Coleman v. Hardy

• Decision Date: 03 August 2012
• Docket Number: No. 10–1437.,10–1437.
• Citation: 690 F.3d 811
• Parties: Lawrence COLEMAN, Petitioner–Appellant, v. Marcus HARDY, Respondent–Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

690 F.3d 811

Lawrence COLEMAN, Petitioner–Appellant,

v.Marcus HARDY, Respondent–Appellee.

No. 10–1437.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued April 3, 2012.

Decided Aug. 3, 2012.

Robert J. Palmer, Brian Michel (argued), Attorneys, May, Oberfell & Lorber, Mishawaka, IN, Petitioner–Appellant.

Joshua M. Schneider, Davida Simpson (argued), Attorneys, Office of the Attorney General, Chicago, IL, for Respondent–Appellee.

Before BAUER, POSNER and KANNE, Circuit Judges.

BAUER, Circuit Judge.

The petitioner-appellant, Lawrence Coleman, was convicted of murder in Illinois and sentenced to 28 years in prison. Coleman was denied relief in state court and eventually filed a federal habeas petition in district court under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The district court also denied relief; we granted a certificate of appealability. For the following reasons, we affirm the denial of the habeas petition.

I. BACKGROUND

This case arises from a murder that took place on November 30, 1998. Early that morning, a group of men affiliated with a gang known as the Renegade Vice Lords gathered outside of Jacqueline Brenaugh's apartment on the South Side of Chicago. The men believed that Jamil Caraway, a member of a rival gang, was hiding out in her apartment, and they meant to kill him. Instead, they shot and killed Jacqueline Brenaugh, when she peered out of her apartment window to get a better look at the men outside.

Detective Philip Graziano of the Chicago Police Department was assigned to the case. After some investigation, he zeroed in on Lawrence Coleman as a suspect. At about 11:30 a.m. on December 12, Detective Graziano arrested Coleman and began an interrogation. By midnight, Graziano had elicited a confession from Coleman; specifically, Coleman admitted serving as an accomplice in Brenaugh's murder. Graziano called on Assistant State's Attorney Nancy Nazarian to assist him in recording the confession. She arrived at the police station sometime around midnight of December 13, and about four hours later, a court reporter recorded Coleman's full confession.

Coleman subsequently was indicted, pleaded not guilty, and moved to suppress his confession. Central to the motion to suppress was Coleman's claim that he had invoked his right to an attorney several times and that the police had proceeded in violation of Miranda v. Arizona. The parties offered conflicting testimony on this issue at the suppression hearing; the court denied Coleman's motion, holding that “the credibility is resolved on behalf of the State.” At trial, a jury found Coleman guilty of first-degree murder under an accomplice liability theory. He was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

Coleman appealed his conviction in state court, arguing, among other things, that the trial court had improperly refused to suppress his confession. He included an affidavit from his attorney, David Wiener, stating that Wiener had called the police station during the December 12 interrogation and requested that police cease questioning his client. The Illinois appellate court concluded that the suppression question came down to a credibility determination, and that the trial court had properly exercised its discretion in crediting the State's witnesses over Coleman. State of Illinois v. Coleman, No. 1–00–4022333 Ill.App.3d 1205, 296 Ill.Dec. 813, 836 N.E.2d 228 (Ill.App.Ct. Sept. 27, 2002). The court affirmed Coleman's conviction.

Coleman has mounted several challenges to his conviction over the course of many years, so a short summary of the current procedural posture is in order.

After exhausting his state post-conviction remedies, Coleman filed a pro se habeas petition in federal court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The district court denied relief, see U.S. ex rel. Coleman v. Shaw, No. 06C184, 2009 WL 1904370 (N.D.Ill. July 1, 2009), and Coleman responded by filing a motion to reconsider, plus several other motions. The district court consolidated the motions as a Rule 60(b) request for relief, considered each of Coleman's arguments on the merits, and rejected each one; the court then denied him a certificate of appealability. Coleman appealed to this Court; after reviewing the record, we granted a certificate of appealability, but limited to the following issue: “whether the state courts reasonably determined that Coleman did not request counsel when he was arrested or during the 17 hours he was in custody before giving a statement and, thus, whether Coleman's statement was admissible at trial.” This is now the sole issue before us on appeal.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Habeas Standards of Review

We review a district court's denial of habeas relief de novo. Northern v. Boatwright, 594 F.3d 555, 559 (7th Cir.2010). Our review of state court decisions, however, is limited by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA). Thus, when we are dealing with a state court's determination on the merits, we may only grant habeas relief if the decision “was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law,” or “was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1)-(2); see also Harrington v. Richter, ––– U.S. ––––, 131 S.Ct. 770, 783–84, 178 L.Ed.2d 624 (2011). The relevant decision that we review under AEDPA is always the decision of the last state court to rule on the merits of the petitioner's claims.¹McCarthy v. Pollard, 656 F.3d 478, 483 (7th Cir.2011).

A state court decision is “contrary to” federal law when it “contradicts the governing law set forth in [Supreme Court] cases.” Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 405, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000). A state court decision involves an “unreasonable application of ... clearly established federal law” when the state court “identifies the correct governing legal rule from [Supreme Court] cases but unreasonably applies it to the facts of the particular state prisoner's case.” ²Id. at 407, 120 S.Ct. 1495.

Alternatively, a state court decision involves “an unreasonable determination of the facts” under § 2254(d)(2) only when the state court makes an “unreasonable error.” Morgan v. Hardy, 662 F.3d 790, 798 (7th Cir.2011). We give great deference to state court factual findings. After AEDPA, we are required to presume a state court's account of the facts correct, and the petitioner has “the burden of rebutting the presumption of correctness by clear and convincing evidence.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1); Miller–El v. Dretke, 545 U.S. 231, 240, 125 S.Ct. 2317, 162 L.Ed.2d 196 (2005).

B. “Contrary to” or an “Unreasonable Application” of Federal Law Under Section 2254(d)(1)

We begin by identifying the clearly established federal law at issue here: Miranda v. Arizona and its progeny. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966).

Once an accused is read his Miranda rights, he may invoke his right to counsel under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments by requesting an attorney, and the police must immediately cease the interrogation until counsel is present. Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 481–82, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981). Any waiver of the Miranda right to counsel must be voluntary, knowing, and intelligent. Id. at 482, 101 S.Ct. 1880. To be voluntary, the waiver must simply be non-coerced; to be knowing and intelligent, waiver must be made with “a full awareness of both the nature of the right being abandoned and the consequences of the decision to abandon it.” Moran v. Burbine, 475 U.S. 412, 421, 106 S.Ct. 1135, 89 L.Ed.2d 410 (1986). Finally, a court may only conclude that a suspect waived his Miranda rights if the “ ‘totality of the circumstances surrounding the interrogation’ reveal both an uncoerced choice and the requisite level of comprehension.” Id. (quoting Fare v. Michael C., 442 U.S. 707, 724–25, 99 S.Ct. 2560, 61 L.Ed.2d 197 (1979)).

Coleman is never clear as to whether he is arguing that his state conviction was “contrary to” or represents an “unreasonable application” of clearly established federal law. Although there are separate standards associated with each of these prongs under § 2254(d)(1), he uses them interchangeably throughout his argument. We will discuss first whether the state court decision was “contrary to” federal law.

Coleman's primary argument under § 2254(d)(1) is that the state appellate court ran afoul of Edwards v. Arizona in its analysis. Edwards does indeed contain the relevant standard, but the Illinois appellate court correctly identified that standard in its decision. The state court was careful to explain that any waiver of the right to counsel must be “voluntary, knowing, and intelligent,” and it found that Coleman's waiver met that standard. The court went on to explain that in determining whether waiver is knowing and intelligent, the court must consider the totality of the circumstances. This is also correct and in accord with Edwards and Moran v. Burbine. Because the state appellate court identified the correct legal standards,we now turn to whether it applied those standards reasonably under the “unreasonable application” clause. See Etherly v. Davis, 619 F.3d 654, 661 (7th Cir.2010) (analyzing the “contrary to” and “unreasonable application” clauses in a similar fashion).

We first highlight an important distinction between Edwards and this case; in Edwards, the defendant was arrested and requested counsel during his initial interrogation. The police ceased questioning, but then failed to provide him with counsel and resumed questioning the next day. Eventually the defendant relented during interrogation and confessed to a crime. The Supreme Court held that the defendant had not “knowingly and intelligently” waived his right to counsel when interrogation resumed on the second day.

Coleman admits but downplays the crucial difference here: In Edwards, there was no question (as there is here) about whether the...