Woods v. Sinclair, 09–99003.

• Citation: 2011 Daily Journal D.A.R. 12066,655 F.3d 886,11 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 10090
• Decision Date: 10 August 2011
• Docket Number: No. 09–99003.,09–99003.
• Parties: Dwayne Anthony WOODS, Petitioner–Appellant,v.Stephen SINCLAIR, Respondent–Appellee.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (9th Circuit)

655 F.3d 886

11 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 10,090

2011 Daily Journal D.A.R. 12,066

Dwayne Anthony WOODS, Petitioner–Appellant,

v.Stephen SINCLAIR, Respondent–Appellee.

No. 09–99003.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted March 4, 2010.Filed Aug. 10, 2011.

Suzanne Lee Elliott, Law Offices of Suzanne Lee Elliott, Seattle, Washington, and David B. Zuckerman, Law Offices of David B. Zuckerman, Seattle, Washington, for petitioner-appellant Dwayne Anthony Woods.John Joseph Samson, Assistant Attorney General, Olympia, Washington, for respondent-appellee Stephen Sinclair.Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Washington, Lonny R. Suko, Chief District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. 2:05–CV–00319–LRS.Before: RICHARD A. PAEZ, RICHARD C. TALLMAN and MILAN D. SMITH, JR., Circuit Judges.

OPINION

PAEZ, Circuit Judge:

In 1997, a Washington jury found Dwayne A. Woods guilty of two counts of aggravated murder in the first degree, one count of attempted murder in the first degree, and one count of attempting to elude a police vehicle. After two days of deliberation, the jury sentenced Woods to death. The Washington State Supreme Court upheld his conviction and sentence, State v. Woods, 143 Wash.2d 561, 23 P.3d 1046 (2001), and denied his petition for post-conviction relief, In re Woods, 154 Wash.2d 400, 114 P.3d 607 (2005). Woods then filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court, which was denied. Woods appeals the denial of habeas relief, contending that (1) he was denied his Sixth Amendment right to represent himself, (2) the state court's admission of certain evidence violated the Confrontation Clause, (3) the State withheld material, exculpatory evidence in violation of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963), and (4) his trial counsel's representation was ineffective.¹ We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

I. THE CRIME²

On Friday, April 26, 1996, Telisha Shaver was house-sitting at her aunt's trailer home in Spokane Valley, Washington. Telisha ³ planned to spend the night at her boyfriend's home, but had agreed to let her sister, Venus, and Venus's friend, Jade Moore, spend the night at the trailer. Venus and Jade arrived at the trailer at approximately 1:45 a.m. on Saturday morning. The women drank alcohol and socialized. At some point, Venus and Jade decided to contact Dwayne Woods, whom Venus had previously dated. After the women paged Woods, he eventually joined them at the trailer. By that time, approximately 4:20 a.m., Jade was asleep.

While at the trailer, Woods served himself alcohol and talked with Venus. According to Venus's testimony, Woods was upset that Jade was asleep and urged Venus to wake her up. Venus tried to wake Jade up, but Jade did not respond. At this, Woods became irate and, according to Venus, shoved her onto the couch and attempted to unbutton her pants. Venus said that she initially escaped Woods's grasp, but that he managed to grab her again and then slammed her head and neck against a door. Venus testified that she has no memory of what transpired from that point forward except for intermittent flashes of memory in which she recalls struggling with Woods.

At approximately 7:30 a.m., Woods forced Jade to wake up at knife point. He took her to another one of the bedrooms, where Venus lay unconscious and severely beaten. Woods forced Jade to help him loot the trailer and to give him her ATM card and personal identification number. He then raped Jade orally and vaginally.

During the attack on Jade, Telisha returned to the trailer to retrieve some personal effects. Woods seized and bound her. Jade, who was laying on the floor and feigning unconsciousness, later stated that she heard a baseball bat hit Telisha's head. Jade said that she was then hit in the head with the bat, knocked unconscious, and had no memory of what happened after that point.

When Telisha failed to return home that morning, her mother, Sherry Shaver, decided to go to the trailer to check on her. She arrived at approximately 10:25 a.m. and found the door locked. Peering through a window in the trailer, she saw a man—whom she later identified as Woods—exiting from the other side of the trailer. She pounded on the locked trailer door, and Jade, naked and beaten, eventually opened the door. Sherry Shaver called 911.

Emergency personnel arrived at the trailer and took the victims to the hospital. While en route to the hospital, Jade told a paramedic about the events of the prior evening. At the hospital, she also told her father, the emergency room physician, and a nurse about what had transpired. Of the three victims, only Venus survived. Telisha died without ever regaining consciousness. Despite initially responding to medical treatment, Jade died the following day.

Shortly after Sherry Shaver reported seeing Woods leave the trailer, he was seen at two local businesses close to the crime scene. At one of those businesses, Woods convinced another patron to drive him to downtown Spokane. Within close proximity to where Woods was dropped off, a series of cash machine withdrawals occurred with the use of Jade's ATM card.

At approximately 12:30 p.m. that same day, Woods ran into his brother-in-law, Louis Thompson, at a grocery store in the downtown area. Thompson gave Woods a ride to the home of Johnny Knight, a friend of Woods's. Knight and his friend Mary Knapp testified that when Woods came to their home, he offered to sell them some jewelry and to buy one of Knight's automobiles.

Woods spent the night at Elizabeth Gerber's apartment. The following morning, Gerber asked Woods to leave the apartment. At trial, she testified that Woods became agitated and said he was “a wanted man” and she was “putting him on the streets.”

Later that day, Knight heard a television broadcast that authorities were searching for Woods. In response, Knight called the police and agreed to lead them to Woods. With Knight's cooperation, sheriff's deputies followed Knight as he went to pick up Woods. After Knight picked Woods up, the deputies pulled the car over. Knight got out, but Woods jumped into the driver's seat and sped away. The deputies eventually caught, arrested, and interrogated him.

Woods told the interviewing detectives that he fled because he had a number of “outstanding traffic violations” and some “traffic warrants.” At the time of his arrest, Woods had no outstanding traffic violations. Woods denied any responsibility for the crimes and claimed he had not been in contact with Venus for about a week. He further denied knowing a woman named Jade. He also told detectives that he had not been in Spokane Valley for about a month, that he had never visited a trailer home, and that there was no logical explanation of why his fingerprints would have been found in the trailer.

II. PRE–TRIAL PROCEEDINGS

Woods was charged with two counts of aggravated first degree murder, one count of attempted first degree murder, and in the alternative, one count of first degree assault.⁴ At his arraignment on May 30, 1996, Woods pleaded not guilty to the charges and waived his right to be tried within sixty days of his arraignment, but not later than November 12, 1996. The trial was set for October 21, 1996.

In the meantime, the prosecution processed the physical evidence in the case. Doctors had completed “rape kits” for all three victims, including taking a swab from the vagina of each victim. The rape kits were sent to the Washington State Police Crime Laboratory (or “WSPCL”) in Spokane. At the Spokane lab, William Morig examined the swabs in search of sperm cells that might contain the DNA of the murder suspect. Morig found no sperm on the swab taken from Venus Shaver, but found usable samples from the swabs taken from Telisha Shaver and Jade Moore. The prosecution also obtained a vial of Woods's blood to use in DNA tests. That sample was sent to the Spokane lab as well. The WSPCL lab in Spokane did not have the required DNA testing equipment, so Morig's responsibilities were limited to preparing DNA samples from the rape kits and Woods's blood that could be submitted to other labs for DNA testing and analysis.

On August 23, 1996, Woods's defense counsel moved for a continuance of the trial date based on the fact that they had not received the DNA test results and that they needed additional time to produce mitigation evidence. Although Woods objected to this motion, defense counsel argued that unless a continuance was granted, Woods would be unable to receive a fair trial. The trial court ultimately granted the motion and reset the trial date for March 17, 1997.

On October 16, 1996, the prosecutor informed the court that the DNA evidence had not yet been sent for testing. The prosecutor represented that the results from the testing would be received by January 1, 1997. Consequently, the court ordered that the DNA test results be disclosed to the defense by January 1, 1997. The prosecutor also informed the court that the vial of Woods's blood had been mistakenly frozen and had cracked. The prosecution therefore needed a new blood sample for testing purposes. Woods objected to providing a new sample and renewed his objection to having the trial commence after the original date of October 21, 1996. The court overruled both objections.

By January 2, 1997, the WSPCL had returned only one of two DNA test results. That test, performed by a private company, showed that Woods was not the source of semen found in Telisha's body. At a hearing on January 13, 1997, the prosecutor informed the trial court that the testing of the sperm sample taken from Jade Moore was not complete. WSPCL performed that testing at its more advanced Seattle laboratory because it required a complex testing procedure. The prosecutor informed the court that the test would not be complete until the middle of February 1997. Defense counsel moved to...