Conner v. Wingo, 19033.

• Decision Date: 15 April 1969
• Docket Number: No. 19033.,19033.
• Parties: William Ronald CONNER, Petitioner-Appellant, v. John W. WINGO, Warden, Kentucky State Penitentiary, Respondent-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

409 F.2d 21 (1969)

William Ronald CONNER, Petitioner-Appellant, v. John W. WINGO, Warden, Kentucky State Penitentiary, Respondent-Appellee.

No. 19033.

United States Court of Appeals Sixth Circuit.

April 15, 1969.

Livingston Hall, Cambridge, Mass., for appellant.

John B. Breckinridge, Atty. Gen., George F. Rabe, Asst. Atty. Gen., Commonwealth of Kentucky, Frankfort, Ky., for appellee.

Before PHILLIPS and EDWARDS, Circuit Judges, and CECIL, Senior Circuit Judge.

PER CURIAM.

This is an appeal by William Ronald Conner, petitioner-appellant, from an order of the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky at Paducah, denying his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Conner was convicted on a charge of armed robbery in the Calloway County, Kentucky Circuit Court and sentenced to life imprisonment.

After exhausting his remedies in the Kentucky courts he petitioned the District Court for a writ of habeas corpus. The district judge dismissed the petition without a hearing and the sole question before this Court is whether the district judge erred in not conducting a plenary hearing.

A judge of the Calloway Circuit Court did conduct an evidentiary hearing, at which appellant was present, on a motion of the appellant under Kentucky law to vacate the judgment of conviction. From this evidence the state trial judge made an extensive finding of facts and concluded as a matter of law that the appellant was not deprived of due process or any other constitutional right and that his conviction and life sentence were valid. These findings and conclusions, but without a transcript of the evidence upon which they were based, were before the district judge. The district judge said:

"All relevant facts are set forth in the two cited opinions of the Court of Appeals of Kentucky and in the detailed findings of fact and conclusions of law of the trial court where his post conviction hearing was conducted. If it is concluded that a state court granted a habeas corpus applicant a full hearing and reliably found the relevant facts, the federal court may defer to the state court\'s findings of fact. Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293 83 S.Ct. 745, 9 L.Ed.2d 770. It is clear from the state court record that he did receive a full and fair hearing and that the state court\'s determination of the factual dispute to which the petitioner objects is fairly supported by the record."

In Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 316, 83 S.Ct. 745, 758, the Court said,

"Where the fundamental liberties of the person are claimed to have been infringed, we carefully scrutinize the state-court record. (Citation omitted). The duty of the Federal District Court on habeas is no less exacting.

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"* * * Even if all the relevant facts were presented in the state-court hearing, it may be that the fact-finding procedure there employed was not adequate for reaching reasonably correct results. * * * Even where the procedure employed

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