Worden v. McLemore

• Citation: 200 F.Supp.2d 746
• Decision Date: 22 April 2002
• Docket Number: No. 00-71419.,00-71419.
• Parties: Jeffrey James WORDEN, Petitioner, v. Barry McLEMORE, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Michigan

Page 746

200 F.Supp.2d 746

Jeffrey James WORDEN, Petitioner, v. Barry McLEMORE, Respondent.

No. 00-71419.

United States District Court, E.D. Michigan, Southern Division.

April 22, 2002.

Marla McCowan, Michigan State Appellate Defender Office, Detroit, MI, for Petitioner.

Janet Van Cleve and Laura G. Moody, Michigan Department of Attorney General Habeas Corpus Division, Lansing, MI, for Respondent.

OPINION AND ORDER DENYING PETITION FOR WRIT OF HABEAS CORPUS AND ORDER GRANTING PARTIAL CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY

COHN, District Judge.

I. Introduction

This is a habeas case under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. Petitioner Jeffrey James Worden (Petitioner), is challenging the constitutionality of his 1996 conviction for possession with intent to deliver more than 50 but less than 225 grams of cocaine. Petitioner is currently incarcerated at the Saginaw Correctional Facility in Freeland, Michigan. For the reasons set forth below, the Court will deny the petition.

II. Facts

On September 22, 1994, Petitioner was arrested by the St. Clair County Sheriff's Department on a weapons offense, and was subjected to a custodial interrogation. Petitioner, who at the time he was arrested was the subject of an on-going drug trafficking investigation by the Sheriff's Department, requested an attorney at one point during the interrogation. Despite this request, the deputy continued to question him. As a result of the interrogation, the deputy elicited information regarding Petitioner's involvement in drug sales. Based upon this information, the Sheriff's Department obtained a search warrant for Petitioner's van. While executing the warrant, the deputies seized approximately 137 grams of cocaine from the van.

III. Procedural History

Following a jury trial in St. Clair County Circuit Court, Petitioner was convicted of possession with intent to deliver between 50 and 225 grams of cocaine. On February 23, 1996, Petitioner was sentenced to fifteen to forty years imprisonment.

Petitioner filed an appeal of right in the Michigan Court of Appeals, presenting the following claims:

I. The trial court erred in admitting the cocaine into evidence because its discovery was not inevitable.

II. Where the prosecutor presented other evidence to support his theory, the trial judge erred by allowing introduction of Mr. Worden's uncharged drug activity.

The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed Petitioner's conviction in an unpublished decision. People v. Worden, No. 193522, 1997 WL 33330867 (Mich.App. Dec. 9, 1997).

Petitioner then filed an application for leave to appeal in the Michigan Supreme Court, presenting the following claims:

I. Where the trial judge found that Mr. Worden's statement was extracted in violation of his state constitutional and Fifth Amendment right to counsel, he erred by failing to suppress the cocaine which was a "fruit" of the illegal confession.

II. Mr. Worden was deprived of his due process right to a fair trial where the prosecutor was permitted to introduce evidence of his unrelated cocaine transactions in Texas and Ohio. The trial judge violated his duty to control the proceedings by denying the mistrial motion made in response to the admission of the "bad acts" evidence.

III. Where Mr. Worden was charged with possession with intent to deliver cocaine, and he disputed the intent to deliver, the prosecutor violated the discovery order as well as Mr. Street's constitutional due process and confrontation rights, by failing to disclose evidence that police discovered a cutting agent in the same vehicle where they found the cocaine.

IV. The trial judge deprived Mr. Worden of his Sixth Amendment and state constitutional rights to a fair trial by a properly instructed jury where he refused to instruct the jury on cocaine "use."

The Michigan Supreme Court denied the application for leave to appeal. People v. Worden, No. 111160, 459 Mich. 897, 589 N.W.2d 277 (Mich. Nov. 3, 1998).

Petitioner then filed a petition for certiorari in the Supreme Court, which was denied on April 19, 1999. Worden v. Michigan, 526 U.S. 1073, 119 S.Ct. 1472, 143 L.Ed.2d 556 (1999).

Thereafter, Petitioner, through counsel, filed the petition for a writ of habeas corpus, presenting the following claims:

I. Where the trial judge found that Mr. Worden's statement was extracted in violation of his Fifth Amendment right to counsel, his decision to not suppress the cocaine that was a fruit of the illegal confession was contrary to, and an unreasonable application of, United States Supreme Court precedent.

II. Where Mr. Worden was charged with possession with intent to deliver cocaine, and he disputed the intent to deliver, the prosecutor violated the discovery order as well as Mr. Worden's constitutional due process and confrontation rights, by failing to disclose evidence that police discovered a cutting agent in the same vehicle where they found the cocaine.

III. The trial judge deprived Mr. Worden of his Sixth Amendment and state constitutional rights to a fair trial by a properly instructed jury where he refused to instruct the jury on cocaine "use."

IV. Analysis

A. Standard of Review

The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, Pub.L. No. 104-132, 110 Stat. 1214 ("AEDPA"), codified at 28 U.S.C. § 2241, et seq., altered the standard of review a federal court must apply when reviewing an application for a writ of habeas corpus. The AEDPA applies to all habeas petitions filed after the effective date of the act, April 24, 1996. Because petitioner's application was filed after April 24, 1996, the provisions of the AEDPA, including the amended standard of review, apply.

28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) imposes the following standard of review that a federal court must utilize when reviewing applications for a writ of habeas corpus:

An application for a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of a person in custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court shall not be granted with respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in State court proceedings unless the adjudication of the claim—

(1) resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States; or

(2) resulted in a decision that was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State court proceedings.

28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). Therefore, a federal court is bound by a state court's adjudication of a petitioner's claims unless the state court's decision is contrary to or involves an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law. Franklin v. Francis, 144 F.3d 429 (6th Cir.1998). Additionally, the Court must presume the correctness of state court factual determinations. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1)¹; see also Cremeans v. Chapleau, 62 F.3d 167, 169 (6th Cir.1995) ("We give complete deference to state court findings unless they are clearly erroneous").

The Supreme Court has explained the proper application of the "contrary to" clause as follows:

A state-court decision will certainly be contrary to [the Supreme Court's] clearly established precedent if the state court applies a rule that contradicts the governing law set forth in our cases....

A state-court decision will also be contrary to this Court's clearly established precedent if the state court confronts a set of facts that are materially indistinguishable from a decision of this Court and nevertheless arrives at a result different from [the Court's] precedent.

Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 1519-20, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000).

With respect to the "unreasonable application" clause of § 2254(d)(1), the Supreme Court tells a federal court to analyze a claim for habeas corpus relief under the "unreasonable application" clause when "a state-court decision unreasonably applies the law of this Court to the facts of a prisoner's case." Id. at 1521. The Supreme Court defined "unreasonable application" as follows:

[A] federal habeas court making the "unreasonable application" inquiry should ask whether the state court's application of clearly established federal law was objectively unreasonable ...

[A]n unreasonable application of federal law is different from an incorrect application of federal law.... Under § 2254(d)(1)'s "unreasonable application" clause, then, a federal habeas court may not issue the writ simply because that court concludes in its independent judgment that the relevant state-court decision applied clearly established federal law erroneously or incorrectly. Rather, that application must also be unreasonable.

Id. at 1521-22.

B. Denial of Petitioner's Motion to Suppress Cocaine

This case presents the unfortunate circumstance where the Court is constrained by the limited standard of review afforded it on habeas review to deny relief on an issue that the Court believes the state court decided incorrectly. The issue is Petitioner's claim that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress cocaine evidence derived from a confession obtained in violation of Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), and Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981). Petitioner's claim arises in the following context.

1.

On September 22, 1996, following his arrest for a firearms offense, deputies with the St. Clair County Sheriff's Department interrogated Petitioner. During the interrogation, Petitioner requested an attorney. The deputies, however, did not terminate the interrogation. Instead, they continued a lengthy interrogation. Thereafter, based upon information obtained from Petitioner after he invoked his right to counsel, the deputies obtained a warrant to search Petitioner's van in which they recovered approximately 137 grams of cocaine and a cutting agent.

Prior to trial, Petitioner filed a motion to suppress his statement to the deputies as violative of his Fifth Amendment...