Powell v. Keller
| Decision Date | 17 July 2013 |
| Docket Number | 1:10CV793 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Middle District of North Carolina |
| Parties | JAMES ALONZO POWELL, Petitioner, v. ALVIN W. KELLER, JR., et al., Respondents. |
Petitioner, a prisoner of the State of North Carolina, seeks a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254. (Docket Entry 1.) On September 22, 1978, in the Superior Court of Durham County, a jury found Petitioner guilty of first-degree burglary, second-degree rape, two counts of assault inflicting serious injury, two counts of felonious larceny, and one count of breaking and entering for conduct occurring in April and May 1978. State v. Powell, 297 N.C. 419, 420-22, 255 S.E.2d 154, 155-56 (1979).1 The state trial court sentenced Petitioner to life in prison. Id.2 Petitioner does not contest his convictions or sentence, but instead challenges the State's refusal to apply good time, gain time, andmerit time credits ("good time credits") to reduce his sentence. (See Docket Entry 1 at 2-4.)3
In North Carolina, for defendants convicted of crimes occurring "between 8 April 1974 and 30 June 1978 [who] were sentenced to life imprisonment . . ., the controlling statute provided that 'a sentence of life imprisonment shall be considered as a sentence of imprisonment for a term of 80 years in the state's prison.'" Jones v. Keller, 364 N.C. 249, 252, 698 S.E.2d 49, 53 (2010) (citing N.C. Gen. Stat. § 14-2) (internal brackets omitted). For decades, North Carolina prison officials "interpreted a life sentence imposed under that statute to be an indeterminate sentence . . . ." Id. The North Carolina Court of Appeals, however, eventually rejected the view that the 80-year figure in the relevant statute applied only to the assessment of parole eligibility. See State v. Bowden, 193 N.C. App. 597, 668 S.E.2d 107 (2008). The Bowden decision produced questions for North Carolina prison officials concerning whether good time credits applied to reduce such "80-year life sentences"; indeed, at one point, North Carolina prison officials tentatively advised Petitioner that he would be released. (Docket Entry 1 at 8-9, Exs. 8, 9, 13.) However, North Carolina prison officials quickly haltedthe release and later issued a final determination that the good time credits would not reduce 80-year life sentences such as Petitioner's. (Id. at 10-14, Exs. 14-19.) Petitioner now challenges that decision.
Petitioner raises four claims for relief. First, Petitioner asserts that he "earned sentence reduction credits without reservation or restriction." (Docket Entry 1 at 29.) Second, Petitioner contends that he "has a constitutionally-protected liberty interest in his sentence reduction credits and was deprived of his credits without Due Process of Law." (Id. at 38.) Third, Petitioner asserts that the "[r]etroactive summary revocation of [his] sentence reduction credits violates the Ex Post Facto Clause" of the United States Constitution. (Id. at 41.) Finally, Petitioner contents that the "refusal to credit [his] sentence reduction credits to his unconditional release date infringes upon his entitlement to fair notice of the law." (Id. at 48.) Respondents have moved for summary judgment as to all of these claims. (Docket Entry 9.)
Petitioner did not challenge in the state courts the final determination by North Carolina prison officials regarding these matters before filing his instant Petition in this Court. However, another similarly situated inmate litigated the issue in state court and ultimately lost. See Jones, 364 N.C. at 251-60, 698 S.E.2d at 52-58. Petitioner maintains that he was not required toexhaust his state court remedies "because, after the North Carolina Supreme Court's ruling in the identical case of Jones v. Keller, such an endeavor would be futile." (Docket Entry 1 at 25.) Petitioner nonetheless did file a state habeas corpus petition at the same time that he filed his Petition in this Court. (Id. at 28; see also Docket Entry 10, Ex. 7.) The North Carolina Supreme Court later summarily denied that petition (Docket Entry 10, Ex. 12), which means that Petitioner exhausted his state court remedies (Docket Entry 10 at 9).
Respondents initially argue that Petitioner submitted his instant Petition after the expiration of the deadline for filing set out in 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1). However, in addressing this issue in a case raising claims virtually identical to Petitioner's, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit recently stated that "inasmuch as the statute of limitations question is arguably more difficult than the merits issues, we are content to assume without deciding that [the petitioner's] claims are not time-barred and proceed with our analysis of their merits." Waddell v. Department of Corr., 680 F.3d 384, 394 (4th Cir.) (citing Bauberger v. Haynes, 632 F.3d 100, 103 (4th Cir. 2011)), cert denied, _ U.S. _, 133 S. Ct. 451 (2012). Because, as discussed below, the decision in Waddell largely controls thepresent case, this Recommendation adopts the same approach and proceeds to discuss the merits of Petitioner's claims.4
Because the state courts adjudicated Petitioner's claims on their merits in his state court habeas petition, this Court must apply the deferential standards of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). See Waddell, 690 F.3d at 394. That statute precludes habeas relief in cases where a state court has considered a claim on its merits unless Petitioner shows that the decision was contrary to or involved an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law as set out by the United States Supreme Court or the state court decision was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d); Cullen v. Pinholster, _ U.S. _, _, 131 S. Ct. 1388, 1398 (2011) (). A state court decision is "contrary to" Supreme Court precedent if it either arrives at "a conclusion opposite to that reached by Court on a question of law" or "confronts facts that are materially indistinguishable from a relevant Supreme Court precedent and arrives at a result opposite" to that of the Supreme Court. Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 406 (2000). A state decision "involves an unreasonable application" of Supreme Court law "if the state court identifies the correct governing legal rule from Court's cases but unreasonably applies it to the facts ofthe particular state prisoner's case." Id. at 407. "Unreasonable" does not mean simply "incorrect" or "erroneous" and the Court must judge the reasonableness of the state court's decision from an objective, rather than subjective, standpoint. Id. at 409-11. Finally, state court findings of fact are presumed correct unless rebutted by clear and convincing evidence. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1).
Turning to Petitioner's claim that he earned his good time credits "without reservation or restriction," the North Carolina Supreme Court has ruled otherwise under state law. Jones, 364 N.C. at 253-56, 698 S.E.2d at 53-55. As the Fourth Circuit pointed out, federal courts review habeas "claims for violations of federal law only, inasmuch as 'federal habeas corpus relief does not lie for errors of state law.'" Waddell, 680 F.3d at 394 (quoting Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U.S. 764, 780 (1990)). Therefore, this Court is "not entitled to decide whether the [] actions [of North Carolina prison officials] fall within the statutory authority delegated to [them] under North Carolina law, but only whether [their] refusal to apply [] good time credits to reduce [an 80-year] life sentence violated the due process clause or the ex post facto clause of the Constitution." Id. This holding in Waddell defeats Petitioner's first claim for relief and focuses the discussion on his second and third claims.
Unfortunately for Petitioner, Waddell also squarely rejects Petitioner's due process and ex post facto claims. As to the due process claim, the Fourth Circuit held that:
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