Coulter v. McCann

• Decision Date: 20 April 2007
• Docket Number: No. 06-2457.,06-2457.
• Citation: Coulter v. McCann, 484 F.3d 459 (7th Cir. 2007)
• Parties: Dwayne COULTER, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Terry McCANN, Warden, Respondent-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

484 F.3d 459

Dwayne COULTER, Petitioner-Appellee, v.Terry McCANN, Warden, Respondent-Appellant.

No. 06-2457.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued September 20, 2006.

Decided April 20, 2007.

Debra R. Salinger(argued), Office of the State Appellate Defender, Chicago, IL, for Petitioner-Appellee.

Gary S. Feinerman(argued), Office of the Attorney General, Chicago, IL, for Respondent-Appellant.

Before ROVNER, WOOD, and EVANS, Circuit Judges.

WOOD, Circuit Judge.

Dwayne Coulter's case has been traveling through the state and federal judicial systems for twenty years.Coulter was convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder by an Illinois state court in 1987.Illinois v. Coulter,230 Ill.App.3d 209, 171 Ill.Dec. 643, 594 N.E.2d 1163(1992)("Coulter I").His case first arrived in federal court more than a decade ago, in 1996, when he petitioned for habeas corpus relief.Throughout these proceedings, Coulter, who is African-American, has been contending that the state's use of its peremptory strikes during the jury selection process violated his rights under the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution.SeeBatson v. Kentucky,476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69(1986).Although the jury in Coulter's criminal trial included three jurors who were African-American, the state used nine of the ten peremptory strikes it exercised to exclude African-American venirepersons.

In 1998, the district court issued Coulter a conditional writ and this court affirmed that decision.Coulter v. Gramley,945 F.Supp. 1138, 1143(N.D.Ill.1996);Coulter v. Gilmore,155 F.3d 912, 922(7th Cir.1998)("Coulter II").Our decision gave the state the choice of releasing him or holding a new Batson hearing; not surprisingly, it opted for the latter.After that hearing, the state trial court found that the prosecution's reasons for its use of peremptory strikes were race-neutral; the state appellate court affirmed.Illinois v. Coulter,321 Ill.App.3d 644, 254 Ill.Dec. 794, 748 N.E.2d 240(2001)("Coulter III").Coulter then returned to federal court in 2005, purportedly "reinstating" his earlier habeas corpus petition.The district court concluded that the Batson problem remained and issued the writ, again with a stay designed to permit the state to retry him within 120 days.Coulter v. Battaglia,2006 WL 566448, *6, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 8869, *20(N.D.Ill.2006).On July 5, 2006, this court issued a stay of the district court's order directing that Coulter be released, pending resolution of this appeal.

We conclude that Coulter's 2005 petition must be evaluated under the standards set forth in the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), Pub.L. No. 104-132, Apr. 24, 1996.On that basis, we conclude further that while the state court's explanation of its findings leaves something to be desired, we cannot say that its decision is either contrary to or an unreasonable application of Batson.We therefore reverse and remand so that judgment may be entered in favor of Warden McCann.

I

Given the lengthy history of this case, a brief summary of the underlying facts and proceedings is in order before addressing the merits of Coulter's petition.

A

In 1985, Coulter was riding in a car with his two codefendants when the vehicle was stopped by Officer Michael Ridges of Prospect Heights, Illinois, because it had no visible license plates.Officer Ridges called in the traffic stop.Shortly after the stop, another call reported that an officer had been shot at that location.The first officer to respond to the second call found Ridges already dead with a bullet wound to the head.Investigators found the driver's license of one of Coulter's co-defendants on the scene.Later that day, Coulter and his co-defendants were spotted and pulled over.

Coulter was charged with two crimes: the murder of Ridges and conspiracy to commit the murder of a Robert Fischer.During the jury selection process for Coulter's trial, the prosecution exercised ten of its 14 allowed peremptory challenges.Of the ten, it used nine to strike African-American prospective jurors.It used the tenth strike against a non-African-American juror who said that he could not impose the death penalty against a criminal defendant.Coulter's attorney moved three times for a mistrial on the ground that the state's use of peremptory challenges violated the Equal Protection Clause.Each time, the trial judge denied the motion.The final jury consisted of eight Caucasians, one Hispanic and three African-Americans.The two alternates were also African-American.

At trial, Coulter's defense centered around his claim that the shooting was an accident that occurred when he slammed the gun on top of the hood of the stopped car after he became angry while talking to Ridges.This was not enough to raise a reasonable doubt in the mind of the jury, which convicted him.The court imposed a sentence of life imprisonment automatically when the jury did not authorize the death penalty.

On direct appeal, Coulter raised his Batson claim, among many others.In 1990, the Illinois appellate court, while retaining jurisdiction over Coulter's appeal, ordered the trial court to clarify the record regarding the jury selection process.Four months later, in early 1991, the issue was briefed, attorneys appeared again before the trial court, and the trial court concluded that there was no Batson violation.When the case returned to the Illinois appellate court, it affirmed the trial court even though it viewed the trial court's procedure as "less than ideal."Coulter I,171 Ill.Dec. 643, 594 N.E.2d at 1171.The Supreme Court of Illinois denied Coulter's petition for leave to appeal.Illinois v. Coulter,146 Ill.2d 636, 176 Ill.Dec. 807, 602 N.E.2d 461(1992).

Coulter then successfully petitioned in federal district court for a writ of habeas corpus based on the alleged Batson violation.Coulter v. Gramley,945 F.Supp. at 1143.On appeal, we agreed with the district court that the state court had not followed the proper procedure for assessing Coulter's Batson claim.We also found troubling the prosecution's stated reasons for striking prospective jurors Melvin Igess, Jeanell Hicks, Melanie Pinkins, and Marcina Adams — all African-Americans.Id. at 920-21.In the end, we affirmed the district court's judgment, but we modified its order to issue the writ unless within 120 days the state chose to return to state court for a new Batson hearing.Coulter II,155 F.3d at 922.We also described the appropriate methodology for such a hearing:

[I]n addition to reviewing the reasons given for striking each individual prospective juror, [the trial court must] consider[ ] the totality of the circumstances and compare[ ]the prosecutor's strikes against African-Americans against its treatment of similarly situated Caucasians.

Id. at 922.

The state opted for the new Batson hearing.In 1998, the state trial court conducted a new hearing, at which it considered all of Coulter's arguments and assessed on the record some of the reasons given by the prosecution for striking some of the African-American potential jurors in Coulter's 1987 trial.The court concluded that the prosecution's reasons for its strikes were "credible and . . . not pretextual."The trial court also volunteered its opinion of the prosecutors' character — an unhelpful step in this particular case, given the fact that the trial judge had no experience with those individuals as prosecutors in Coulter's or any other person's trial.The Supreme Court of Illinois has allowed the consideration of a prosecutor's character in a Batson analysis, but in a much more limited way and not at the expense of full consideration of the required factors.SeeIllinois v. Andrews,146 Ill.2d 413, 167 Ill.Dec. 996, 588 N.E.2d 1126, 1134(1992)(holding that "the trial judge's experience with local prosecutors and knowledge of local conditions are relevant factors in a prima facie [Batson] case analysis, [but]this court has never intimated that such considerations are dispositive of this issue").

On appeal from the trial court's reaffirmation of its earlier conclusion that Batson was not violated, the state appellate court affirmed.Coulter III,254 Ill.Dec. 794, 748 N.E.2d at 252.The Supreme Court of Illinois again denied Coulter leave to appeal.Illinois v. Coulter,196 Ill.2d 551, 261 Ill.Dec. 351, 763 N.E.2d 321(2001).The U.S. Supreme Court, however, granted Coulter's petition for certiorari and vacated the state appellate court's decision.Coulter v. Illinois,537 U.S. 1230, 123 S.Ct. 1384, 155 L.Ed.2d 194(2003).The Court instructed the Illinois appellate court to reconsider its decision in light of Miller-El v. Cockrell,537 U.S. 322, 123 S.Ct. 1029, 154 L.Ed.2d 931(2003)("Miller-El I").

The state appellate court took up the case again, but it decided that Miller-El I shed no new light on Coulter's claims.Once again, it held that Coulter's Batson rights had not been violated.Illinois v. Coulter,345 Ill.App.3d 81, 278 Ill.Dec. 843799 N.E.2d 708, 717(2003)("Coulter IV").Meanwhile, Coulter's state courtpetition for post-conviction relief was making its way through the Illinois courts, resulting in two additional decisions from the Illinois appellate court on an ineffective assistance of counsel claim, a remand by the Supreme Court of Illinois, and a denial of certiorari by the U.S. Supreme Court.

On November 23, 2005, after the state courts reached their final decision on the merits of Coulter's challenges to his 1998Batson hearing, Coulter filed a motion in federal court asking to "reinstate" his federal habeas corpus petition.The district court granted the motion, apparently on the assumption that it had never really relinquished jurisdiction over the case during the new round of Batson proceedings triggered by the conditional writ issued after Coulter II.This time, Coulter argued...