Benson v. Chappell

• Decision Date: 01 May 2020
• Docket Number: No. 13-99004,13-99004
• Citation: 958 F.3d 801
• Parties: Richard Allen BENSON, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Kevin CHAPPELL, Warden, San Quentin State Prison, Respondent-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

958 F.3d 801

Richard Allen BENSON, Petitioner-Appellant,

v.Kevin CHAPPELL, Warden, San Quentin State Prison, Respondent-Appellee.

No. 13-99004

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted December 5, 2017

Submission Vacated February 7, 2019

Resubmitted April 24, 2020 Pasadena, California

Filed May 1, 2020

CALLAHAN, Circuit Judge:

In 1986, Richard Allen Benson confessed to sexually molesting two little girls and murdering the girls, their mother, and their baby brother. He was tried and convicted for murder and other crimes and sentenced to death. After his conviction and sentence were affirmed and the California Supreme Court had denied several habeas petitions, Benson filed a federal habeas petition with the United States District Court for the Central District of California. The district court denied the petition and Benson has appealed.

On appeal Benson raises two certified claims: (1) his confessions should have been suppressed, and (2) his trial counsel was ineffective at sentencing because he failed to investigate and present evidence of Benson's severe physical, sexual, and emotional abuse in early childhood. In addition, Benson raises two uncertified claims: (3) trial counsel was ineffective at the guilt phase in failing to impeach the state's case, and (4) the prosecutor withheld material and exculpatory evidence (a claim pursuant to Brady v. Maryland , 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963) ).

Because Benson's claims are subject to review under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), 28 U.S.C. § 2254, to be granted relief, he must show that the California Supreme Court's denials of his claims were unreasonable determinations of the facts or contrary to clearly established federal law. Benson has not done so. He confessed after he was given his Miranda warnings, acknowledged the warnings, and waived them. The California Supreme Court reasonably determined that an officer's misstatement during Benson's interrogation that there was no death penalty in California did not prompt Benson's confessions. Furthermore, Benson has not shown that his statements were not knowing, voluntary, and intelligent. In addition, even if Benson were able to show that trial counsel was ineffective in not fully investigating his abuse as a child or his alleged organic brain injury, the California Supreme Court could reasonably have determined that any shortcoming in trial counsel's investigation was not prejudicial. Finally, we grant the Certificate of Appealability on Benson's two uncertified issues and determine that the state court reasonably rejected Benson's claims that (a) his trial counsel should have impeached the government's case, and (b) the prosecutor withheld material, exculpatory evidence. Accordingly, we affirm the district court's denial of the writ.

I. The Underlying Facts

A. Benson's Criminal Activities

There is overwhelming evidence that Benson deliberately murdered Laura Camargo and her two-year old son, and sexually molested her four-year-old and three-year-old daughters, before brutally murdering both girls. He then set the family's home on fire and fled the scene.

The California Supreme Court's opinion provides this recitation of the underlying facts:

On the evening of Saturday, January 4, 1986, Laura Camargo set out to visit Barbara Lopez and Katrina Flores. The three women were close friends. Laura lived in Nipomo with her children, Stephanie Camargo, age four, Shawna Camargo, age three, and Sterling Gonzales, age twenty-three months, in a small, two-room shack that shared an unattached bathroom with another unit. Barbara and Katrina lived with their children in an apartment in Oceano, which was about 10 miles away. Just before Thanksgiving of 1985, defendant had moved into the apartment; he was a jeweler by trade. Over the following weeks, he became acquainted with Laura and her children.

On the evening in question, Laura secured a baby-sitter to care for Stephanie, Shawna, and Sterling, and then obtained a ride to Oceano. She socialized with Barbara, Katrina, and defendant. Before long, she decided to return home. Defendant arranged for a ride. Taking measures to conceal his destination from Barbara and Katrina, he accompanied Laura to Nipomo, carrying with him a heavy briefcase. As he later admitted, he "went out there with the intention of doing something to the kids."

Around midnight, defendant and Laura arrived at the shack, and the baby-sitter departed. Shortly thereafter, defendant took up a claw hammer he found in the shack, apparently positioned himself behind Laura, and repeatedly and violently struck her in the head, as he subsequently acknowledged, "to take her out." Laura fell; defendant thought she was dead; she gurgled loudly; he stuffed socks into and over her mouth; she soon expired. From that point on, he took pains to make it appear to Laura's neighbors that no one was in the shack. He proceeded to sexually assault Stephanie and Shawna.

Throughout Sunday, January 5, defendant continued to molest the two girls. A number of times that day, neighbors came by the shack and the common unattached bathroom. More than once, Sterling coughed and cried; more than once, defendant quieted the child. After nightfall defendant—in words he later used—"realized ... that it was inevitable": in order to avoid discovery, he decided to kill Sterling. Although he met with resistance from the child as he attempted to smother and strangle him to death, he finally succeeded. With Laura and Sterling dead, he found himself in what he later described as "a molester's type of heaven": in the paraphrase of the police psychiatrist to whom he confessed, "it was like being in heaven, and being completely able to get what he wanted with no interference."

As Monday, January 6, approached, defendant continued to molest Stephanie and Shawna. At the same time, he began to consider whether he should kill the girls. As he later described his thoughts:

"I knew it couldn't be put off and uh, in the state of mind that I was in at that time, the best thing, no I can't say it like that, the only option I had was to go ahead and finish the job and uh, try to keep from being implicated in it, okay. Uh, I had trouble bringing myself to do it. ... [A]nd uh, you know, three, four times I set them up for it and I, I just couldn't do it. ..." As the sky began to lighten, however, defendant found himself able to carry through. He took up a heavy steel jeweler's mandrel which he carried in his briefcase; he repeatedly struck Stephanie and Shawna in the head; seeing that death did not come immediately, he seized the claw hammer and used the instrument to dispatch the children. As he subsequently admitted, he killed Stephanie and Shawna, and Laura and Sterling before them, "to protect my freedom." To cover his crimes, he proceeded to start a fire in the shack. About 8 a.m., just before the flames began to rage, he fled.

People v. Benson , 52 Cal.3d 754, 276 Cal.Rptr. 827, 802 P.2d 330, 336–37 (1990).

On Monday morning, January 6, 1986, Mike Owen stopped by a liquor store in Nipomo. Benson approached him and asked for a ride to Oceano. Owen agreed. Benson retrieved his briefcase and was dropped off in Oceano just after 8:00 a.m. At around this time, smoke was seen coming from Laura's home and the fire department was called. The home was heavily damaged and charred. According to the district court:

Laura's three children, Stephanie, Shawna, and Sterling, were all dead, on the floor in the middle of this room, which the fire had heavily damaged. A lot of burnt and partially burnt debris was under and around the girls' bodies and on the floor of the second room. A pink and black, wire-ribbed female corset was next to Stephanie's body.

A partially-burnt claw hammer was lying on top of Stephanie's shoulder. Petitioner's ring mandrel was lying next to Shawna. Another hammer was hanging on the wall next to the kitchen sink.

Investigators found pornographic magazines, newspapers, and a photo album under the two girls' bodies. ...

The arson investigator ... examined the fire, and determined someone had deliberately set on fire the surface of a four foot wide pile of magazines, paper goods, clothing, and toys, in the middle of the children's room next to and underneath the bodies of Stephanie and Shawna, allowing it to burn down into the pile.

On Tuesday, January 7, Benson asked a friend of a friend, K.S., for a ride to Los Osos, a town north of San Luis Obispo. K.S. agreed to give him a ride as far as San Luis Obispo, Benson picked up his belongings, and they left for San Luis Obispo around 6:30 p.m. They drove to an apartment complex where Benson got out and asked K.S. to wait while he went inside. When Benson returned, he started gathering his belongings, then he grabbed K.S. from behind, put a knife to her throat, and ordered her to drive to Los Osos. K.S. panicked and offered Benson her car. He rejected the offer and "took out a cylinder with something like a needle sticking out of it and told her it would kill her if he pricked her with it."

Benson made K.S. drive to a liquor store in San Luis Obispo where he forced her to buy a bottle of whiskey and pornographic magazines. They returned to the car and Benson forced her to continue driving to Los Osos. When they got there, Benson said he was on a mission to rescue a family in Los Osos.¹ They talked in the parked car for more than an hour until Benson made a phone call. K.S. was terrified of Benson, who remained within reach of her. Benson made K.S. drive to an abandoned house, where he eventually got his things out of the car and went inside. K.S. drove straight home to San Luis Obispo and called the police.

Later that night, K.S. accompanied the police to the abandoned house in Los Osos. The police went to the house and arrested Benson. Benson was booked at around 11:30 p.m. on Tuesday, January 7, in connection with the kidnaping of K.S.

On Wednesday, ...