Giarratano v. Murray
| Citation | 836 F.2d 1421 |
| Decision Date | 04 January 1988 |
| Docket Number | 87-7519,Nos. 87-7518,s. 87-7518 |
| Parties | Joseph M. GIARRATANO; Johnny Watkins, Jr.; Richard T. Boggs, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. Edward W. MURRAY, Director, Virginia Department of Corrections; Gerald L. Baliles, Governor; Robert N. Baldwin; Michael Samberg, Warden, in their official capacities, Defendants-Appellants. Joseph M. GIARRATANO; Johnny Watkins, Jr.; Richard T. Boggs, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Edward W. MURRAY, Director, Virginia Department of Corrections; Gerald L. Baliles, Governor; Robert N. Baldwin; Michael Samberg, Warden, in their official capacities, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (4th Circuit) |
Robert Q. Harris, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Mary Sue Terry, Atty. Gen., Richard F. Gorman, III, Asst. Atty. Gen., Guy W. Horsley, Jr., Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., on brief), for defendants-appellants.
Steven E. Landers (Jay Topkis, Alisa D. Shudofsky, Clyde Allison, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, Gerald T. Zerkin, Zerkin, Heard & Kozak, Martha A. Geer, Smith, Patterson, Follin, Curtis, James & Harkavy, Jonathan D. Sasser Moore & Van Allen, on brief), for plaintiffs-appellees.
Eugene C. Thomas, President, American Bar Ass'n, Ronald J. Tabak, Sara-Ann Determan, Charles G. Cole, on brief, for amicus curiae American Bar Ass'n.
Before HALL and WILKINS, Circuit Judges, and G. ROSS ANDERSON, Jr., United States District Judge for the District of South Carolina, sitting by designation.
This is a consolidated appeal and cross-appeal arising from a class action initiated by death row inmates in the Commonwealth of Virginia pursuant to 42 U.S.C.A. Sec. 1983 (West 1981). The Commonwealth appeals an order of the district court, 668 F.Supp. 511, requiring the automatic appointment of counsel for death row inmates, on request, to prepare state habeas corpus petitions challenging their convictions and sentences. The inmate class cross-appeals the district court's refusal to order the automatic appointment of counsel for preparation of federal post-conviction petitions. We reverse in part and affirm in part.
This action was initiated by Joe Giarratano, a Virginia death row inmate, and other Virginia "John Doe" inmates also on death row. Giarratano was convicted and sentenced in 1979 for the murder of a Virginia woman and the rape and murder of her fifteen-year-old daughter. His conviction and sentence were affirmed by the Virginia Supreme Court in April, 1980. Giarratano v. Commonwealth, 220 Va. 1064, 266 S.E.2d 94 (1980). For the past seven years he has awaited execution.
Death row inmates Boggs, Watkins, Wise, Beaver and Frye, through their attorneys, filed a class action and complaint in intervention naming as defendants the Governor of Virginia, the Executive Secretary of the Virginia Supreme Court, the Director of the Virginia Department of Corrections, and the Warden of the State Penitentiary in Richmond. Plaintiffs asserted that under the eighth amendment, the equal protection and due process clauses of the fourteenth amendment, the sixth amendment, and the constitutional right to meaningful access to the courts, the defendants were required to automatically appoint "each indigent death row inmate competent and adequately paid counsel to represent him in connection with post-conviction proceedings." The matter was tried by the court. The district court concluded that Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817, 97 S.Ct. 1491, 52 L.Ed.2d 72 (1977) "dictates that the plaintiffs here be granted some form of relief."
In Bounds, the Supreme Court held that the constitutional right of access to the courts is satisfied by providing inmates "adequate law libraries or adequate assistance from persons trained in the law." 430 U.S. at 828, 97 S.Ct. at 1498. The district court found in this case that the provision of a library did little to satisfy Virginia's obligation to assist death row inmates in the preparation and filing of meaningful legal papers as required by Bounds. The court found that Virginia provides inmates with a total of seven institutional attorneys who act in an advisory capacity in preparing post-conviction petitions, as well as appointed counsel to assist in cases which require an evidentiary hearing. However, the advisory services were held inadequate for death row inmates because the attorneys conduct no "factual inquiries of the kind necessitated by death penalty issues." Although Virginia courts appoint counsel to represent any inmate who alleges nonfrivolous issues which require a hearing, Darnell v. Peyton, 208 Va. 675, 160 S.E.2d 749 (1968), the timing of this appointment was held insufficient as to these inmates because "by reason of the lateness of the appointment, [they are] unable to provide all of the required assistance."
The district court determined that the legal assistance provided by Virginia for death row inmates is "at best, a patchwork system." The court concluded that "only the continuous services of an attorney to investigate, research and present claimed violations of fundamental rights provides them the meaningful access to the courts guaranteed by the Constitution."
The findings given by the district court in support of this conclusion were (1) the time limitations upon death row inmates to prepare and present their petitions, (2) the complexity and difficulty of the legal work, and (3) the emotional instability suffered by inmates preparing for "impending death." As a result, the court ordered Virginia to "develop a system whereby attorneys may be appointed to the death row inmates individually" upon request to draft state petitions, but not as to federal petitions. The court described the relief granted as requiring "only a slight modification of the current assistance" now provided by Virginia.
We are bound by the district court's findings of fact indicating that Virginia was not in compliance with its constitutional obligation to provide death row inmates meaningful access to the courts only if they are not clearly erroneous. Anderson v. City of Bessemer City, 470 U.S. 564, 105 S.Ct. 1504, 84 L.Ed.2d 518 (1985). The pivotal conclusion on which the logic of the district court turns is that the legal complexity of any death penalty case presents a per se exception to the standards by which meaningful access is assessed under Bounds.
The record established that upon request these inmates are provided copies of the transcript, briefs, and state court opinion from the initial automatic appeal of their conviction. Testimony from Plaintiffs' witnesses established the critical assistance these materials provide in the preparation of habeas corpus petitions. In compliance with Bounds, Virginia provides prison library facilities which are more than adequate to meet the needs of all inmates. As Giarratano testified, Virginia provides a "decent" law library which includes Federal Supplement, Federal Reports, United States Supreme Court Reporter, the Federal Digest, Virginia Reports, and the United States Code. The success of Giarratano in at least two other pro se actions demonstrates the sufficiency of the assistance provided. Giarratano v. Bass, 596 F.Supp. 818 (E.D.Va.1984). Virginia has thus satisfied requirements of meaningful access by providing an adequate law library, and it also provides a system of institutional attorneys to assist inmates.
Further, counsel is appointed under Va.Code Ann. Sec. 14.1-183 (1950 & Repl.Vol.1985) for any state post-conviction petition which raises a nonfrivolous issue and requires a hearing. Virginia allows liberal amendment of pro se habeas corpus petitions. Plaintiffs' expert on Virginia post-conviction proceedings testified that he had no firsthand knowledge of a Virginia Circuit Court ever denying amendment to a habeas corpus petition in a capital case. And, the record does not identify any instance in which a Virginia death row inmate has properly requested and been denied assistance of counsel in pursuing his first habeas corpus petition.
We hold that the district court clearly erred in concluding that the Commonwealth of Virginia was not meeting its obligation and abused its discretion in fashioning such an extreme remedy. Virginia fulfills its obligation under Bounds to provide all inmates with meaningful access to the courts, and there is no factual or legal justification for requiring a higher standard of access for death row inmates. In essence, by reading the record to support a sweeping extension of Bounds, the district court has, under the guise of meaningful access, established a right of counsel where none is required by the Constitution.
After the district court rendered its decision the Supreme Court decided Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U.S. ---, 107 S.Ct. 1990, 95 L.Ed.2d 539 (1987). In that case the Court held that the procedures articulated in Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738, 87 S.Ct. 1396, 18 L.Ed.2d 493 (1967), which must be satisfied before appointed counsel may withdraw from a frivolous appeal, do not apply to state post-conviction proceedings because there is no constitutional right to counsel in those proceedings:
Anders did not set down an independent constitutional command that all lawyers, in all proceedings, must follow these particular procedures. Rather, Anders established a prophylactic framework that is relevant when, and only when, a litigant has a previously established constitutional right to counsel. We have never held that prisoners have a constitutional right to counsel when mounting collateral attacks to their convictions, and we decline to so hold today. Our cases establish that the right to appointed counsel extends to the first appeal of right, and no further.
Finley, 481 U.S. ---, 107 S.Ct. 1990, 95 L.Ed.2d at 545 (citation omitted).
The decision in Finley relies heavily on Ross v. Moffitt, 417 U.S. 600, 94 S.Ct. 2437, 41 L.Ed.2d 341...
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Murray v. Giarratano
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