Hendricks v. Vasquez

• Decision Date: 29 October 1992
• Docket Number: No. 91-16631,91-16631
• Parties: Edgar M. HENDRICKS, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Daniel VASQUEZ, Warden, and the Attorney General of the State of California, Respondents-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 1099

974 F.2d 1099

Edgar M. HENDRICKS, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Daniel VASQUEZ, Warden, and the Attorney General of the State of California, Respondents-Appellees.

No. 91-16631.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted June 9, 1992.

Decided Sept. 2, 1992.

As Amended on Denial of Rehearing

Oct. 29, 1992.

William Goodman, Topel & Goodman, San Francisco, Cal., for petitioner-appellant.

Dane R. Gillette, Deputy Atty. Gen., San Francisco, Cal., for respondents-appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

Before GOODWIN, CANBY and RYMER, Circuit Judges.

GOODWIN, Circuit Judge:

In petitioning this court for a writ of habeas corpus, Edgar M. Hendricks alleges numerous constitutional errors with respect to his conviction for murder, sentence of death, and habeas corpus appeal. All but one of Hendricks' claims are unavailing. Because we find that the district court erred in failing to conduct an evidentiary hearing with respect to Hendricks' ineffective assistance of counsel claim, we remand this case for a hearing on that claim.

Hendricks committed the San Francisco murders which are the subject of this petition in late 1980. In September of that year, Hendricks agreed to have sex with Joseph Nelson in return for a fee. Hendricks accompanied Nelson to the latter's apartment where they had sex. Hendricks also had sex with James Parmer, Nelson's roommate. A few days later, Hendricks returned to the apartment, broke in, and shot Parmer six times at point blank range. He took Parmer's checkbook and fled. Shortly thereafter, Hendricks had a paid sexual encounter with Charleston Haynes in the latter's apartment. After the encounter, Hendricks shot Haynes five times at point blank range, took Haynes' checkbook, and fled.

Although this appeal concerns only the Parmer and Haynes murders, three other uncharged murders Hendricks committed became relevant at trial. The first of the three other victims, Harry Carter, was a 79-year-old homosexual with whom Hendricks lived for about two weeks in the former's Los Angeles apartment. After Carter called Hendricks a "low life," Hendricks stabbed and killed Carter. The second victim, Virginia Hernandez, was a prospective client of Hendricks' whom Hendricks shot and killed after she began criticizing Hendricks for his lifestyle. The final victim, James Burchell, was a sexual client of Hendricks' who lived in Los Angeles.

In 1981, Hendricks was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in San Francisco for the Parmer and Haynes murders. Hendricks appealed his conviction and sentence to the California Supreme Court. That court rejected his appeal in People v. Hendricks, 44 Cal.3d 635, 244 Cal.Rptr. 181, 749 P.2d 836 (1988). Hendricks followed his direct appeal with a state habeas corpus petition which the California Supreme Court also rejected.

Hendricks subsequently petitioned the federal district court for a writ of habeas corpus. Two days after Hendricks filed his 69-page petition, the district court summarily dismissed the petition. In Hendricks v. Vasquez, 908 F.2d 490 (9th Cir.1990), we reversed the summary dismissal and remanded the case for further consideration. On remand, the district court again denied Hendricks' petition. Hendricks v. Vasquez, No. C-89-2901-JPV (N.D.Cal.1991). In rejecting Hendricks' claims, the court declined to hold any evidentiary hearings. Hendricks timely appealed to this court.

I. The District Court's Failure to Hold Evidentiary Hearings

In considering Hendricks' habeas petition, the district court held no evidentiary hearings. Hendricks had requested a hearing for most of his claims and now alleges that it was error for the court to refuse to hold any hearings.

A habeas petitioner is entitled to an evidentiary hearing on a claim if "(1) the petitioner's allegations, if proved, would entitle him to relief, and (2) the state court trier of fact has not, after a full and fair hearing, reliably found the relevant facts." Creech v. Arave, 947 F.2d 873, 887 (9th Cir.1991), cert granted --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 2963, 119 L.Ed.2d 585 (1992). The corollary to this is that no hearing is required if either the state court has reliably found the relevant facts, Tinsley v. Borg, 895 F.2d 520, 530 (9th Cir.1990), or there are no disputed facts and the claim presents a purely legal question. Harris v. Pulley, 885 F.2d 1354, 1378 (9th Cir.1988).

With the exception of Hendricks' ineffective assistance claim, the district court did not err in failing to hold evidentiary hearings. Other than that exception, all of Hendricks' claims involve purely legal disputes, or they concern facts which the state trial court has reliably found.

II. Excusal of Jurors for Cause

Hendricks argues that in excusing four prospective jurors the trial judge violated his right to an impartial jury under the sixth and fourteenth amendments. Specifically, Hendricks claims that it was error for the trial judge to excuse the prospective jurors for their views on capital punishment because the jurors did not clearly state their opposition to that penalty.

A prospective juror may not be excused for her views concerning capital punishment unless those views would prevent or substantially impair the performance of her duties as a juror in accordance with her instructions and oath. Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U.S. 412, 420, 105 S.Ct. 844, 850, 83 L.Ed.2d 841 (1985). A finding by the trial judge of juror bias concerning the death penalty is a factual finding entitled to a presumption of correctness under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). Id. at 429, 105 S.Ct. at 854. The question in this case "is not whether a reviewing court might disagree with the trial court's findings, but whether these findings are fairly supported by the record." Id. at 434, 105 S.Ct. at 857.

During voir dire, the trial judge excused certain potential jurors because, based on their responses to questions, he concluded that their opposition to the death penalty would prevent them from properly performing their duties as jurors. To each of these four prospective jurors, the prosecutor repeatedly posed the ultimate question: "Would you automatically vote against the death penalty regardless of the evidence?" Each of the four answered unequivocally in the affirmative. The record supports the trial judge's decision.

III. Hendricks' Confessions

Hendricks claims that San Francisco police investigators obtained two statements from him in violation of the fifth and sixth amendments. Accordingly, Hendricks argues, it was error for the trial judge to admit these statements into evidence.

On March 23, 1981, FBI agents arrested Hendricks in Dallas on a charge of unlawful flight from homicide charges in California and arraigned him on that charge. Four days later, San Francisco police detectives arrived in Dallas, seeking to question Hendricks about the homicide charges. The detectives read Hendricks the Miranda warnings and Hendricks invoked his right to remain silent. The next day, March 28, the detectives brought Hendricks to San Francisco. Several times during the trip from Dallas to San Francisco, Hendricks attempted to initiate conversation about the homicides with the detectives but they told him to wait.

In the San Francisco interview room, the detectives asked Hendricks whether he had remembered the Miranda warnings from the day before. Hendricks responded that he did, and then made a first statement confessing to the Parmer and Haynes murders. Hendricks testified at the suppression hearing that he made the statement because he had wanted the police to know what had happened.

After making his first statement, Hendricks rode in a car with the detectives to the scenes of the two San Francisco homicides. In the car, Hendricks told the detectives that he knew about three other homicides which had taken place in Los Angeles and Oakland but would talk about them only if the detectives provided him with a fifth of whiskey and a Bible. After obtaining the requested items, the detectives returned Hendricks to the interrogation facility. Once there, the detectives read Hendricks the Miranda warnings and Hendricks made his second statement--a confession to the Carter, Burchell, and Hernandez murders--while drinking some of the whiskey.

At the suppression hearing concerning Hendricks' first statement, the trial judge found that the Miranda warnings given by the San Francisco police on March 27 were proper, that Hendricks had initiated the conversations with the detectives on the trip to San Francisco, and that Hendricks' statement was free and voluntary.

At the trial from which this appeal arises, Hendricks did not move to suppress his second statement. However, at the subsequent trial in Los Angeles for the murders covered by the second statement, Hendricks did move to suppress it. At that hearing, Hendricks conceded that the alcohol had not affected his ability to understand and give answers to the detectives' questions. The Los Angeles trial judge found that "[Hendricks] was properly Mirandized and it was a free and voluntary statement. It appears from hearing the tapes [of the confession] that there was no effect of the alcohol and he was really anxious to make all the statements to them."

Hendricks' sixth amendment argument concerning the two statements is unavailing. The sixth amendment right to counsel attaches after a defendant has been arraigned. Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625, 629, 106 S.Ct. 1404, 1407, 89 L.Ed.2d 631 (1986). However, the sixth amendment is offense-specific. McNeil v. Wisconsin, --- U.S. ----, ----, 111 S.Ct. 2204, 2207, 115 L.Ed.2d 158 (1991). In other words, if a defendant is arraigned on one charge, then the sixth amendment right to counsel attaches to that charge but not to a different charge for which the defendant has not yet been arraigned. We have recognized a limited exception to that rule, however, when the two...