Jackson v. State of Louisiana

• Decision Date: 14 December 1971
• Docket Number: No. 71-1957.,71-1957.
• Citation: 452 F.2d 451
• Parties: Torance C. JACKSON, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE OF LOUISIANA et al., Respondents-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

452 F.2d 451 (1971)

Torance C. JACKSON, Petitioner-Appellant, v. STATE OF LOUISIANA et al., Respondents-Appellees.

No. 71-1957.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

December 14, 1971.

Torance C. Jackson, pro se.

Jack P. F. Gremillion, Atty. Gen. of La., Baton Rouge, La., for respondents-appellees.

Before WISDOM, COLEMAN and SIMPSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Torance Jackson appeals from the denial of habeas corpus relief by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana for failure to exhaust available state remedies. We affirm that court's denial of a certificate of probable cause to appeal, but for reasons quite different from those relied upon by the district court.

Jackson is a prisoner of the State of California. His original pleadings filed in March 1965 in the court below sought both habeas corpus relief and damages under the Civil Rights Act arising out of his 1947 conviction in a Louisiana state court for burglary, although he had completed service of the sentence fourteen years previously. After his petition had been pending in the district court for six years, Jackson voluntarily dismissed that portion of his pleadings which sought damages under the Civil Rights Act. Treating the remainder of the pleadings as a petition for federal habeas corpus, the district court dismissed the action because Jackson had failed to exhaust the remedies available to him within the state courts of Louisiana.

Jackson then filed a motion for a certificate of probable cause, which the district court denied. But the case was erroneously docketed in this Court upon receipt of Jackson's notice of appeal. In accordance with Rule 22(b), F.R.A.P., we treat Jackson's notice of appeal as a request to this Court for a certificate of probable cause, and for the reasons stated below, we find no basis for issuing one.

Federal habeas corpus is not available to challenge the validity of a state conviction after the sentence has been completely served, unless the habeas petitioner sustains the burden of proving that he is under some form of restraint by virtue of the conviction. Brown v. Wainwright, 5 Cir.1971, 447 F.2d 980. In order to have standing to attack such a conviction the petitioner must show that he is presently suffering from harmful collateral consequences of the challenged conviction. Carafas v. LaVallee, 1968, 391 U.S. 234, 88 S.Ct. 1556, 20 L.Ed.2d 554. An allegation that the conviction was used in a subsequent criminal proceeding for enhancement of a sentence which the petitioner is serving at the time of filing the habeas action constitutes a sufficient collateral effect to maintain the action. See Forbes v. Wainwright, 5 Cir. 1970, 425 F.2d 724.

In the case before us, the district court found that Jackson "has allegedly been informed by the California authorities that if his 1947 Louisiana conviction were determined to be invalid, he would then be eligible for parole on his California sentence." When the record on appeal arrived in this Court, it failed to reveal any such allegation by Jackson. The district court, however, has now disclosed to us letters and a telephone memorandum in its possession which show plainly that Jackson does allege that his parole is being forestalled by his prior Louisiana conviction. In accordance with F.R.A.P. 16(b), we directed that this important omission from the record be corrected by adding the crucial documents to the record on appeal. The omission having been corrected, Jackson does allege sufficient restraint flowing from his Louisiana conviction to satisfy this Court's holding in Brown v. Wainwright.

Nevertheless, we affirm the district court's decision to dismiss Jackson's petition. The lower court dismissed Jackson's petition because Jackson had failed to exhaust his Louisiana post-conviction remedies before attacking his Louisiana conviction in federal court. We have discovered no Louisiana case, however, in which a post-conviction attack on a conviction has been entertained after the person convicted has fully served his sentence. The "possibility of state relief is so uncertain as to make resort to state courts ineffective." Whippler v. Balkcom, 5 Cir. 1965, 342 F.2d 388, 390. Yet there is another, more crucial exhaustion problem at the heart of Jackson's case—his failure to exhaust California remedies before attacking his Louisiana conviction in federal court.

In Nelson v. George, 1970, 399 U.S. 224, 90 S.Ct. 1963, 26 L.Ed.2d 578, the petitioner attempted to attack a North Carolina conviction in a habeas corpus proceeding in United States District Court in California, where the petitioner was serving a California sentence. The petitioner alleged that his North Carolina conviction (and the detainer imposed upon him as a result of that conviction) "adversely affected the probability of his securing parole and the degree of security in which he was detained by California authorities." 399 U.S. at 229, 90 S.Ct. at 1966, 26 L.Ed.2d at 582. But the Supreme Court affirmed denial of the writ because the petitioner had never given California the opportunity to decide what effect, if any, it would give to the North Carolina detainer for purposes of the petitioner's custody. Noting that the Full Faith and Credit Clause does not require that sister States enforce a foreign penal judgment, the Supreme Court held that the petitioner had not exhausted his California remedies.

Petitioner Jackson also alleges that his Louisiana conviction adversely affects his chances of parole, but, like George, Jackson has not given California a chance to indicate whether it will in fact attach any significance to the Louisiana conviction when it evaluates Jackson's prospects for parole. Jackson's petition falls squarely within the exhaustion rule of Nelson v. George, and federal habeas relief cannot be granted at this stage in the proceedings.

We think it appropriate to note that a difficult procedural problem lurks just around the corner should Jackson exhaust his California state remedies. Jackson will have to decide whether he wishes to renew his collateral attack upon his Louisiana conviction in a United States District Court in Louisiana, or, instead, whether he prefers to recommence his collateral attack in a United States District Court in California. While it is clear that the California United States District Court for the district where Jackson is confined would have jurisdiction over Jackson's habeas petition, Nelson v. George, supra, it is by no means clear that the district court in Louisiana could entertain Jackson's petition. In Ahrens v. Clark, 335...