Rhode v. Olk-Long

• Decision Date: 11 March 1996
• Docket Number: OLK-LON,No. 95-1898,W,95-1898
• Citation: 77 F.3d 1113
• Parties: Denise Cleone RHODE, Appellant, v. Barbaraarden, Iowa Correctional Institution for Women, Mitchelville, State of Iowa, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 1113

77 F.3d 1113

Denise Cleone RHODE, Appellant, v. Barbara OLK-LONG, Warden, Iowa Correctional Institution for Women, Mitchelville, State of Iowa, Appellee.

No. 95-1898.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted Nov. 13, 1995.

Decided March 11, 1996.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa.

Jon M. Kinnamon, Cedar Rapids, IA, argued, for appellant.

Thomas McGrane, Asst. Atty. Gen., Des Moines, IA, argued. Thomas G. Fisher, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., on brief, for appellee.

Before BEAM, HEANEY, and MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judges.

MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judge.

Denise Rhode appeals the order of the district court ¹ denying her petition for a writ of habeas corpus. We affirm.

I.

On January 27, 1989, Rhode telephoned the Blank Clinic and informed a nurse that her four-month-old nephew, Matthew, had hit his head when his walker tipped against a wall. She said that he had a "goose egg" on his head, that his eyes were rolled back in his head, and that his arms and legs were stiff. The nurse told Rhode that Matthew needed immediate medical attention. Rhode then telephoned Matthew's father, and the two took him to the hospital. Matthew died the following day.

Rhode was charged with felony murder and child endangerment. She waived her right to a jury trial, and the case was tried before a judge in Iowa state court. Although Rhode did not testify at trial, her testimony about Matthew's death given at an earlier juvenile proceeding was read into evidence. In the juvenile hearing, she testified that, on the day Matthew was injured, she left him with her parents, Marilyn and Charles Marsh, between 11:00 a.m. and 1:00 or 1:30 p.m. During that time, she said, Matthew fell off the bed but sustained no apparent injuries. She further stated that after she returned she fed Matthew, put him in the walker in the kitchen, left the room, and a short while later heard him crying. She testified that when she returned, she found the walker tilted and Matthew's head against the wall. According to her, her two children, ages five and three, were playing nearby.

At trial, several doctors who treated Matthew and the pathologist who performed his autopsy testified for the state. The doctors all agreed that Matthew's injuries could not have resulted from the walker tipping over or from falling off a bed. The injuries could only have resulted from a direct and intentional blow with extreme force to the baby's head. The medical experts were unable to pinpoint exactly when the injury occurred, but they opined that Matthew was injured between 10:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m.

Rhode's parents, Marilyn and Charles Marsh, were subpoenaed to appear as witnesses for the state. In chambers, the Marshes asserted their Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and did not testify. At the conclusion of the trial, the court found that their refusal to testify was a "ruse, a ploy to generate doubt by their silence where no reasonable doubt otherwise exists."

At the close of the state's case, Rhode's attorneys asked to withdraw as defense counsel. The attorneys also told the court that they were concerned that Rhode might not be competent to assist in her defense. The court granted the attorneys' request to withdraw and appointed replacement counsel. Her new attorneys told the judge that they believed Rhode was competent so the judge decided not to hold a competency hearing. Rhode's attorneys then rested without presenting any evidence. The court then found Rhode guilty of felony murder and child endangerment and sentenced her to life imprisonment for felony murder and ten years for child endangerment. Rhode is serving her sentences concurrently.

Rhode appealed, contending in part that the trial court should have held a competency hearing at the time that her attorneys first indicated concerns about her competence. The Iowa court of appeals found that because reasonable grounds existed to question whether Rhode was competent to stand trial, the trial court should have held a competency hearing. The court remanded the case to determine whether Rhode was competent at the time she was tried. Two and a half years after the trial, the trial court held a competency hearing. After the testimony was completed, the court found that the evidence presented by Rhode and the state was in "equipoise." Because a defendant is presumed competent in Iowa, the court held that Rhode was competent to stand trial. The Iowa court of appeals then affirmed the competency determination as well as Rhode's convictions. State v. Rhode, 503 N.W.2d 27, 35, 41 (Iowa App.1993).

In her petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, Rhode set forth six grounds for relief. The district court denied the petition on all grounds and Rhode renews these claims on appeal.

II.

Rhode first argues that her conviction is invalid because the state trial court lacked jurisdiction over her case. It has long been established that federal habeas corpus relief is available when a conviction is void for want of jurisdiction in the trial court. See Keizo v. Henry, 211 U.S. 146, 148, 29 S.Ct. 41, 41-42, 53 L.Ed. 125 (1908); Ex Parte Siebold, 100 U.S. 371, 375, 25 L.Ed. 717 (1880); Houser v. United States, 508 F.2d 509, 512 (1974). (Indeed, for many years, the writ of habeas corpus was available solely in such cases. Houser, 508 F.2d at 512.) We disagree, however, with Rhode's contention that the trial court lacked jurisdiction.

Rhode premises her jurisdictional argument exclusively on Iowa law. She asserts that the court lost jurisdiction over her case when it failed to conduct a competency hearing during her trial as required by Iowa Code § 812.3 (1994). The Iowa court of appeals, however, held that the failure to conduct a contemporaneous competency hearing did not deprive the trial court of jurisdiction to try, convict, and sentence Rhode. State v. Rhode, 503 N.W.2d at 34. Because a "determination of whether a state court is vested with jurisdiction under state law is a function of the state courts, not the federal judiciary," Martin v. Solem, 801 F.2d 324, 331 (8th Cir.1986) (quoting Wills v. Egeler, 532 F.2d 1058, 1059 (6th Cir.1976)), the decision of the court of appeals conclusively establishes that the trial court had jurisdiction over Rhode.

III.

Rhode next challenges the post-conviction competency hearing. She alleges that the state of Iowa denied her due process by determining her competency two and a half years after the court was legally obligated to conduct a competency hearing; she further alleges that there was insufficient evidence to support a finding that she was competent.

The conviction of a legally incompetent person violates due process. Pate v. Robinson, 383 U.S. 375, 378, 86 S.Ct. 836, 838, 15 L.Ed.2d 815 (1966). While post-conviction determinations of competency are generally disfavored, Pate, 383 U.S. at 387, 86 S.Ct. at 843, we have held that a post-conviction competency hearing is proper so long as "a meaningful hearing" remains possible. Harkins v. Wyrick, 552 F.2d 1308, 1311 (8th Cir.1977). We agree with the district court and with the Iowa court of appeals that Rhode received a meaningful and constitutional post-conviction competency hearing. At the hearing, there was testimony from several medical experts who had examined Rhode either during the trial or not long after her conviction. These witnesses offered their expert opinions on Rhode's competence to stand trial in 1989, and we think that "the contemporary nature of these doctors' examinations of appellant was sufficient to make an adequate hearing possible" in 1992. Harkins, 552 F.2d at 1311-12. We are also of the view that the evidence presented at the hearing was, contrary to the petitioner's contention, sufficient to support a conclusion that she was competent when she committed the offense. For instance, there was a great deal of testimony that she was not suffering from the mental illness that she claimed rendered her incompetent to stand trial and testimony that she was competent to stand trial. We have read the record of her post-trial hearing with care and find it more than adequate to support the finding of the trial court.

Rhode also argues that the state trial court deprived her of due process by requiring her to bear the burden of demonstrating that she was incompetent. We disagree. The Supreme Court recently held that the due process clause permits a state to require a defendant to bear the burden of proving his own incompetence. Medina v. California, 505 U.S. 437, 450-51, 112 S.Ct. 2572, 2579-80, 120 L.Ed.2d 353 (1992). In Iowa, criminal defendants are presumed competent when evidence about competency is in "equipoise." State v. Pedersen, 309 N.W.2d 490, 496 (Iowa 1981). Rhode contends that Medina should only apply when the competency hearing and trial are held contemporaneously. She argues that applying a presumption of competence in a post-conviction competency hearing violates due process because it unfairly adds to the difficulties inherent in such hearings. This argument is without merit. In Medina, the Supreme Court indicated that federal courts should not disturb state laws allocating the burden of proof in competency hearings. The Medina decision was based upon the long-standing principle that state legislatures, not federal courts, should establish state rules of criminal procedure. Id. at 445-46, 112 S.Ct. at 2577-78. Because we believe that this principle applies with equal force to post-conviction competency hearings, we decline to adopt Rhode's narrow reading of Medina.

IV.

Rhode argues that she was denied due process because there was insufficient evidence presented at trial to prove that she killed Matthew and because there was insufficient evidence that she acted with malice aforethought, this latter being an element of all murder offenses, even felony murder, under Iowa...