Smith v. Crow
| Decision Date | 02 September 2022 |
| Docket Number | 19-CV-0187-GKF-CDL |
| Parties | DEZMEN DAESHON SMITH, Petitioner, v. SCOTT CROW,[1] Respondent. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Oklahoma |
Petitioner Dezmen Daeshon Smith, an Oklahoma prisoner appearing through counsel, is serving a life sentence following his conviction in the District Court of Tulsa County, Case No. CF-2015-866 of first-degree murder. Smith petitions for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. He claims he is in state custody under a constitutionally-flawed judgment because trial errors and prosecutorial misconduct deprived him of a fair trial and his trial and appellate attorneys did not provide adequate representation. Respondent Scott Crow urges the Court to deny the petition. Having considered Smith's petition (Dkt. 2) and brief in support of the petition (Dkt 8), Crow's response in opposition to the petition (Dkt. 13), the record of state-court proceedings (Dkts. 14, 15),[2] and applicable law, the Court denies the petition.
Following a trial, a Tulsa County jury found Smith guilty of first-degree murder. Dkt. 14-8, Tr. Trial vol. 4, 797 [195].[3] The State presented evidence at trial establishing that Smith fatally shot Keith Liggins, a barber, in February 2015, when Smith engaged in a shootout with a member of a rival gang, Christopher Ruff, inside a Tulsa barbershop. Dkt. 14-5, Tr. Trial vol. 1, 199-203, 218, 222-31; Dkt. 14-6, Tr. Trial vol. 2, 308-10 [51-53], 320-22 [63-65], 331 [74], 384-87 [127-30], 391-401 [134-44]; Dkt. 14-7, Tr. Trial vol. 3, 473-74 [21-22], 516 [64]; Dkt. 14-8, Tr. Trial vol. 4, 631 [29].[4] The jury recommended life imprisonment, and the trial court sentenced Smith accordingly. Dkt. 14-9, Tr. Sentencing Hr'g 2. Represented by appellate counsel, Smith filed a direct appeal in the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (OCCA), raising nine claims. Dkt. 8-1, Smith v. State, Case No. F-2016-236 (Okla. Crim. App. 2017) (unpublished) (OCCA Op.) 2-3. The OCCA denied all nine claims and affirmed Smith's conviction and sentence. Id. at 3-12. Represented by state postconviction counsel, Smith applied for postconviction relief in state district court, claiming he was denied his Sixth Amendment right to the effective assistance of appellate counsel. Dkt. 8-2, Smith v. State, No. PC-2019-0034 (Okla. Crim. App. 2019) (unpublished) (OCCA Order) 1. The state district court denied the application, and the OCCA affirmed the denial of postconviction relief. Id. at 1-5.
Represented by habeas counsel, Smith filed the instant petition, asserting seven claims he presented to the OCCA through his direct and postconviction appeals. Dkt. 2, Pet. 5-10, 16; Dkt. 8, Pet'r's Br. 2-3. Smith requests an evidentiary hearing to develop factual support for his ineffective-assistance-of-appellate-counsel claim. Dkt. 8, Pet'r's Br. 39, 41. Crow contends an evidentiary hearing is not warranted and urges the Court to deny the petition. Dkt. 13, Resp. 6-7, 78.
A federal court may grant habeas relief to a person in custody under a state-court judgment only if that person shows that he or she is “in custody in violation of the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”) strictly limits a court's discretion to grant federal habeas relief. As relevant in this case, a federal habeas court shall not grant relief as to any federal claims that were adjudicated on the merits in state court unless the petitioner first shows that the state court's adjudication of the claim resulted in a decision (1) “that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1),[5] or (2) “that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding,” id. § 2254(d)(2).
A state court's decision is contrary to Supreme Court precedent “if: (a) ‘the state court applies a rule that contradicts the governing law set forth in Supreme Court cases'; or (b) ‘the state court confronts a set of facts that are materially indistinguishable from a decision of the Supreme Court and nevertheless arrives at a result different from [that] precedent.'” House v. Hatch, 527 F.3d 1010, 1018 (10th Cir. 2008) (quoting Maynard v. Boone, 468 F.3d 665, 669 (10th Cir. 2006)).
When the state court “‘identifies the correct governing legal principle' in existence at the time” of its decision, the only question under § 2254(d)(1) is “whether the decision ‘unreasonably applies that principle to the facts of the prisoner's case.'” Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S. 170, 182 (2011) (quoting Williams, 529 U.S. at 413). To establish that the decision resulted from an objectively unreasonable application of the law, a petitioner “must show that the state court's ruling on the claim being presented in federal court was so lacking in justification that there was an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.” Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 103 (2011).
A petitioner may also challenge the reasonableness of the factual underpinnings of the state court's decision on a federal claim. “A state-court decision unreasonably determines the facts if the state court ‘plainly misapprehend[ed] or misstate[d] the record in making [its] findings, and the misapprehension goes to a material factual issue that is central to petitioner's claim.'” Wood v. Carpenter, 907 F.3d 1279, 1289 (10th Cir. 2018) (quoting Byrd v. Workman, 645 F.3d 1159, 1170-72 (10th Cir. 2011)). But “a state-court factual determination is not unreasonable merely because the federal habeas court would have reached a different conclusion in the first instance.” Wood v. Allen, 558 U.S. 290, 301 (2010). Rather, under § 2254(d)(2), the reasonableness of a factual determination also is measured by Richter's fairminded-disagreement standard. Dunn v. Madison, 138 S.Ct. 9, 12 (2017); see also Mays v. Hines, 141 S.Ct. 1145, 1149 (2021) (per curiam) ().[6]
Congress made § 2254(d)'s standards demanding “to confirm that state courts are the principal forum for asserting constitutional challenges to state convictions.” Id. at 102-03. Thus, state prisoners may obtain federal habeas relief from a state conviction only in cases demonstrating “extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems.” Richter, 562 U.S. at 102.
If a petitioner overcomes § 2254(d)'s demanding standards, the federal court will review the petitioner's claims de novo to determine whether any alleged constitutional errors occurred and, if so, whether those errors were harmless. Milton v. Miller, 744 F.3d 660, 670-71 (10th Cir. 2014). On habeas review, the court evaluates harmlessness “under the ‘substantial and injurious effect' standard set forth in Brecht [v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 631 (1993)].” Fry v. Pliler, 551 U.S. 112, 121 (2007).
Smith claims he was denied his Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process and a fair trial because: (1) “the State, without cause or judicial permission, stationed uniformed gang-unit police officers in the courtroom” (claim one); (2) the trial court permitted the State to elicit improper opinion testimony from Corporal Nathan Schilling (claim two); (3) the trial court gave a coercive Allen[7] instruction (claim three); and (4) the prosecutor committed several acts of reversible misconduct (claim four). Dkt. 8, Pet'r's Br. 18-32. Smith further claims he was denied his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to the effective assistance of trial counsel (claim five) and appellate counsel (claim six). Id. at 33-39. Finally, Smith claims the cumulative effect of all errors deprived him of his Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights to a fair trial (claim seven). Id. at 40-41.
Smith first claims he was deprived of a fair trial because “the State, without cause or judicial permission, stationed uniformed, gang-unit police officers in the courtroom.” Dkt. 8, Pet'r's Br. 18. Smith argues the officers' presence in the courtroom deprived him of an impartial jury because it created an “unacceptable risk” that the jury would decide the case based on the perception that Smith is “dangerous” rather than on the evidence presented at trial. Id. at 18-23.
Just before Smith's case-in-chief, and outside the presence of the jury, defense counsel advised the trial court he anticipated presenting three witnesses, and left the courtroom to confirm those witnesses were waiting. Dkt. 14-8 Tr. Trial vol. 4, 679 [77]. When defense counsel returned to the courtroom, a deputy informed the trial court, outside the presence of the jury, that the deputy escorted Smith's mother out of the courthouse because “[s]he was upset and making comments in front of the jurors in the hallway.” Id. at 679-80 [77-78]. The deputy explained he could not hear the comments, but he “knew they pertained to a conversation that [Smith's mother] had had with [defense counsel] before [Smith's mother] left the courtroom.” Id. at 680. Defense counsel explained that Smith's mother got upset when he discussed certain evidence...
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