Bland v. California Dept. of Corrections

• Decision Date: 06 April 1994
• Docket Number: No. 93-55766,93-55766
• Parties: Charles BLAND, Jr., Petitioner-Appellee, v. CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS; Attorney General of the State of California, Respondents-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 1469

20 F.3d 1469

62 USLW 2671

Charles BLAND, Jr., Petitioner-Appellee, v. CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS; Attorney General of the State of California, Respondents-Appellants.

No. 93-55766.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted March 9, 1994.

Decided April 6, 1994.

David Glassman, Tricia Ann Bigelow, Deputy Attys. Gen., Los Angeles, CA, for respondents-appellants.

William S. Harris, Stewart & Harris, Pasadena, CA, for petitioner-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

Before: BRIGHT, ^* WIGGINS, and T.G. NELSON, Circuit Judges.

T.G. NELSON, Circuit Judge:

I

OVERVIEW

The Director of the California Department of Corrections and the Attorney General of the State of California (collectively referred to as the "State") appeal the district court's grant of Charles Bland's (Bland) habeas petition. ¹ The district court concluded that the state trial court denied Bland his Sixth Amendment right to obtain counsel of his choice. We affirm.

II

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On February 4, 1987, three men in a blue and white Suzuki Jeep drove past a group of people standing at a bus stop in Inglewood, California. The men in the jeep were members of the street gang, the Cripps. Some of the people at the bus stop were members of the rival gang, the Bloods. One of the men in the jeep fired several shots into the group, wounding a bystander. A number of the eyewitnesses identified the driver as Dazarri Waller and the shooter as Shawn Gascon (also spelled Gaskin). The third occupant was subsequently identified as Darren Wannamaker.

Inglewood Police Detectives, Russell Enyeart and Stephen Young, were dispatched to the scene where they met Officer Rick Clark who had obtained statements from the witnesses. Based upon these statements, warrants were issued for the arrests of Waller and Gascon. Gascon waived his right to remain silent and told the officers that he had not been in the jeep. He stated that he had received a phone call from Wannamaker who had told him that Wannamaker and Bland were riding in Waller's jeep when several members of the Bloods threw bottles at them. After driving to Bland's house where Bland retrieved a gun, they drove back to find the gang members who had taunted them. Bland, the rear passenger, then fired four shots into the group, one of which wounded an innocent bystander who was waiting for the bus. Waller confirmed that Bland had fired the shots. During interrogation, Bland admitted having obtained the gun from his house and admitted that he was in the jeep; however, he denied firing the shots. When he took the stand at trial, he denied making those admissions.

The jury convicted Bland of attempted murder, personal use of a firearm, and the intentional infliction of great bodily injury with regard to the wounded bystander. Bland was also convicted of assault with a firearm and personal use of a firearm with respect to the intended victim. He was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment plus seven years. Bland appealed to the California Court of Appeal (Second Appellate District, Division One) where he claimed that the trial court erred in denying his motion to discharge retained counsel. In his consolidated petition for habeas, he argued that he was denied effective assistance of counsel. ² The Court of Appeal affirmed the convictions with a modification to the sentence. The California Supreme Court denied Bland's petition for review.

On September 17, 1991, Bland filed a habeas petition in the United States District Court for the Central District of California. The magistrate judge held an evidentiary hearing on one of Bland's claims, counsel's failure to seek suppression of inculpatory statements made by Bland following his arrest. On September 25, 1992, the magistrate judge filed his report recommending dismissal of the habeas petition. The district court declined to adopt that recommendation and granted the habeas petition on April 21, 1993, concluding that Bland was denied his right to discharge counsel in violation of the Sixth Amendment. The State appeals, contending that: (1) Bland failed to exhaust state remedies; (2) the district court erred in construing factual allegations contained in the declarations of Bland and his father as true; (3) the district court erred in holding that the state trial court denied Bland the right to discharge counsel; and (4) any alleged error was harmless. We affirm.

III

DISCUSSION

We review de novo the district court's decision to grant a habeas petition. Thomas v. Brewer, 923 F.2d 1361, 1364 (9th Cir.1991).

A. Exhaustion

The State argues that Bland failed to exhaust his state remedies because the district court considered factually different claims than the California state courts considered. ³ We disagree. A state prisoner must exhaust his state remedies before petitioning for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court. McQueary v. Blodgett, 924 F.2d 829, 833 (9th Cir.1991). The federal habeas petitioner must "provide the state courts with a 'fair opportunity' to apply controlling legal principles to the facts bearing upon his constitutional claim." Anderson v. Harless, 459 After reviewing the record, we are convinced that Bland has satisfied the exhaustion requirement. Not only did he present the operative facts in both the California Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, but he presented the substance of his federal habeas claim to those courts. In both California courts, Bland argued that the state trial court had improperly denied his motion to discharge counsel in violation of his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. His Sixth Amendment right to counsel is at issue here. Because Bland presented the identical federal claim to the California appellate courts, he has fulfilled the exhaustion requirement.

U.S. 4, 6, 103 S.Ct. 276, 277, 74 L.Ed.2d 3 (1982). "It is not enough that all the facts necessary to support the federal claim were before the state courts, or that a somewhat similar state-law claim was made." Id. (internal citations omitted). In order to satisfy the exhaustion requirement, the petitioner must have fairly presented the substance of his federal claim to the state courts. Id.; see also Hudson v. Rushen, 686 F.2d 826, 830 (9th Cir.1982), cert. denied, 461 U.S. 916, 103 S.Ct. 1896, 77 L.Ed.2d 285 (1983). A federal claim "is fairly presented if the petitioner has described the operative facts and legal theory upon which his claim is based." Tamapua v. Shimoda, 796 F.2d 261, 262 (9th Cir.1986).

The State contends that Bland failed to exhaust his claim because the district court relied upon facts not considered by the state courts. In particular, the State bases its argument upon several factual allegations contained in two declarations which the district court assumed to be true, the declaration of Bland's father, Charles Bland, Sr. (Mr. Bland), and the declaration of Bland himself. Those declarations reveal the following facts. Mr. Bland contacted Bland's attorney, Ronald Anderson, in June, 1987, to determine why Anderson had not contacted eyewitnesses who identified Gascon as the shooter. Because Mr. Bland was not satisfied with the way Anderson was handling the case, he told Anderson he was going to find another attorney. Mr. Bland did not retain another attorney and attempted to reach Anderson without success until the July 20, 1987, trial date. On that date, Mr. Bland asked the judge, on his son's behalf, to remove Anderson from the case, but the judge declined to do so. According to Bland's declaration, Anderson spent only 15-20 minutes with him prior to trial. Bland also claimed that Anderson pressured him to plead guilty. When Bland asked Anderson why he had not contacted several eyewitnesses (named in the police reports) who had identified Gascon as the shooter, Anderson responded: "What are you, a jailhouse lawyer?" Bland also stated that Anderson did not spend any time preparing him to take the witness stand. Finally, Bland's declaration states that he did not feel Anderson was concerned with his case and as a result, he spoke to Anderson, his parents and the judge about obtaining a new lawyer.

The State contends that Bland's denial of his right to discharge claim is unexhausted because the factual allegations contained in the two declarations and relied upon by the district court present a substantially different factual context than was presented in the state courts. This claim lacks merit. These same declarations were presented to the Court of Appeal as part of Bland's ineffective assistance of counsel claim raised in his consolidated habeas petition. In rejecting Bland's ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the Court of Appeal noted that this contention was "related" to his substitution of counsel claim. In addition, the Court of Appeal reviewed and considered both declarations before concluding that these facts failed to demonstrate inadequate assistance of counsel. When Bland appealed this decision to the California Supreme Court, he presented the same facts and referenced the same declarations. These were the same declarations relied upon by the district court.

Bland presented the operative facts and legal theories to both state appellate courts. Therefore, because the substance of his federal claim was fairly presented to and rejected by the California appellate courts, we conclude that Bland has satisfied the exhaustion requirement. See Anderson, 459 U.S. at 6, 103 S.Ct. at 277; see also Hudson, 686 F.2d at 830 (claim exhausted under state law "when the California Court of Appeal decided

it adversely to [defendant] and the California Supreme Court denied a hearing"). "On the record before it, the state court had a fair opportunity to consider the claim and to correct the asserted constitutional defect in the petitioner's conviction." Hudson, 686 F.2d at 830.

B. Truth of Declarations

The State next...