Riley v. State

• Decision Date: 12 December 1989
• Citation: 585 A.2d 719
• Parties: James W. RILEY, Defendant Below, Appellant, v. STATE of Delaware, Plaintiff Below, Appellee. . Submitted:
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Delaware

Page 719

585 A.2d 719

James W. RILEY, Defendant Below, Appellant, v. STATE of Delaware, Plaintiff Below, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Delaware.

Submitted: Dec. 12, 1989.

Decided: Dec. 21, 1990.

Upon appeal from Superior Court. Affirmed.

Lawrence J. Connell (argued), Postconviction Relief Clinic, Widener University School of Law, Wilmington, for appellant.

Jeffrey M. Taschner (argued), and Peter N. Letang, Deputy Attys. Gen., Dept. of Justice, Wilmington, for appellee.

Before CHRISTIE, C.J., HORSEY, MOORE, WALSH and HOLLAND, JJ., constituting the Court en Banc.

HORSEY, Justice:

Defendant, James W. Riley, appeals from two decisions of Superior Court, the first, dated April 29, 1988, and a second, dated April 21, 1989, each denying defendant postconviction relief. Defendant seeks relief from his 1982 convictions in trial by jury in Superior Court of two counts of murder in the first degree, intentional murder and felony murder, and his sentence to death for felony murder. In 1985, this Court, sitting en banc on Riley's direct appeal, unanimously affirmed defendant's convictions and sentence. Riley v. State, Del.Supr., 496 A.2d 997 (1985) ("Riley I "), cert. denied, 478 U.S. 1022, 106 S.Ct. 3339, 92 L.Ed.2d 743 (1986). Though defendant raises numerous postconviction issues, we find none to have merit. Accordingly, we affirm the decisions below.

Defendant Riley was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1982 murder of a liquor store owner committed in the course of an armed robbery. In his direct appeal, Riley raised, and this Court addressed, eleven issues in the guilt phase and seven issues in the penalty phase, two raised by Riley and five raised by the amicus, The American Civil Liberties Union. In rejecting defendant's multiple claims of error, we ruled, in part, that defendant was not denied the right to trial by an impartial jury as a result of the State's asserted use of peremptory challenges to strike prospective black jurors for racial or impermissible reasons. Riley I, 496 A.2d at 1009-1013.

Thereafter Riley, after a change of counsel, sought postconviction relief, raising multiple claims. In 1988, Superior Court, after evidentiary hearing, selected out and addressed three of defendant's claims: the State's exercise of its peremptory challenges should be reviewed in the light of Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986); the adequacy of the trial court's voir dire of juror attitude on the death penalty; and a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel at the penalty phase. The court, in a twenty-seven page unreported decision, rejected each of the claims as being without merit. ¹

Riley moved for reargument and docketed an appeal in this Court. The case was remanded, and defendant's motion for reargument was granted. The court determined that Riley had established a prima facie case of discrimination based on the post-Riley I standard announced in Batson and was entitled to an evidentiary hearing. After a further evidentiary hearing, however, Superior Court, in 1989, applying Batson, found no merit to Riley's claim of discrimination. The court stated:

The State in this case provided race-neutral explanations for the peremptory challenges on all three black jurors. After examining the demeanor and credibility of the witnesses and prosecutors at the evidentiary hearing, I believe the State exercised its peremptory challenges entirely within the strictures of the Fourteenth Amendment. No factual basis exists for a successful claim of an equal protection violation. The State successfully rebutted any prima facie showing of discrimination in jury selection based upon race. Therefore, the motion for reargument based upon an alleged violation of equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and under the State constitutional right to trial by a fair and impartial jury is denied.

The court also examined defendant's remaining claims for postconviction relief and found them to have been previously raised and rejected either by this Court in Riley I or by Superior Court in its 1988 decision. Riley then docketed this appeal. He seeks our review of not only his claims ruled upon by Superior Court in 1988 and 1989, but of his other claims for relief which that court summarily rejected in 1989.

I

Of the eight claims Riley raises, we find that four were previously addressed by us in Riley's direct appeal. Those claims are:

(1) the trial court's denial of Riley's request for appointment of co-counsel and employment of an investigator;

(2) the trial court's denial of Riley's motion for change of venue for adverse pretrial publicity deprived Riley of trial by an impartial jury;

(3) that statements of the prosecutor and of the trial court during the penalty hearing were prejudicial; and

(4) that this Court's proportionality review in Riley I was flawed.

We agree with Superior Court that each of the issues underlying these claims was addressed by this Court in Riley I, 496 A.2d at 1014-1017, 1023-1027, and therefore is precluded from reconsideration under Superior Court Criminal Rule 61(i)(4). The Rule provides:

(i) Bars to Relief.

* * * * * *

(4) Former Adjudication. Any ground for relief that was formerly adjudicated, whether in the proceedings leading to the judgment of conviction, in an appeal, in a postconviction proceeding, or in a federal habeas corpus proceeding is thereafter barred, unless reconsideration of the claim is warranted in the interest of justice.

In summary, we find no merit to defendant's challenge to the "universe" of cases from which this Court determined in 1985 that the death penalty imposed upon defendant was not disproportionate. Riley I, 496 A.2d at 1027. The issues underlying the three remaining claims were carefully addressed in Riley I; and we conclude that the interests of justice would not be served by any further consideration of them. Justice does not require that an issue that has been previously considered and rejected be revisited simply because the claim is refined or restated. See Younger v. State, Del.Supr., 580 A.2d 552, 556 (1990); Nicholson v. State, Del.Supr., 582 A.2d 936 (1990) (ORDER). To the extent that any of Riley's particularized claims were not asserted at trial and on direct appeal, we decline to address them as procedurally barred under the cause and prejudice standard of Rule 61(i)(3). ² Younger, 580 A.2d at 556.

We turn to Riley's four remaining claims for postconviction relief:

(5) that the trial court's instructions to the jury in the penalty phase were constitutionally inadequate;

(6) that Superior Court in its 1989 decision improperly applied the standards of Batson v. Kentucky in determining that the prosecution had satisfactorily explained its use of peremptory challenges to exclude all blacks from the jury;

(7) that in conducting voir dire of the jury venire, the trial court violated defendant's Eighth Amendment rights by failing to probe whether jurors would automatically impose death upon a finding of guilt; and

(8) that defendant was denied effective assistance of counsel in the penalty phase of the trial by his attorney's failure to present mitigating evidence.

II

We first take up Riley's claim that the jury instructions in the penalty phase hearing were constitutionally inadequate and not in compliance with 11 Del.C. § 4209, as construed and applied by this Court in Whalen v. State, Del.Supr., 492 A.2d 552 (1985). In Whalen, we recognized that sentencing procedures:

must not create 'a substantial risk that the [death penalty will] be inflicted in an arbitrary and capricious manner'. Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 188, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 2932, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976) (plurality opinion). Discretion in sentencing may not be eliminated completely, but must instead be 'directed and limited'. Id. at 189, 96 S.Ct. at 2932. Thus, it is the trial judge's duty to guide the jury's discretion by ensuring that they understand the bases for imposing a death sentence, and comprehend their responsibilities in applying such criteria. It is only through the careful use of jury instructions that the judge properly discharges this function.

492 A.2d at 559. Whalen then laid down a set of prerequisites against which to test the adequacy of the penalty instructions there before us. Riley seeks to employ those prerequisites for a purpose for which they were not intended. Riley reads Whalen as establishing a pattern set of penalty phase jury instructions from which no deviation will be permitted in determining whether a given set of instructions passes constitutional muster.

Riley reads more into Whalen than was intended. The short answer is that Whalen is a fact-driven decision and the flawed instructions found in Whalen are absent in Riley. Further, as will be seen, the instructions in Riley are virtually identical with those which this Court approved in Flamer just seven months before Whalen was issued. Flamer v. State, Del.Supr., 490 A.2d 104 (1983) ("Flamer I "), cert. denied (guilt phase), 464 U.S. 865, 104 S.Ct. 198, 78 L.Ed.2d 173 (1983), cert. denied (penalty phase), 474 U.S. 865, 106 S.Ct. 185, 88 L.Ed.2d 154 (1985). If we intended our analysis and rulings in Whalen to implicate Flamer I and its progeny, including Riley, we would have included Flamer I in our Whalen analysis.

Under 11 Del.C. § 4209(d), the task of the jury in determining the sentence for first degree murder is defined:

A sentence of death shall not be imposed unless the jury or judge, where appropriate, finds:

a. Beyond a reasonable doubt at least 1 statutory aggravating circumstance; and b. Unanimously recommends, after weighing all relevant evidence in aggravation or mitigation which bears upon the particular circumstances or details of the commission of the offense and the character and propensities of the offender, that a sentence of death be imposed.

11 Del.C. § 4209(d). The penalty phase...