Martin v. Symmes

782 F.3d 939

LaMonte Rydell MARTIN, Petitioner–Appellant

v. Jessica SYMMES, Warden, Oak Park Heights Facility, Minnesota, Defendant–AppelleeJuvenile Law Center; Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth; Children's Law Center of Los Angeles; Council on Crime and Justice ; Defender Association of Philadelphia; Isaiah; Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana ; Juvenile Justice Initiative; Legal Rights Center ; National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers; National Center for Youth Law; National Juvenile Defender Center ; National Juvenile Justice Network; National Legal Aid & Defender Association; The Orleans Public Defenders; The Pacific Juvenile Defender Center; The Public Defender Service for the; Rutgers School of Law–Camden Children's Justice Clinic; San Francisco Office of the Public Defender; Youth Law Center; Stephen K. Harper; Kristin Henning; Frank Vandervort, Amici on Behalf of Appellant.

No. 13–3676.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

Submitted Nov. 12, 2014.

Filed April 6, 2015.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied May 11, 2015.

Bryan Allen Stevenson, argued, Montgomery, AL, Zachary Allen Longsdorf, on the brief, Inver Grove Heights, MN, for appellant.

Lee W. Barry, argued and on the brief, Minneapolis, MN, for appellee.

Marsha L. Levick, Philadelphia, PA, on the brief, for Amicus.

Before MURPHY, MELLOY, and BENTON, Circuit Judges.

Opinion

BENTON, Circuit Judge.

A Minnesota jury convicted LaMonte Rydell Martin of first-degree murder, committed at age 17. Martin received a mandatory life sentence without possibility of release. The Minnesota Supreme Court affirmed and also rejected a challenge to the jury's composition under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). State v. Martin, 773 N.W.2d 89, 104, 110 (Minn.2009).

Martin filed a habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. While it was pending, the U.S. Supreme Court held that mandatory life sentences without parole for defendants who commit homicide before age 18 violate the Eighth Amendment. Miller v. Alabama, ––– U.S. ––––, 132 S.Ct. 2455, 2460, 2475, 183 L.Ed.2d 407 (2012). The magistrate judge¹ ordered briefing, and Martin argued that Miller applied retroactively to him.

The district court² denied the petition, but granted a certificate of appealability on the Miller and Batson issues. Martin v. Symmes, 2013 WL 5653447, at *17 (D.Minn. Oct. 15, 2013). Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253, this court affirms.

I.

In Miller , the Court relied on its prior juvenile-sentencing decisions. Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2463, citing Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 578, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005) (categorically barring death sentences for offenders under 18) and Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 82, 130 S.Ct. 2011, 176 L.Ed.2d 825 (2010) (categorically barring life sentences without possibility of parole for juveniles convicted of non-homicide offenses). “By making youth (and all that accompanies it) irrelevant to imposition of that harshest prison sentence, [a mandatory] scheme poses too great a risk of disproportionate punishment.” Id. at 2469. Now, sentencers must “take into account how children are different, and how those differences counsel against irrevocably sentencing them to a lifetime in prison.” Id.

Miller consolidated the appeals of Evan James Miller (on direct review) and Kuntrell O'Bryan Jackson (on collateral review), both of whom had received mandatory life sentences without parole for murders committed at age 14. Id. at 2460, 2461, 2462. See also Miller v. State, 63 So.3d 676, 691 (Ala.Crim.App.2010) (affirming Miller's mandatory life sentence); Jackson v. Norris, 2011 Ark. 49, 378 S.W.3d 103, 106 (2011) (declining to extend Roper and Graham to non-death sentences for juvenile homicide defendants and affirming dismissal of Jackson's state habeas petition). The Miller opinion reversed both cases. Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2475.³

A.

Generally, “new constitutional rules of criminal procedure will not be applicable to those cases which have become final before the new rules are announced.” Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288, 310, 109 S.Ct. 1060, 103 L.Ed.2d 334 (1989). It is undisputed that Miller announced a new rule and that Martin's conviction became final before Miller . “A new rule applies retroactively in a collateral proceeding only if (1) the rule is substantive or (2) the rule is a watershed rule of criminal procedure implicating the fundamental fairness and accuracy of the criminal proceeding.” Whorton v. Bockting, 549 U.S. 406, 416, 127 S.Ct. 1173, 167 L.Ed.2d 1 (2007) (internal quotation marks and alteration omitted).

1.

Substantive rules “alter[ ] the range of conduct or the class of persons that the law punishes,” but procedural rules “regulate only the manner of determining the defendant's culpability.” Schriro v. Summerlin, 542 U.S. 348, 353, 124 S.Ct. 2519, 159 L.Ed.2d 442 (2004). New substantive rules include “rules prohibiting a certain category of punishment for a class of defendants because of their status or offense.” Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302, 330, 109 S.Ct. 2934, 106 L.Ed.2d 256 (1989), abrogated on other grounds by Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304, 321, 122 S.Ct. 2242, 153 L.Ed.2d 335 (2002) (prohibiting execution of mentally retarded criminals).⁴ “Such rules apply retroactively because they necessarily carry a significant risk that a defendant ... faces a punishment that the law cannot impose upon him.” Schriro, 542 U.S. at 352, 124 S.Ct. 2519 (internal quotation marks omitted).

Miller announced a procedural rule, not a substantive rule. The Court eliminated mandatory life sentences without parole for juvenile homicide defendants; it did not eliminate those sentences: “[W]e think appropriate occasions for sentencing juveniles to this harshest possible penalty will be uncommon,” but “we do not foreclose a sentencer's ability to make that judgment in homicide cases....” Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2469. Thus, Miller does not prohibit a category of punishment (life sentences without parole) for a class of defendants (juveniles) because of their status (age).

See Penry, 492 U.S. at 330, 109 S.Ct. 2934. In other words, Martin does not “face[ ] a punishment that the law cannot impose upon him.” See Schriro, 542 U.S. at 352, 124 S.Ct. 2519.

Martin argues that Miller is substantive because it eliminated “an entire line of sentencing” and “created an expanded range of [sentencing] outcomes” by making “age an element” for juvenile homicide defendants. This argument ignores the Court's characterization of Miller :

Our decision does not categorically bar a penalty for a class of offenders or type of crime—as, for example, we did in Roper or Graham. Instead, it mandates only that a sentencer follow a certain process —considering an offender's youth and attendant characteristics—before imposing a particular penalty.

Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2471 (emphasis added). See Black's Law Dictionary 1242 (8th ed.2004) (defining “process” as “[t]he proceedings in any action”); Webster's International Dictionary 1808 (3d ed.1961) (defining “process” as “the course of procedure in a judicial action”).

2.

A “watershed” rule “must be one ‘without which the likelihood of an accurate conviction is seriously diminished.’ ” Schriro, 542 U.S. at 352, 124 S.Ct. 2519, quoting Teague, 489 U.S. at 313, 109 S.Ct. 1060. The “watershed” exception “is clearly meant to apply only to a small core of rules requiring observance of those procedures that ... are implicit in the concept of ordered liberty.” Beard v. Banks, 542 U.S. 406, 417, 124 S.Ct. 2504, 159 L.Ed.2d 494 (2004), quoting O'Dell v. Netherland, 521 U.S. 151, 157, 117 S.Ct. 1969, 138 L.Ed.2d 351 (1997). The “new rule must itself constitute a previously unrecognized bedrock procedural element that is essential to the fairness of a proceeding.” Bockting, 549 U.S. at 421, 127 S.Ct. 1173.

The Court has never found a new procedural rule to be “watershed.” Johnson v. Ponton, 780 F.3d 219, 223–24 (4th Cir.2015). See, e.g., Gilmore v. Taylor, 508 U.S. 333, 345, 113 S.Ct. 2112, 124 L.Ed.2d 306 (1993) (rejecting as “watershed” new rule that jury instructions in murder cases must allow for consideration of diminished mental state); Butler v. McKellar, 494 U.S. 407, 416, 110 S.Ct. 1212, 108 L.Ed.2d 347 (1990) (rejecting as “watershed” new rule barring police-initiated interrogation after a request for counsel). Cf. Beard, 542 U.S. at 417, 124 S.Ct. 2504 (noting that Gideon v. Wainwright's guarantee of right to counsel “might fall within this exception”) (emphasis added).

Miller is not a “watershed” rule of criminal procedure. It does not “constitute a previously unrecognized bedrock procedural element that is essential to the fairness of a proceeding.” See Bockting, 549 U.S. at 421, 127 S.Ct. 1173. Rather, the Court recognized that Miller “flow[ed] straightforwardly from our precedents.” Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2471. Nor does the absence of Miller seriously diminish “the likelihood of an accurate conviction. ” Schriro, 542 U.S. at 352, 124 S.Ct. 2519 (emphasis added). Miller creates procedural safeguards for sentencing juveniles; it says nothing about those defendants' underlying convictions.

Because Miller “is a new procedural rule that is not of watershed magnitude, it cannot be applied retroactively to” Martin under the Teague exceptions. See Burton v. Fabian, 612 F.3d 1003, 1011 (8th Cir.2010).

B.

According to Martin, Miller is retroactive because the Court granted relief to Jackson on collateral review. See Miller, 132 S.Ct. at 2475. Martin and his amici cite Teague:

We can simply refuse to announce a new rule in a given case unless the rule would be applied retroactively to the defendant in the case and to all others similarly situated. We think this approach is a sound one.

Teague, 489 U.S. at 316, 109 S.Ct. 1060 (citation omitted) (“Because a decision extending the fair cross section requirement to the petit jury would not be applied retroactively to cases on collateral review under...