Sansing v. Ryan, CV-11-1035-PHX-SRB

• Decision Date: 07 February 2013
• Docket Number: No. CV-11-1035-PHX-SRB,CV-11-1035-PHX-SRB
• Parties: John Edward Sansing, Petitioner, v. Charles L. Ryan et al., Respondents.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Arizona

John Edward Sansing, Petitioner,

v.Charles L. Ryan et al., Respondents.

No. CV-11-1035-PHX-SRB

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA

DATED: February 7, 2013

DEATH PENALTY CASE

MEMORANDUM OF DECISIONAND ORDER

Petitioner John Edward Sansing, a state prisoner under sentence of death, has filed a Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus alleging that he is imprisoned and sentenced in violation of the United States Constitution. (Doc. 35.)¹ The petition raises 29 claims. Pursuant to the Court's general procedures governing resolution of capital habeas proceedings, the parties have briefed both the procedural status and merits of Petitioner's claims. (Docs. 37, 51.) Petitioner has also filed a Motion for Evidentiary Development regarding four of his claims. (Doc. 53.) As set forth below, the Court concludes that Petitioner is not entitled to either evidentiary development or federal habeas relief.

BACKGROUND

In September 1998, Petitioner pled guilty to the first-degree murder, kidnapping, armed robbery, and sexual assault of Trudy Calabrese. The Arizona Supreme Court summarized the facts as follows:

On February 24, 1998, the defendant called the Living Springs Church and requested delivery of a food box for his family. He gave the church secretary his name and home address for the delivery. The defendant then telephoned his wife, Kara Sansing, at work several times, primarily to discuss how to obtain more crack cocaine for the two of them to smoke. During these calls, the defendant informed his wife that he had obtained some crack cocaine, that he had smoked some of it and was saving the rest for her. He also told her that he had called a church and arranged for delivery of some food. When Kara Sansing returned home at approximately 3:20 p.m., the couple smoked the remaining crack cocaine. The defendant, in the presence of his four children, informed Kara of his plan to rob the person who came from the church with the food boxes so he could purchase more crack cocaine.

Trudy Calabrese left the Living Springs Church in her truck at approximately 4:00 p.m. She arrived at the Sansing home shortly thereafter, parked in front of the house, and delivered two boxes of food. Ms. Calabrese chatted with Kara Sansing in the kitchen while the defendant signed a receipt for the delivery. Before Ms. Calabrese could leave, the defendant grabbed her from behind and threw her to the dining room floor. Aided by his wife and with his children watching, the defendant bound her wrists while she cried, "Lord, please help me" and, "I don't want to die, but if this is the way you want me to come home, I am ready," and repeatedly asked the defendant's children to call the police. The defendant instructed his children to go into the living room and watch television.

Using a club, the defendant struck Ms. Calabrese in the head several times with force sufficient to break the club into two pieces and render her temporarily unconscious. Leaving her on the dining room floor, the defendant took her keys and moved her truck to a business parking lot nearby. At some point before he returned, Ms. Calabrese regained consciousness. Upon his return, the defendant dragged her into his bedroom and sexually assaulted her. Kara Sansing, who witnessed the rape, testified that she heard the defendant and Ms. Calabrese speaking during the rape. The defendant then fatally stabbed her in the abdomen three times with a kitchen knife. During the attack, the defendant placed a sock in Ms. Calabrese's mouth and secured two plastic bags over her head with additional cords and a necktie. According to the medical examiner, she lived several minutes after being stabbed. After the murder, the defendant left the bedroom and went to look out the dining room window to make certain no one had observed his actions.

The defendant then removed Ms. Calabrese's jewelry and left her body in his bedroom, covered with laundry, for several hours. The defendant engaged in two separate drug transactions shortly after the murder. First, he telephoned a drug dealer and arranged to trade the victim's rings for crack cocaine. Later, he arranged to trade her necklace for more crack cocaine.

Later in the evening, Pastor Becker from Living Springs Church called the Sansing home looking for Ms. Calabrese and spoke to the defendant. The defendant, giving a false address, told the pastor that she had never arrived.

Late that night, the defendant dragged Ms. Calabrese from the bedroom to the backyard and placed her body in a narrow space between the back of his shed and the fence. He covered her with a piece of old carpeting and other debris. At least three of the four Sansing children saw the body behind the shed. At some point, the defendant washed the bloody club and hid the clothes he had used to cover her body in a box in the bedroom.

The next day, searchers found Ms. Calabrese's truck in a parking lot near the Sansing home. Inside, they found a piece of paper with the Sansings' correct address. The police went to the Sansing home and discovered the victim's body behind the shed. The defendant, who had driven to his sister's house, admitted to her that he and his wife had killed Ms. Calabrese. Eventually, the defendant's father telephoned the police and reported the defendant's location. The defendant knew the police were coming and did not attempt to flee. When the police arrived, he submitted to custody peaceably and without resistance.

State v. Sansing, 200 Ariz. 347, 351-52, 26 P.3d 1118, 1122-23 (2001) (Sansing I).

In September 1999, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Ronald S. Reinstein held a sentencing hearing to determine the existence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances. The court found that the State had proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Petitioner committed the crime in the expectation of pecuniary gain, A.R.S. § 13-703(F)(5),² and that Petitioner committed the murder in an especially cruel, heinous, or depraved manner, A.R.S. § 13-703(F)(6). The court further found that Petitioner had failed to prove any statutory mitigating circumstances under A.R.S. § 13-703(G), but that he had established five non-statutory mitigating circumstances: (1) impairment from the use of crack cocaine; (2) a difficult childhood; (3) acceptance of responsibility and remorse; (4) lack of education; and (5) family support. Weighing the sentencing factors, the court determined that the proven mitigation was not sufficiently substantial to outweigh the aggravation and sentenced Petitioner to death.

On appeal, the Arizona Supreme Court struck the pecuniary gain aggravating factor but nonetheless affirmed. Sansing I, 200 Ariz. at 355-56, 26 P.3d at 1126-27. Subsequently, the United States Supreme Court decided Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584 (2002), holding thatArizona's aggravating factors are an element of the offense of capital murder and therefore must be found by a jury. The Court granted Petitioner's petition for certiorari, vacated the Arizona Supreme Court's judgment, and remanded for further consideration in light of Ring. Sansing v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 954 (2002) (mem.). On remand, the state court determined that the lack of jury findings as to aggravation constituted harmless error in Petitioner's case. State v. Sansing, 206 Ariz. 232, 77 P.3d 30 (2003) (Sansing II). The Supreme Court denied a petition for certiorari. Sansing v. Arizona, 542 U.S. 939 (2004).

Petitioner then sought post-conviction relief in state court, raising six claims for relief. In July 2008, the trial court dismissed five of the claims as meritless or procedurally precluded. It held a four-day evidentiary hearing on the remaining claim, which alleged ineffective assistance of counsel at sentencing, and ultimately denied relief in July 2010. The Arizona Supreme Court summarily denied a petition for review in May 2011, and Petitioner thereafter initiated these habeas corpus proceedings.³

APPLICABLE LAW

Because it was filed after April 24, 1996, this case is governed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (AEDPA). Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U.S. 320, 336 (1997); see also Woodford v. Garceau, 538 U.S. 202, 210 (2003). The following provisions of the AEDPA will guide the Court's consideration of Petitioner's claims.

I. Principles of Exhaustion and Procedural Default

Under the AEDPA, a writ of habeas corpus cannot be granted unless it appears that the petitioner has exhausted all available state court remedies. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1); see also Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 731 (1991); Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509 (1982).To exhaust state remedies, the petitioner must "fairly present" his claims to the state's highest court in a procedurally appropriate manner. O'Sullivan v. Boerckel, 526 U.S. 838, 848 (1999).

A claim is "fairly presented" if the petitioner has described the operative facts and the federal legal theory on which his claim is based so that the state courts have a fair opportunity to apply controlling legal principles to the facts bearing upon his constitutional claim. Anderson v. Harless, 459 U.S. 4, 6 (1982); Picard v. Connor, 404 U.S. 270, 277-78 (1971). Unless the petitioner clearly alerts the state court that he is alleging a specific federal constitutional violation, he has not fairly presented the claim. See Casey v. Moore, 386 F.3d 896, 913 (9th Cir. 2004). A petitioner must make the federal basis of a claim explicit either by citing specific provisions of federal law or federal case law, even if the federal basis of a claim is "self-evident," Gatlin v. Madding, 189 F.3d 882, 888 (9th Cir. 1999), or by citing state cases that explicitly analyze the same federal constitutional claim, Peterson v. Lampert, 319 F.3d 1153, 1158 (9th Cir. 2003) (en banc).

In Arizona, there are two primary procedurally appropriate avenues for petitioners to exhaust federal constitutional claims: direct appeal and post-conviction relief (PCR) proceedings. Rule 32 of the Arizona...