 2006, Tucker filed his federal habeas petition in the Eastern District of Michigan. On December 15, 2006, Magistrate Judge Paul J. Komives issued a Report and Recommendation ("R & R"), in which he recommended that the District Court grant Tucker's petition for habeas relief on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence for the trial court to conclude that Tucker entered Sutliff's home. (JA at 97.) Relatedly, the R & R recommended that the District Court find that the state trial court's conviction of Tucker "involved an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law." (JA at 108.) On March 22, 2007, District Judge Lawrence P. Zatkoff adopted the Magistrate Judge's R & R, entered it as "the findings and conclusions of this Court," and concomitantly granted Tucker's petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Tucker v. Palmer, No. 06-10250, 2007 WL 869164, at *1 (E.D.Mich. Mar.22, 2007). Subsequently, on April 16, 2007, the District Court granted the Michigan Attorney General's request to stay the release of Tucker pending the outcome of this appeal. He remains in custody today.

The District Court had jurisdiction over this case pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The District Court's March 22, 2007 Opinion & Order, adopting the Magistrate Judge's R & R, constitutes a final order such that this Court has appellate jurisdiction over this appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.

II.

We review de novo a district court's decision to grant or deny habeas corpus relief. Parker v. Renico, 506 F.3d 444, 447 (6th Cir.2007) (citing Wilson v. Mitchell, 498 F.3d 491, 497-98 (6th Cir. 2007); Joseph v. Coyle, 469 F.3d 441, 449 (6th Cir.2006)). "Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (`AEDPA'), a federal court may grant a writ of habeas corpus only if the state courts ruled in a way contrary to, or involving an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law as determined by the United States Supreme Court." Parker, 506 F.3d 444, 447-48 (citing 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1); Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 404-05, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000); Varner v. Stovall, 500 F.3d 491, 494-95 (6th Cir. 2007)); see also Tinsley v. Million, 399 F.3d 796, 801 (6th Cir.2005). "A state-court decision is an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law if it `correctly identifies the governing legal rule but applies it unreasonably to the facts of a particular prisoner's case.'" Parker, 506 F.3d at 448 (quoting Williams, 529 U.S. at 407-08, 120 S.Ct. 1495). "When assessing unreasonableness, `a federal habeas court may not issue the writ simply because that court concludes in its independent judgment that the relevant state-court decision applied clearly established federal law erroneously or incorrectly. Rather, that application must also be unreasonable.'" Id. (quoting Williams, 529 U.S. at 411, 120 S.Ct. 1495). Furthermore, "[f]indings of fact made by the state court are presumed correct, and this presumption may be rebutted only by `clear and convincing evidence.'" Tinsley, 399 F.3d at 801-02 (citing 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1); Mitchell v. Mason, 325 F.3d 732, 737-38 (6th Cir.2003)); see also Eady v. Morgan, 515 F.3d 587, 595 (6th Cir. 2008).

As framed by AEDPA, the issue before this Court is whether the District Court erred in concluding that the state court unreasonably applied Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 99 S.Ct. 2781, 61 L.Ed.2d 560 (1979). Parker, 506 F.3d at 448. "Jackson v. Virginia established the test for challenges based on sufficiency of the evidence." Eady, 515 F.3d at 595. It held that a reviewing court's task is

to determine whether the record evidence could reasonably support a finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.... [T]he relevant question is whether, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. This familiar standard gives full play to the responsibility of the trier of fact fairly to resolve conflicts in testimony, to weigh the evidence, and to draw reasonable inferences from basic facts to ultimate facts.

443 U.S. at 318-19, 99 S.Ct. 2781 (emphasis in original). In other words, "[u]nder Jackson, habeas corpus relief is appropriate based on insufficient evidence only where the court finds, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, that no rational trier of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt." Parker, 506 F.3d at 448. Accordingly, the law commands deference at two levels in this case: First, deference should be given to the trier-of-fact's verdict, as contemplated by Jackson; second, deference should be given to the Michigan Court of Appeals' consideration of the trier-of-fact's verdict, as dictated by AEDPA. Id. "Where we consider the [trier-of-fact's] verdict, we do so `with explicit reference to the substantive elements of the criminal offense as defined by state law.'" Id. (quoting Jackson, 443 U.S. at 324 n. 16, 99 S.Ct. 2781; Brown v. Palmer, 441 F.3d 347, 351 (6th Cir.2006)).

III.

Tucker was charged with, and convicted of, second-degree home invasion, which is defined by the statute in the following terms:

A person who breaks and enters a dwelling with intent to commit a felony, larceny or assault in the dwelling, a person who enters a dwelling without permission with intent to commit a felony, larceny, or assault in the dwelling, or a person who breaks and enters a dwelling or enters a dwelling without permission and, at any time while he or she is entering, present in, or exiting the dwelling, commits a felony, larceny, or assault is guilty of home invasion in the second degree.

Mich. Comp. Laws §...