Bond v. Beard
| Decision Date | 20 August 2008 |
| Docket Number | No. 06-9003.,No. 06-9002.,06-9002.,06-9003. |
| Citation | 539 F.3d 256 |
| Parties | Jesse BOND, Appellant (No. 06-9002), v. Jeffrey BEARD; William Stickman; Joseph Mazurkiewicz; The District Attorney of The County of Philadelphia; The Attorney General of the State of Pennsylvania, Appellant (No. 06-9003). |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit |
Arnold H. Gordon, First Assistant District Attorney, Lynne Abraham, District Attorney, Philadelphia, PA, Counsel for Jeffrey Beard, et al.
Before: AMBRO, SMITH and ALDISERT, Circuit Judges.
Table of Contents
I. Background and Procedural History.................................................262
II. Jurisdiction and Standard of Review...............................................263
III. Discussion .......................................................................263
A. Bond's Appeal of the Denial of his Petition to Vacate his Conviction...........263
1. Batson Claim................................................................263
a. The Batson Standard......................................................264
b. Standard of Review for Habeas Petitions..................................264
(i) Relevant Background................................................264
(ii) Whether State Courts Reached Third Step of Batson
Analysis..........................................................268
c. Analysis of Batson Claim.................................................269
(i) Evidence Presented to the State Courts..............................269
(A) Disproportionate Strikes........................................269
(B) Disparate Questioning...........................................270
(C) Pretextual Strikes..............................................270
(ii) Evidence Presented to the District Court...........................272
(A) Evidence Considered by the District Court......................272
(B) Evidence Not Considered by the District Court..................274
2. Bruton Claim................................................................275
3. Jury-Instruction Claims.....................................................276
a. Reasonable Doubt.........................................................276
b. Accomplice Liability.....................................................278
B. The Commonwealth's Appeal of the Vacation of Bond's Death Sentence.............278
1. Background of the Ineffective Assistance of Counsel Claim...................279
a. The Penalty Phase Hearing................................................279
(i) Mitigation Testimony.................................................279
(ii) Penalty Phase Argument..............................................279
b. The PCRA Hearing.........................................................280
c. The Pennsylvania Courts' Conclusion......................................284
d. Proceedings in the District Court........................................285
2. Governing Law...............................................................285
3. Analysis of Bond's Ineffective Assistance of Counsel Claim..................288
a. Deficient Performance ...................................................288
b. Prejudice................................................................289
IV. Conclusion........................................................................292
Jai Ho Lee died in October 1991 after being shot during the robbery of the Stop and Go Deli in Philadelphia that he managed. A Philadelphia County jury convicted Jesse Bond of Lee's first-degree murder in February 1993. It returned a verdict of death and the court imposed that sentence.
Bond exhausted his state court remedies before filing a petition for habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The District Court rejected Bond's challenges to his conviction. It granted the petition as to his death sentence, however, as it concluded that Bond had received ineffective assistance of counsel at the penalty hearing. Bond and the Commonwealth cross-appealed. We affirm the judgment of the District Court in all respects.
The Commonwealth prosecuted Bond for shooting Lee when he refused to open the cash register. It prosecuted Aaron Wheeler at the same trial for serving as Bond's lookout.1 The Commonwealth presented extensive evidence of Bond's guilt. Yang-Jin Kim, an employee at the Stop and Go Deli who witnessed the entire robbery and shooting from close range, identified Bond as the shooter. The prosecution presented confessions by both defendants that had been redacted to eliminate references to the other defendant by name (although Bond challenged his confession on the basis that it had been coerced and testified that he was not involved in the robbery). Beulah Sheppard also told police that she saw Bond shoot Lee, though she claimed at trial she had lied to the police.
The jury found Bond guilty of first-degree murder, robbery, criminal conspiracy, and possession of an instrument of crime. The penalty phase began the next day. The Commonwealth presented evidence in support of the aggravating circumstance that Bond murdered Lee while committing another felony. It also presented evidence of Bond's criminal history, and specifically his conviction for the robbery and murder of a restaurant owner ten days prior to the murder of Lee.2 Bond attempted to establish mitigating factors by presenting evidence of his good character and his youth. The jury found three aggravating circumstances and no mitigating circumstances.3 It returned a verdict of death.
The trial judge denied post-verdict motions and Bond appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which affirmed. See Commonwealth v. Bond, 539 Pa. 299, 652 A.2d 308 (1995). Bond filed a petition pursuant to Pennsylvania's Post Conviction Relief Act ("PCRA"), 42 Pa. Con. Stat. § 9541 et seq.4 The trial judge (now sitting as the PCRA court) held a seven-day hearing on Bond's PCRA claims before denying them all. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court affirmed. See Commonwealth v. Bond, 572 Pa. 588, 819 A.2d 33 (2002).
Bond subsequently filed a petition for habeas corpus in the District Court. The Court held an evidentiary hearing regarding Bond's claims, including those of jury discrimination and ineffective assistance of counsel at the penalty phase. It denied each of Bond's guilt-phase claims but vacated the death sentence after granting Bond's petition as to the penalty phase ineffective assistance of counsel claim.
The Commonwealth appeals the grant of penalty phase habeas relief. Bond appeals the District Court's denial of his guilt-phase claims.5
The District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 2241, 2254. We have jurisdiction over this appeal under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291, 2253.
The Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 ("AEDPA") limits habeas relief on issues that state courts have decided on the merits. AEDPA bars habeas relief unless the state court decision is contrary to or an unreasonable application of clearly established Supreme Court law, or the state court decision involves an unreasonable determination of the facts. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1)-(2); Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412-13, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000). We may not "grant habeas corpus relief simply because we disagree with the state court's decision or because we would have reached a different result if left to our own devices." Werts v. Vaughn, 228 F.3d 178, 197 (3d Cir.2000). The state court's application of Supreme Court precedent must have been objectively unreasonable; "[t]he federal habeas court should not grant the petition unless the state court decision, evaluated objectively and on the merits, resulted in an outcome that cannot reasonably be justified under existing Supreme Court precedent." Hackett v. Price, 381 F.3d 281, 287 (3d Cir.2004) (internal quotation marks omitted).6 A state court's factual findings are "presumed to be correct," and the habeas petitioner carries the "burden of rebutting the presumption of correctness by clear and convincing evidence." 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). See also Chadwick v. Janecka, 312 F.3d 597, 607 (3d Cir.2002). We review de novo issues that the state court did not decide on the merits. Everett v. Beard, 290 F.3d 500, 508 (3d Cir.2002).
Bond argues that the District Court erred in denying three of his guilt-phase claims. We conclude that each argument fails.
Bond, who is black, contends that the prosecutor used peremptory strikes in a racially discriminatory manner during jury selection. He argues that this violates the Equal Protection Clause as interpreted in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). The trial court rejected each of the three Batson challenges made by defense counsel, resulting in the seating of a jury consisting of eight white and four black members.7 The state courts rejected Bond's Bat...
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