Avalos v. Frauenheim
| Decision Date | 02 July 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 2:15-cv-2222 TLN AC,2:15-cv-2222 TLN AC |
| Parties | FREDDY AVALOS, Petitioner, v. SCOTT FRAUENHEIM, Warden, Respondent. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of California |
Petitioner is a California state prisoner represented by counsel and proceeding with an application for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The petition challenges petitioner's 2013 conviction for assault with a firearm and shooting at an occupied vehicle. ECF No. 1. Respondent has answered, ECF No. 11, and petitioner filed a traverse, ECF No. 18.
Petitioner was charged in this San Joaquin County with (1) attempted murder, with enhancements for personal discharge of a firearm and for infliction of great bodily injury; (2) assault with a firearm, with enhancements for use of a firearm in commission of a felony and for infliction of great bodily injury; (3) and shooting at an occupied motor vehicle, with an
//// enhancement for personal discharge of a firearm. 1 CT 104-107.1
On February 18, 2011, at approximately 1:00 in the morning, petitioner was driving his car in the city of Tracy. Several friends were passengers. At the same time, Brandon Areia was driving his truck in the vicinity. As petitioner came down an off-ramp and proceeded through a green light, Areia ran through the opposing red light and crashed into petitioner's car, disabling it. As the truck tried to leave the scene, two of petitioner's passengers tried to stop it and take the keys away from its driver. The driver, who appeared drunk, drove away, running another red light, then headed back toward the scene of the accident.
A waitress at the nearby Denny's restaurant heard the collision and saw the truck driving away and then returning toward the accident scene. She saw petitioner emerge from the driver's side of the damaged car and shoot at the truck when it passed him without stopping. Another Denny's employee saw petitioner with a gun, heard the shooting, and saw that the truck did not stop. Petitioner gave the gun to one of his friends, who tossed it behind a nearby gas station.
Police responded to the scene. A responding officer found petitioner sitting in his car. Petitioner denied hearing a shooting. He smelled like alcohol. He told the officer a truck had hit him and drove away. The officer found Areia inside his truck, bleeding from a gunshot wound. Areia also smelled like alcohol.
Areia had suffered a bullet wound in the back left shoulder. The bullet had lodged in the middle of his back, where it remained, causing continuing pain. At the emergency room after the incident, he was noted to be intoxicated. Areia denied that alcohol had affected his driving, and claimed that he failed to stop after the accident because he feared for his life.
Officers at the scene found three .45 casings. Areia's truck had front end damage from the collision, and a bullet hole through the driver's door. At least two bullets had hit the truck. There was an expended bullet in petitioner's car. The gun was found near the gas station, and anempty gun box in the car.
In a recorded interview the next morning, petitioner initially denied owning a gun but later admitted having one for protection. He said that he had been driving a car involved in a crash with a pickup truck. The truck's driver sped through a red light, hit petitioner's car, and then left the scene. Petitioner's car was inoperable, but he told his two friends to chase the truck because it "seemed like [the truck's driver] was trying to leave the scene." After stopping briefly down the street, the truck came back toward petitioner and then "everything just went crazy." Petitioner eventually admitted that he had shot at the truck to stop it from driving away. He was angry because he was a hard-working man, he needed his car for commuting to work, and the truck driver (who was probably drunk) was trying to get away, so he tried to shoot the truck's tires out as it passed. He then ran "like hell, just trying to get rid of [the gun]." Petitioner insisted, "[M]y intentions weren't to hurt him, my intentions were for him to stop."
Mario Aviles, one of petitioner's passengers, testified about the accident. He and a friend had chased the truck down and told the driver the police were on their way, and the driver said "I gotta go" and "floored it." When the truck headed back to the accident scene, Aviles thought it was going to hit the car again.
One of the responding officers testified that the victim, Areia, had appeared to be under the influence of alcohol, and had made inconsistent statements.
Petitioner testified that he was upset because a drunk driver had "mess[ed] up [his] life." Things had been going well for him before the accident; he had a job and a baby on the way, and he feared losing the job if he no longer had a functioning vehicle. When the truck came back past him, he shot "towards the direction that the truck was moving in." He shot "out of anger, out of heat of passion, out of frustration." Petitioner conceded that he was in no danger when the victim drove past him.
On January 30, 2013, the jury returned guilty verdicts on assault with a deadly weapon and shooting at an occupied vehicle, and found the alleged enhancements related to those offensestrue as charged. The jury found petitioner not guilty of attempted murder, and not guilty of the lesser included offense of attempted involuntary manslaughter. 2 CT 497-498.
On April 15, 2013, petitioner was sentenced to the mid-term of 5 years on Count 3, shooting at an occupied vehicle, consecutive to 25 to life on the enhancement under Cal. Penal Code § 12022.53(d).2 Shorter sentences were imposed on the other counts and enhancements, but those were all stayed. Accordingly, the total aggregate term of imprisonment was 30 years to life. 2 CT 571-572.
Petitioner timely appealed, and the California Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment of conviction on May 27, 2014. Lodged Doc. 10. The California Supreme Court denied review on August 1, 2014. Lodged Doc. 12.
Petitioner filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the Superior Court of San Joaquin County on September 15, 2015, which was denied in a written decision on October 7, 2015. Lodged Docs. 13, 14. Petitioner filed no further applications for state habeas relief.
28 U.S.C. § 2254, as amended by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 ("AEDPA"), provides in relevant part as follows:
The statute applies whenever the state court has denied a federal claim on its merits, whether or not the state court explained its reasons. Harrington v. Richter, 582 U.S. 86, 99 (2011). State court rejection of a federal claim will be presumed to have been on the merits absent any indication or state-law procedural principles to the contrary. Id. (). "The presumption may be overcome when there is reason to think some other explanation for the state court's decision is more likely." Id. at 99-100.
The phrase "clearly established Federal law" in § 2254(d)(1) refers to the "governing legal principle or principles" previously articulated by the Supreme Court. Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U.S. 63, 71-72 (2003). Only Supreme Court precedent may constitute "clearly established Federal law," but courts may look to circuit law "to ascertain whether...the particular point in issue is clearly established by Supreme Court precedent." Marshall v. Rodgers, 569 U.S. 58, 64 (2013).
A state court decision is "contrary to" clearly established federal law if the decision "contradicts the governing law set forth in [the Supreme Court's] cases." Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 405 (2000). A state court decision "unreasonably applies" federal law "if the state court identifies the correct rule from [the Supreme Court's] cases but unreasonably applies it to the facts of the particular state prisoner's case." Id. at 407-08. It is not enough that the state court was incorrect in the view of the federal habeas court; the state court decision must be objectively unreasonable. Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 520-21 (2003).
Review under § 2254(d) is limited to the record that was before the state court. Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S. 170, 180-181 (2011). The question at this stage is whether the state court reasonably applied clearly established federal law to the facts before it. Id. at 181-182. In other words, the focus of the § 2254(d) inquiry is "on what a state court knew and did." Id. at 182. Where the state court's adjudication is set forth in a reasoned opinion, §2254(d)(1) review is confined to "the state court's actual reasoning" and "actual analysis." Frantz v. Hazey, 533 F.3d 724, 738 (9th Cir. 2008) (en banc). A different rule applies where the state court rejects claimssummarily, without a reasoned opinion. In Richter, supra, the Supreme Court held that when a state court denies a claim on the merits but without a reasoned opinion, the federal habeas court must determine what...
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