Martini v. Hendricks, Civ. No. 99-4347 (WHW) (D. N.J. 2002)

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JOHN MARTINI, SR., Petitioner, v. ROY L. HENDRICKS, Administrator, New Jersey State Prison, and JOHN L. FARMER, JR., Attorney General, State of New Jersey, Respondents.

Civ. No. 99-4347 (WHW).

United States District Court, D. of New Jersey.

March __, 2002.

OPINION

WILLIAM H. WALLS, District Judge.

Petitioner, John Martini, Sr. is currently on New Jersey's death row for kidnapping and murder. He now moves for writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. §2254 on the following seven grounds¹: (1) ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to investigate and use at trial certain mitigating evidence; (2) ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to find and use drug paraphernalia in the form of several burned screens in the guilt and penalty-phase trials; (3) violation of Petitioner's due process rights because of failure of the prosecution to turn over certain mitigating evidence discoverable under Brady v. Maryland; (4) violation of Petitioner's due process rights and right to an impartial jury for the wrongful exclusion of prospective jurors; (5) subjection to cruel and unusual punishment because of the trial court's refusal to instruct the jury as to N.J.S.A. 2C:11-3c(5)(g), that the Petitioner rendered substantial assistance to the state in the prosecution of another person for the crime of murder; (6) violation of the Petitioner's due process rights to a reliable sentencing proceeding and his subjection to cruel and unusual punishment because of the trial court's "erroneous" answer to the jury's question regarding mitigating evidence; (7) denial of Petitioner's due process rights because of state court's refusal to admit expert testimony during the post-conviction relief ("PCR") hearing.

The petition is denied on all grounds for the reasons stated below.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In 1990, a Bergen County jury convicted Martini of the kidnapping and murder of Irving Flax, a Fairlawn, New Jersey business executive. The evidence at trial established that Martini, and his codefendant Therese Afdahl, abducted Flax and demanded ransom money from his wife. Although his wife paid the money, Martini nevertheless shot Flax three times in the back of the head and killed him.

During the trial, Martini did not dispute the fact that he kidnapped and fired the three shots that killed Flax. Instead, he asserted a diminished capacity defense based on cocaine addiction. The jury rejected that defense at both the guilt and penalty-phase trials. Martini was then sentenced to death.

Martini's conviction and death sentence were upheld by the New Jersey Supreme Court on direct appeal, State v. Martini, 131 N.J. 176 (1993) ("Martini I"), and on proportionality review, State v. Martini, 139 N.J. 3 (1994) ("Martini II"). After the United States Supreme Court denied Martini's petition for certiorari on October 2, 1995², the Superior Court, Law Division, issued a warrant scheduling Defendant's execution for November 15, 1995. On October 30, 1995, the Public Defender sought PCR review and a stay of execution on Defendant's behalf, even though Martini did not wish to file any further appeals. In response, the trial court entered a stay and appointed independent counsel to represent Martini. The court also appointed a psychiatrist to determine whether Martini was competent to waive PCR proceedings. Following a two-day hearing, the court concluded that Martini was competent, and that the Public Defender could not pursue PCR on Martini's behalf without his consent. The stay of execution was continued pending review by the New Jersey Supreme Court.

In State v. Martini, 144 N.J. 603 (1996) ("Martini III"), the New Jersey Supreme Court agreed with the trial court that the psychiatric evidence demonstrated Martini's competence to make the waiver decision, but granted PCR review based on an independent interest of the State to ensure the fair application of the death penalty. In addition, the court in Martini III remanded the matter to the trial court for a PCR hearing to review "a defense based on certain undisclosed information that has been imparted to the Public Defender and presumably was not disclosed to the jury below" and two other issues which are not pertinent to this appeal. Martini III, 144 N.J. at 610-11.

On remand, the Public Defender attempted to present materials Martini considered confidential, claiming the information constituted mitigating evidence erroneously omitted at the penalty-phase trial. Yet Martini expressed his continued desire to keep this evidence confidential. The court conducted an in-camera inspection of the Public Defender's submission, and ruled that Martini's interest in maintaining the confidentiality of the submitted materials prevented their use in the PCR proceeding. The Public Defender sought and obtained leave to appeal the court's decision to the New Jersey Supreme Court. That Court vacated the trial court's order, and again remanded the matter to permit the judge to "reconsider the issue of the omission of mitigating evidence from Defendant's penalty-phase trial." State v. Martini, 148 N.J. 434, 453 (1997) ("Martini IV"). The Court specifically directed the lower court to determine five issues related to the omission of this allegedly mitigating evidence, including: (1) "[w]hether the evidence was mitigating"; (2) "[i]f the evidence was mitigating, whether defense counsel's failure to obtain the evidence constituted ineffective assistance of counsel, or whether the omission of the evidence constituted a manifest injustice and a violation of defendant's constitutional rights, entitling defendant to post-conviction relief." Id. at 454.

On remand, the trial judge, after reviewing all of the confidential evidence, determined that the evidence was not mitigating. In rejecting Martini's claims, the trial judge refused to allow two experts to testify on the mitigation value of the evidence, because he believed that to be unnecessary. Because he found the evidence was not mitigating, the trial judge determined that counsel's failure to obtain it was not ineffective assistance of counsel. He determined that even if the evidence had some mitigating value, this value would be outweighed by Martini's confidentiality interests in the evidence. In addition, the judge found that some of the evidence was damaging to Martini, and this eliminated the possibility that its omission constituted a manifest injustice to him.

The trial judge also decided additional issues raised in the PCR petition. Two of those issues are relevant to this petition. First, the judge rejected the Public Defender's argument that the State committed a Brady violation by failing to disclose the confidential information to the defense before Martini's murder trial. See Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 87, 83 S.Ct 1194, 10 L.Ed.2d 215 (1963). The trial judge concluded that the State did not have knowledge of the evidence at the time and, therefore, could not be obligated to release to Defendant what it did not know. Further, even if knowledge were imputed to the prosecutors, there was no Brady violation because Defendant himself possessed the information, yet chose not to share it with his attorneys. (10 PCR 40:8-41:5.) Second, the Public Defender also claimed ineffective assistance of counsel because of the defense counsel's failure to obtain and use two burned cocaine screens that the Public Defender argued would have strengthened Petitioner's diminished capacity defense. The judge rejected this argument determining that the evidence would not have "changed the jury's mind as to whether or not the defendant was using or not using cocaine at the time." (10 PCR 42:3-42:9.)

On appeal, the New Jersey Supreme Court in State v. Martini ("Martini V"), 160 N.J. 248 (1999), considered Martini's claims for ineffective assistance of counsel and Brady violation. The court affirmed the trial court, and held that Martini's counsel did not render ineffective assistance of counsel because the evidence was not "mitigating," and therefore it did not meet the Strickland prong of "prejudice" to the defendant, such that there was a reasonable probability that the outcome of the jury's deliberations would have been different. Id. at 265-68; see also Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984). The court further held that defense counsel's conduct was not "deficient" under Strickland because: (1) the counsel's failure to discover the allegedly mitigating evidence was significantly affected by Petitioner's conduct; and (2) it was reasonable for counsel "to conclude that further investigation would not yield anything useful." Martini V 160 N.J. at 267. Second, the court rejected Petitioner's Brady claim because the information was not mitigating. Moreover, the court found that because, as determined, Defendant knew the information, the government did not have a duty to turn over to him that which he already knew. Id. at 269-270. Finally, the court dismissed Petitioner's claim for ineffective assistance of counsel for failure to discover and present the burned screens at the guilt and penalty-phase trials. The Court concluded that the burned screens would have "added only cumulative weight" to the contention that Petitioner had used cocaine around the time of the murder. Id. at 272.

DISCUSSION

Standard for Review Under 28 U.S.C. §2254

The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 ("AEDPA"), effective April 24, 1996, amended the standards for reviewing state court judgments in federal habeas petitions filed under 28 U.S.C. §2254. For any petitions filed after the effective date of AEDPA, courts are required to apply those amended standards. See Werts v. Vaughn, 228 F.3d 178, 195 (3d. Cir. 2000) (citing Lindh v. Murphy, 521 U.S. 320, 336, 117 S.Ct. 2059, 138 L.Ed.2d 481 (1997)). Under 28 U.S.C. §2254(a) (2001), a federal court is required to consider only petitions filed on behalf of individuals in...