Dean v. Noeth
| Decision Date | 27 July 2022 |
| Docket Number | 18-CV-6648 CJS |
| Parties | WILLIAM M. DEAN, Petitioner, v. SUPERINTENDENT JOSEPH H. NOETH, Respondent. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of New York |
WILLIAM M. DEAN, Petitioner,
v.
SUPERINTENDENT JOSEPH H. NOETH, Respondent.
No. 18-CV-6648 CJS
United States District Court, W.D. New York
July 27, 2022
DECISION AND ORDER
CHARLES J. SIRAGUSA UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
INTRODUCTION
Petitioner William Dean (“Petitioner” or “Dean”), proceeding pro se, filed the subject petition for writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, challenging his conviction in Ontario County Court, on March 29, 2011, for crimes including three counts of Burglary in the Second Degree. Now before the Court is Respondent's Motion to Dismiss the Petition as untimely. (ECF No. 12). For the reasons discussed below, Respondent's motion is granted and the petition is dismissed as untimely.
BACKGROUND
Dean was convicted following a jury trial in Ontario County Court before the Honorable Craig J. Doran, County Court Judge (“Judge Doran”). The evidence introduced at trial, viewed in the light most-favorable to the Prosecution, established, among other things, that in April and May of 2010, Dean burglarized three residences, including one belonging to his brother Mark from which jewelry, cash and other items were stolen. Mark suspected that Dean may have been the perpetrator, and alerted police that if Dean had committed the burglary, he might try to sell the stolen jewelry at a particular jewelry store in Rochester. A police investigation found that Dean and his girlfriend had, immediately following the burglary at Mark's house, gone to that same jewelry store and sold a large amount of jewelry, including several items stolen from Mark's
house. Dean was arrested and property stolen from the second burglarized residence, including DVDs and a bottle of pills that had been prescribed to the homeowner's husband, was found in Dean's car following the execution of a search warrant.[1] Additionally, a credit card stolen from the third burglarized residence was used to purchase merchandise from a Walmart store, and Dean was arrested wearing a shirt matching the appearance of a shirt purchased with the stolen card.[2] In sum, the prosecution presented a strong circumstantial case based primarily on Dean's possession of recently-stolen property from all three burglaries, along with evidence of motive and opportunity.[3] The defense case consisted of just two witnesses, namely, Dean's mother, who attempted to provide alibis for him, and an investigator from the Public Defender's Office. The jury convicted Dean after deliberating only a few hours, and Dean was sentenced as a second felony offender to an aggregate sentence of twenty-one years in prison (later modified to nineteen years).
Dean subsequently filed an appeal and various state collateral attacks on his conviction, alleging that he was unfairly convicted for various reasons, including that he had alibis; that his brother lied about the burglary; that the shirt found in his possession did not match the description given by police of the shirt purchased with the stolen credit card; that some of the property found in his car did not match the property stolen from the second residence; that the police and prosecutor fabricated and withheld evidence; and that his attorney provided ineffective assistance of counsel.
On August 13, 2018, Dean filed the subject habeas Petition,[4] which purports to assert ten separate grounds for relief. Dean, proceeding pro se, used a form complaint for filing § 2254 habeas petitions. (ECF No. 1). As relevant to the pending motion to dismiss, the form complaint directed Dean to list all “previously filed” “petitions, applications or motions . . . with respect to this judgement in any court, state or federal[.]” In response to that direction Dean listed sixteen such “petitions, applications or motions,” many of which he claimed were still “pending” years after they were filed. For reasons that will become clear below, it is relevant to note that none of the sixteen “petitions, applications or motions” Dean listed was filed on either April 27, 2015 or May 15, 2016. Dean signed the habeas petition on August 13, 2018.
On March 6, 2019, Respondent filed a motion to dismiss the petition as untimely, under the applicable one-year statute of limitations.[5] Respondent's argument on this point may be summarized as follows: Dean's conviction became final (following his direct appeal and resentencing) on October 5, 2015; however, the limitations clock was immediately tolled, because there was still pending a state-court collateral attack (his second) pursuant to New York Criminal Procedure Law (“CPL”) § 440.10 that he had filed on October 27, 2014; that motion was denied on June 1, 2016; the following day, June 2, 2016, the one-year limitations period began to run; the limitations clock then ran for 269 days, until February 25, 2017, when it was tolled because Dean filed a motion for writ of error coram nobis; that application was denied on November 8, 2017, and the limitations clock began to run again the following day, November 9, 2017; the limitations clock then ran un-interrupted for another 96 days, until it expired on February 13,
2018; and Dean did not file this habeas action until six months later, on August 13, 2018.
Respondent therefore contends that the petition is untimely by six months. Respondent acknowledges that during the limitations period, Dean filed various NYCPLR[6] Article 78 (“Article 78”) motions and Freedom of Information Law (“FOIL”) requests seeking documents related to his case but contends that they did not toll the limitations clock.[7] Respondent further contends that Dean is not entitled to equitable tolling.
Dean opposes the motion (ECF Nos. 25 & 26)[8] and primarily contends that the 1-year limitations period did not begin to run on June 2, 2016, contrary to what Respondent maintains. In that regard, June 1, 2016, is the date that the New York State Supreme Court, Appellate Division Fourth Department (“Appellate Division”) denied Dean's motion for leave to appeal the trial court's denial of his second CPL § 440.10 motion. Respondent argues that the limitations clock began running the next day, June 2, 2016, since New York law gave Dean no ability to appeal that determination. Dean, however, contends that on June 22, 2016, he attempted to appeal the Appellate Division's ruling by filing a request for leave to appeal to the New York Court of Appeals, which was denied, on September 19, 2016, because “the order sought to be
appealed from [was] not appealable under CPL 450.90(1).”[9] Dean further contends that after the Court of Appeals denied his request, he “challenge[d] the [Court of Appeals] Clerk's decision to dismiss his application dated September 19, 2016, and [such challenge] was properly pending before the Court of Appeals until November 28, 2016.” ECF No. 25 at p. AF-2. In sum, and liberally construing Dean's papers, he maintains that the 1-year limitations clock was statutorily stayed, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2),[10] and did not begin to run until November 28, 2016, at the earliest, due to his attempts to appeal the denial of his request for leave to appeal the Appellate Division's denial of his second CPL § 440.10 motion.
Alternatively, Dean contends that the limitations period was stayed under § 2244(d)(2) by other state post-conviction motions he filed. In particular, those applications are as follows: 1) a coram nobis motion which, as Respondent agrees, tolled the statute between February 25, 2017, and November 8, 2017; 2) several Article 78 motions, FOIL applications and motions for “contempt of court,” all directed at obtaining allegedly-withheld Brady and Rosario materials and other evidence;[11] 3) a “Motion for New Trial of Arrest of Judgment” filed with the Ontario County Supreme Court on April 27, 2015, which is purportedly “still pending before said court”;[12] 4) a “Motion to Inspect Grand Jury Minutes and Dismiss Indictment Pursuant to NYS CPL § 210.20,” allegedly filed with the Ontario County Supreme Court on May 15, 2016, that is purportedly “still pending before the Court”; and 5) a third CPL § 440.10 motion, purportedly filed on May 4, 2018, which is purportedly “still pending before the New York State Court of Appeals.”[13] Although, as
noted earlier, Dean did not mention applications 3) and 4) in the Petition, despite having been directed to list all such motions therein.
Additionally, Dean contends that the limitations period should be equitably tolled since he “made several attempts in which to file said petition in a timely manner” but was prevented from doing so.[14] In particular, Dean argues that in January 2018, officials at Attica Correctional Facility (“Attica”) mishandled his request to provide him with inmate-account information that he needed to apply to file the subject Petition in forma pauperis.[15] Specifically, he alleges that on January 15, 2018, he sent a certification request to officials at Attica, and on January 31, 2018, “the facility replied with further instruction and did not return the certification to petitioner as required pursuant to law.”[16] More generally, Dean argues that he was also stymied from pursuing his claims due to misconduct by police, the prosecutor and Judge Doran. Dean alleges, for example, that police fabricated and withheld evidence, that the prosecutor failed to provide him with all the discovery to which he was entitled, and that Judge Doran improperly refused to allow him to file certain evidence-seeking state-court applications without payment of a filing fee.[17]
Finally, Dean maintains that he is actually innocent, which should excuse him from complying with the AEDPA filing deadline.[18]
The Court has considered the arguments of the parties and the entire record, including the voluminous exhibits attached to Dean's Petition and motion response.
DISCUSSION
Petitioner's Pro Se Status
Since Petitioner is...
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