Ex Parte Jenkins

• Decision Date: 08 April 2005
• Docket Number: 1031313.
• Citation: 972 So.2d 159
• Parties: Ex parte Mark Allen JENKINS. (In re Mark Allen Jenkins v. State of Alabama).
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

972 So.2d 159

Ex parte Mark Allen JENKINS (In re Mark Allen Jenkins v. State of Alabama).

1031313.

Supreme Court of Alabama.

April 8, 2005.

Joseph T. Flood, Rochester, New York, for petitioner.

Troy King, atty. gen., and Tracy M. Daniel, asst. atty. gen., for respondent.

Bryan A. Stevenson, Randall S. Susskind, and Angela L. Setzer, Montgomery, for amicus curiae Equal Justice Initiative of Alabama, in support of the petitioner.

LYONS, Justice.

Mark Allen Jenkins was convicted in March 1991 of two counts of capital murder in the death of Tammy Hogeland, i.e., murder during a robbery in the first degree and murder during a kidnapping in the first degree. The jury recommended, by a vote of 10 to 2, that Jenkins be sentenced to death. The trial court followed its recommendation. On direct appeal, the Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed Jenkins's convictions and sentence. See Jenkins v. State, 627 So.2d 1034 (Ala. Crim.App.1992), aff'd, 627 So.2d 1054 (Ala. 1993).

Jenkins timely filed a postconviction petition pursuant to Rule 32, Ala. R.Crim. P., in May 1995. He filed an amended petition in April 1997, after the then applicable two-year period for filing set forth in Rule 32.2(c) had expired.¹ After an evidentiary hearing, the trial court denied the petition. Jenkins appealed. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the judgment denying postconviction relief. Jenkins v. State, [Ms. CR-97-0864, February 27, 2004] 972 So.2d 111 (Ala.Crim.App.2004). Jenkins then petitioned this Court for certiorari review. We granted Jenkins's petition to consider that aspect of the judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals holding that a claim asserted in a Rule 32 petition is time-barred unless that claim satisfies the requirements for relation back, borrowed from Rule 15(c), Ala. R. Civ. P., and relates back to the date of the filing of the original Rule 32 petition. Jenkins argues that the Court of Criminal Appeals improperly applied principles taken from the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure to the Alabama Rules of Criminal Procedure. We agree, and, as to that aspect of the Court of Criminal Appeals' judgment, we reverse.

The Court of Criminal Appeals' opinion states the following facts concerning the murder of Tammy Hogeland:

"At trial, the State's evidence tended to show that on April 21, 1989, a truck driver discovered Tammy Hogeland's nude body on the side of a highway near Birmingham, Alabama. Forensic tests showed that Hogeland died as a result of manual strangulation. Hogeland was last seen on April 18, 1989, at the Tenth Avenue Omelet Shoppe restaurant in Birmingham were she was working as a waitress. Some of the jewelry Hogeland had been wearing when she was last seen was missing when her body was discovered.

"At about 2:00 a.m. on April 18, 1989, a witness saw a red sports car, driven by Jenkins, enter the parking lot of the Omelet Shoppe. Sara Harris, an employee of the Omelet Shoppe, testified that she saw the victim drive off with Jenkins. Later that morning two witnesses saw Jenkins at a gasoline service station off I-59. They said that a female was also in the car and that she appeared to be `passed out.' These two witnesses left the service station and Jenkins also left the station and followed them on I-59. They saw Jenkins pull off of I-59 in an area near where Hogeland's body was later discovered."

Jenkins v. State, 972 So.2d at 119-20 (footnote omitted).

Jenkins's initial Rule 32 petition was timely filed. It raised claims of ineffective assistance of counsel and violations of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 83 S.Ct. 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963), as well as other claims that were determined to be procedurally barred. Jenkins's amended Rule 32 petition added a claim of juror misconduct: Jenkins alleged that a juror in his trial failed to disclose during voir dire that two of her close relatives had been brutally murdered. The juror testified at the Rule 32 hearing that her only nephew had been murdered before she qualified as a juror in Jenkins's trial. Jenkins states that press accounts of that crime show that both the juror's nephew and his wife were murdered execution-style. The trial court denied relief on the juror-misconduct claim on the ground that it could have been, but was not, raised on appeal.

The Court of Criminal Appeals noted that Jenkins's juror-misconduct claim was raised for the first time in the amended petition, which was filed beyond the then two-year limitations period for filing a Rule 32 petition. Relying on Charest v. State, 854 So.2d 1102 (Ala.Crim.App.2002), the Court of Criminal Appeals held that the juror-misconduct claim presented in the amended petition would be considered timely only if it related back to a claim raised in the timely original petition; it concluded that Jenkins's original petition had included "no claim even remotely related to the venire members' failure to truthfully answer questions during voir dire examination." 972 So.2d at 121. Because the limitations period in Rule 32.2(c), Ala. R.Crim. P., is mandatory and jurisdictional, the court said, the trial court could not consider a nonjurisdictional claim filed beyond the limitations period; therefore, the court held that Jenkins's juror-misconduct claim was barred by the expiration of the limitations period of Rule 32.2(c).

In Charest v. State, the Court of Criminal Appeals employed an analysis of the relation-back doctrine drawn from Rule 15, Ala. R. Civ. P.:

"[T]he circuit court should have addressed only those claims raised in the first petition, which was timely filed on February 6, 1998, and any subsequently filed legitimate amendments to that [petition] that relate back to the original petition. See Rodopoulos v. Sam Piki Enters., Inc., 570 So.2d 661, 664 (Ala. 1990) (`"`[W]here the amendment is merely a more definite statement, or refinement, of a cause of action set out in the original complaint, the amendment relates back to the original complaint in accordance with [Ala.] R. Civ. P. 15(c).'"') (quoting McCollough v. Warfield, 523 So.2d 374 (Ala.1988), and quoted with approval in Garrett v. State, 644 So.2d 977, 980 (Ala.Crim.App. 1994))."

854 So.2d at 1104. In Garrett v. State, 644 So.2d 977 (Ala.Crim.App.1994), the only case we have found in which the Court of Criminal Appeals applied the relation-back doctrine before it did so in Charest, the court held that a petitioner who had filed a Rule 32 petition that was not in the proper form should be allowed to amend his petition to comply with the requirements of Rule 32, and that his amended petition would relate back to the filing of the original petition and thus would not be barred by the limitations period of Rule 32.2(c). The court stated in Garrett: "Although the cases [discussing the relation-back doctrine] in the preceding paragraph concerned the construction and application of a specific rule of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure, we find the relation-back principle addressed in those cases applicable to the situation presented in this case." 644 So.2d at 981.

Jenkins argues that Rule 32.7(b), Ala. R.Crim. P., permits an amendment to a Rule 32 petition without incorporating the limitations of the doctrine of relation back. Rule 32.7(b) states: "Amendments to pleadings may be permitted at any stage of the proceedings prior to the entry of judgment." Furthermore, Jenkins notes that Rule 32.7(d) provides: "Leave to amend shall be freely granted." Jenkins maintains that the wording of Rule 32.7 clearly indicates that the relation-back doctrine should not impede a petitioner's ability to file an amendment to a Rule 32 petition that asserts claims that were not raised in the original petition. Jenkins also points to Rule 32.4, which provides that Rule 32 proceedings "shall be governed by the Rules of Criminal Procedure." (Emphasis added.) If Rule 32 proceedings are governed by the Rules of Criminal Procedure, Jenkins argues, then principles taken from the Rules of Civil Procedure do not apply in Rule 32 proceedings.

The State argues in its brief to this Court that the Court of Criminal Appeals, in analyzing Jenkins's juror-misconduct claim under the relation-back doctrine, "followed a long line of state and federal precedent that has analogized to the relation-back principles of Rule [15, Ala. R. Civ. P.,] in determining whether amendments to Rule 32 petitions are appropriate." The only Alabama criminal cases the State cites, however, are Charest and Garrett. The State is correct that most federal courts apply the relation-back principles of Rule 15(c), Fed.R.Civ.P., to habeas corpus proceedings. See, e.g., Davenport v. United States, 217 F.3d 1341 (11th Cir. 2000). The State's reliance on federal precedent is misplaced, however, because federal habeas corpus proceedings are considered civil cases, and, consequently, it is appropriate to apply the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to those cases. See, e.g., Fama v. Commissioner of Correctional Servs., 235 F.3d 804 (2d Cir.2000). See also Rule 11, Rules Governing § 2254 Cases ("The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, to the extent that they are not inconsistent with any statutory provisions or these rules, may be applied to a proceeding under these rules." (Emphasis added.)) Although, as previously noted, Rule 32 postconviction proceedings in Alabama are considered civil in nature, Rule 32.4 specifically mandates that Rule 32 proceedings are governed by the Rules of Criminal Procedure. As Justice Stuart explained in her dissent in Ex parte Hutcherson, 847 So.2d 386, 389 (Ala.2002) (Stuart, J., dissenting):

"[W]hile a Rule 32 proceeding for postconviction relief is considered to be civil in nature, such a proceeding is distinct from a typical civil case. Rule 32, Ala. R.Crim. P., provides a defendant a method by which to seek postconviction relief; therefore, the rights to be accorded a defendant during a Rule 32 proceeding and the procedures pursuant to which such a proceeding...