Galvin v. Buckner

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WILLIAM A. GALVIN, Petitioner, v. LADONNA M. BUCKNER, Respondent.

No. 4:19-cv-03229-SEP

United States District Court, E.D. Missouri, Eastern Division

March 28, 2023

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

SARAH E. PITLYK, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

Before the Court is Petitioner William Galvin's Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. Doc. [1]. For the reasons set forth below, the petition is denied.

Factual and Procedural Background

Petitioner is an inmate at the South Central Correctional Center in Licking, Missouri, where he is serving a twenty-five year sentence on his conviction for second-degree murder. On direct appeal, the Missouri Court of Appeals summarized the facts of his case as follows:

Defendant lived with his girlfriend and her mother, Bonnie Brown (the Victim). On May 9, 2011, between 9:00 and 9:30 a.m., Defendant spoke with the teller at his bank, telling her that the Victim had died of an overdose. The teller testified that Defendant smelled of alcohol. Later that morning, around 10:20 a.m., Defendant called 911 to report a break-in and murder, telling the dispatcher that he had just returned home from Springfield to discover the door kicked in and the Victim dead in her bedroom. The responding officers testified Defendant was “noticeably intoxicated.” During his interview with police, Defendant alternatively stated that he had returned home from Springfield early in the day and not discovered the Victim until after he had gone to the bank, and that he had discovered the Victim's body and then gone to the bank, calling 911 when he returned home. He later agreed he had not gone to Springfield at all.

Michael Pavia, an inmate with Defendant, testified Defendant told him he had not meant to kill the Victim. Defendant and the Victim had argued in the evening, but had gone their separate ways. He then drank vodka all night, and when the argument resumed in the morning, he had strangled her. When he could not revive her, he kicked in the door to make it look like a break-in.

Sergeant Ryan McCarrick testified to the following. He had been employed with the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office since 2005, and he was a member of the Major Case Squad which is a group of Metropolitan-area law-enforcement agencies that share manpower to handle serious crimes, such as homicides. Since becoming an investigator, he had had 600 hours of training, including attending the Medical/Legal Death Investigation course at St. Louis University School of Pathology, a four-day Death and Homicide class, a three-day Child Death and Homicide class, two International Homicide Investigator seminars, and the Medical and Coroner's symposium. As part of the training, he had learned signs to look for in determining whether a death was “potentially from a homicide,” including strangulation cases. The trial court overruled defense counsel's objection that Sergeant McCarrick was not testifying as an expert, and he testified that in strangulation cases he looked for ligature marks, petechiae in the eyes, and bluish discoloration to the upper torso, head, and neck.

In this case, when Sergeant McCarrick arrived at the scene and observed the body of the Victim, he noted her upper torso, head and neck were blueish, there were red marks on her neck, and there were predominant petechiae in both eyes. Based on his initial observations and the circumstances of the case, he called the Major Case Squad.

Dr. Kamal Sabharwal, the medical examiner who performed the autopsy, testified that he had concluded the Victim's cause of death was strangulation and the manner of death was homicide. He testified to the signs of strangulation he noted on the Victim's body.

While he also noted the Victim had heart disease, he testified, “the Victim's other injuries were more significant than the cardiac disease as far as causing her death in this case.” By contract, Defendant presented evidence from Dr. Thomas Young, a self-employed forensic pathologist, who reviewed the autopsy report, the Victim's medical records, and photographs of the crime scene and autopsy, and concluded the Victim died from heart disease and not strangulation.

Leatha Clark, the Victim's daughter and Defendant's girlfriend, testified that at the time of the murder, she was in the county jail. Clark testified that when she walked through the house after the murder, she found an empty bottle of vodka in her and Defendant's room. Clark agreed that Defendant was “a drinker,” and he had been told to quit after having gall-bladder surgery. Defendant had agreed to quit drinking, but Clark confirmed that the empty bottle of vodka in their room was not hers. She further testified the Victim would argue with Defendant about his drinking. She stated that the Victim “liked [Defendant] better when he didn't drink,” and that he was loud and made the Victim “nervous” when he drank. On cross-examination, Defendant's counsel introduced a letter the Victim had sent to Clark in jail showing the Victim and Defendant got along well.

During closing arguments, defense counsel argued: “This was a family. The Victim and Defendant lived in the same house and Leatha Clark lived in the same house and they all got along and they all shared expenses and they all laughed together; they cared about each other. There's no evidence to the contrary.” In response, the State argued: “This was a happy family all living together under one roof except for the Victim was scared of Defendant because he was a drunk and they would have fights when he would drink.” Defense counsel objected on the basis of mischaracterizing the evidence, but the trial court overruled the objection.

At the close of evidence, the trial court found Defendant guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced him to twenty-five years' imprisonment in the Missouri Department of Corrections.

Doc. [12-4] at 2-4.

Petitioner's convictions and sentences were affirmed on direct appeal. Doc. [12-4] at 8. Petitioner then filed a pro se Rule 29.15 motion for post-conviction relief, after which counsel was appointed for his state court post-conviction proceedings. Doc. [12-10] at 5, 12-30, 37. Petitioner filed a timely amended Rule 29.15 motion seeking relief on grounds that his trial counsel was ineffective. Id. at 44-84. The motion court denied the amended petition, and the Missouri Court of Appeals affirmed the motion court's decision after an evidentiary hearing. Id. at 103-110; Doc. [12-9].

Petitioner then filed a habeas petitionasserting four claims for relief (1) the trial court erred when it overruled defense counsel's objection to the State's closing arguments; (2) the trial court erred when it overruled defense counsel's objection to Officer Ryan McCarrick's testimony; (3) trial counsel was ineffective in failing to call neuropsychologist Dr. Robert Heilbronner as a witness during the guilt phase of trial; and (4) trial counsel was ineffective in failing to call Dr. Heilbronner as a witness during the sentencing phase of trial. Respondent argues that Petitioner's claims were considered on the merits by the state court and its determinations are entitled to deference by this Court.

Legal Standard

A federal judge may issue a writ of habeas corpus freeing a state prisoner if the prisoner is “in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). The judge must not issue a writ, however, if an adequate and independent state law ground justified the prisoner's detention, regardless of the federal claim. See Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U.S. 72, 81-82 (1977).

“Federal habeas review exists as ‘a guard against extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice systems, not a substitute for ordinary error correction through appeal.'” Woods v. Donald, 575 U.S. 312, 316 (2015) (quoting Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 102-03 (2011)). Accordingly, “[i]n the habeas setting, a federal court is bound by [the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA)] to exercise only limited and deferential review of underlying state court decisions.” Lomholt v. Iowa, 327 F.3d 748, 751 (8th Cir. 2003) (citing 28 U.S.C. § 2254). Under AEDPA, a federal court shall not grant relief to a state prisoner with respect to any claim that was adjudicated on the merits in the state court proceedings unless the state court's 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 proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).

A state court decision is “contrary to” clearly established Supreme Court precedent “if the state court arrives at a conclusion opposite to that reached by [the United States Supreme] Court on a question of law or if the state court decides a case differently than [the United States Supreme] Court has on a set of materially indistinguishable facts.” Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 412-13 (2000). “[A] state court decision involves an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the state court proceedings only if it is shown that the state court's presumptively correct factual findings do not enjoy support in the record.” Jones v. Luebbers, 359 F.3d 1005, 1011 (8th Cir. 2004) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted); see also Rice v. Collins, 546 U.S. 333, 338-39 (2006) (petitioner can rebut by clear and convincing evidence presumption that state court factual findings are correct).

Discussion

I. Grounds 1 and 2: Petitioner's Claims of Trial Court Error

In Ground 1, Petitioner...