State v. Waldron

• Decision Date: 24 January 2022
• Docket Number: 2021-K-0512
• Citation: 334 So.3d 844
• Parties: STATE of Louisiana, v. Stanley WALDRON
• Court: Court of Appeal of Louisiana — District of US

334 So.3d 844

STATE of Louisiana,
v.
Stanley WALDRON

NO. 2021-K-0512

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Fourth Circuit.

JANUARY 24, 2022

Perry Michael Nicosia, District Attorney, Aston Licciardi, Assistant District Attorney, ST. BERNARD PARISH DISTRICT ATTORNEY, 1101 West St. Bernard Highway, Chalmette, Louisiana 70043, COUNSEL FOR RESPONDENT/STATE OF LOUISIANA

Hardell H. Ward, The Promise of Justice Initiative, 1024 Elysian Fields Ave., New Orleans, Louisiana 70117, COUNSEL FOR RELATOR/PETITIONER

(Court composed of Judge Daniel L. Dysart, Judge Sandra Cabrina Jenkins, Judge Lynn M. Luker, Pro Tempore)

Judge Sandra Cabrina Jenkins

334 So.3d 846

Relator, Stanley Waldron, seeks review of the district court's June 15, 2021 ruling denying petitioner's claim for post-conviction relief. Relator argues that his 2000 conviction by a non-unanimous jury verdict violates the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution, as held in Ramos v. Louisiana , 590 U.S. ––––, 140 S.Ct. 1390, 206 L.Ed.2d 583 (2020). Relator further argues for the retroactive application of the Ramos decision because the unconstitutional nature and racially discriminatory origins of non-unanimous verdicts fundamentally harms the accuracy and fairness of trial proceedings. Based upon our review of the relevant jurisprudence, and in consideration of this Court's recent decision in State v. Melendez , 21-0597, unpub. (La. App. 4 Cir. 11/10/21), we find that Ramos must be applied retroactively to non-unanimous verdicts on state collateral review. Accordingly, we grant relator's writ, reverse the district court's judgment, and grant relator's petition for post-conviction relief.

PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On May 12, 2000, relator was found guilty of attempted second-degree murder by a non-unanimous jury verdict of 11-1. The trial court sentenced relator to serve fifty years imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence. On appeal, this Court affirmed his conviction and sentence. State v. Waldron , 00-2756, 825 So.2d 603, unpub. (La. App. 4 Cir. 6/12/02), writ denied , 02-1993 (La. 6/20/03), 847 So.2d 1221.

On April 6, 2021, relator, represented by counsel, filed an application for post-conviction relief, on the grounds that his conviction by a non-unanimous jury violates the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution. On June 15, 2021, the district court heard arguments regarding the grounds for relator's application for post-conviction relief. At the conclusion of the hearing, the district court denied relator relief without reasons.

Relator now seeks supervisory review of the district court's ruling denying him post-conviction relief.

DISCUSSION

An application for post-conviction relief must assert one of the grounds for granting relief under La. C.Cr.P. art. 930.3.¹ In his application, relator asserts that his conviction was obtained in violation of the U.S. Constitution, because his non-unanimous jury verdict violates the Sixth Amendment, pursuant to Ramos . See La. C.Cr.P. art. 930.3(1). In addition, relator

334 So.3d 847

asserts his application is timely filed in accordance with La. C.Cr.P. art. 930.8(2), because his application was filed within one year of the Ramos decision, which established a "theretofore unknown interpretation of constitutional law" and which relator asserts is retroactively applicable to his case.² Relator acknowledges, however, that he is entitled to relief only if the Ramos holding applies retroactively in state post-conviction proceedings.

Relator filed his application prior to the ruling in Edwards v. Vannoy , 593 U.S. ––––, 141 S.Ct. 1547, 209 L.Ed.2d 651 (2021), in which the United States Supreme Court held that the Ramos holding does not apply retroactively in cases on federal collateral review. However, the U.S. Supreme Court noted that the states "remain free, if they choose, to retroactively apply the jury-unanimity rule as a matter of state law in state post-conviction proceedings." Id ., 141 S.Ct. at 1559.

Since the Edwards ruling, Louisiana courts have split on the retroactive application of Ramos in state post-conviction proceedings. See State v. Melendez , 21-0597, unpub. (La. App. 4 Cir. 11/10/21) (determining Ramos must be applied retroactively in the interest of justice and fundamental fairness due to the "historically racist motivations behind the adoption of the non-unanimous jury verdict practice" and granting post-conviction relief); State v. Nelson , 21-461 (La. App. 3 Cir. 11/10/21), 330 So.3d 336 (relying on the Supreme Court's Teague analysis in Edwards , the Court held that the Ramos decision has no retroactive effect on collateral review); State v. Carter , 21-666 (La. App. 5 Cir. 11/8/21), ––– So.3d ––––, 2021 WL 5869530 (finding trial court did not err in denying post-conviction relief, because our State laws currently do not provide that the unanimity requirement applies retroactively to cases on collateral review). However, the Louisiana Supreme Court has not issued an opinion directly addressing the retroactivity of Ramos in Louisiana post-conviction proceedings. In anticipation of the Louisiana Supreme Court granting writs to address this issue and resolve the split in the circuits, we now elaborate on this Court's position that the Ramos decision must be applied retroactively, as held in Melendez .

Racially motivated and unconstitutional law

As acknowledged in Ramos , the origins of Louisiana's non-unanimous verdicts are undeniably racially motivated. Justice Gorsuch, writing for the Court, explained that the non-unanimous jury provision was passed during Louisiana's 1898 constitutional convention, the purpose of which, according to one committee chairman, was to "establish the supremacy of the white race." Ramos , 590 U.S. at ––––, 140 S.Ct. at 1394. Alongside several laws intended to disenfranchise African-Americans, including a poll tax and a literacy and property ownership tax, the non-unanimous jury provision was intended to exclude

334 So.3d 848

African-Americans from the jury verdict without explicitly revealing such intent. "With a careful eye on racial demographics, the convention delegates sculpted a ‘facially race-neutral’ rule permitting 10-2 verdicts in order ‘to ensure that African-American juror service would be meaningless.’ " Ramos , 590 U.S. at ––––, 140 S.Ct. at 1394 (citation omitted).

In addition, in a partial concurrence, Justice Kavanaugh discussed the discriminatory impact and explicit unconstitutional nature of non-unanimous verdicts, as follows:

In light of the racist origins of the non-unanimous jury, it is no surprise that non-unanimous juries can make a difference in practice, especially in cases involving black defendants, victims, or jurors. After all, that the whole point of adopting the non-unanimous jury requirement in the first place. And the math has not changed. Then and now, non-unanimous juries can silence the voices and negate the votes of black jurors, especially in cases with black defendants or black victims, and only one or two black jurors. The 10 jurors ‘can simply ignore the views of their fellow panel members of a different race or class.’ That reality—and the resulting perception of unfairness and racial bias—can undermine confidence in and respect for the criminal justice system.

* * *

[T]he non-unanimous jury ‘is today the last of Louisiana's Jim Crow laws. And this Court has emphasized time and again the ‘imperative to purge racial prejudice from the administration of justice’ generally and from the jury system in particular.

To state the point in simple terms: Why stick by an erroneous precedent that is egregiously wrong as a matter of constitutional law, that allows convictions of some who would not be convicted under the proper constitutional rule, and that tolerates and reinforces a practice that is thoroughly racist in its origins and has continually racially discriminatory effects?

Ramos , 590 U.S. ––––, 140 S.Ct. at 1417-19 (Kavanaugh, J., concurring in part).

Though the discussion of the racist origins of Louisiana's non-unanimous verdict is dicta, the Court definitively ruled that non-unanimous verdicts are unconstitutional, finding that the Sixth Amendment requires a unanimous verdict to support a felony conviction and that the requirement applies to state and federal criminal trials equally. In reaching this conclusion, the Court looked to the history, text and structure of the Sixth Amendment and found that the Sixth Amendment has always required unanimity in criminal trials:

The text and structure of the Constitution clearly suggest that the term ‘trial by an impartial jury’ carried with it some meaning about the content and requirements of a jury trial.

One of these requirements was unanimity. Wherever we might look to determine what the term ‘trial by an impartial jury trial’ meant at the time of the Sixth Amendment's adoption—whether it's the common law, state practices in the founding era, or opinions and treatises written soon afterward—the answer is unmistakable. A jury must reach a unanimous verdict in order to convict.

Ramos , 590 U.S. at ––––, 140 S.Ct. at 1395.

In...