Miller v. Beard

214 F.Supp.3d 304

Dennis MILLER, Petitioner,

v.Jeffrey BEARD, Commissioner, Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, et al., Respondents.

CIVIL ACTION No. 10–3469

United States District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania.

Signed October 5, 2016

Mary E. Hanssens, Samuel J.B. Angell, Defender Association of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA, for Petitioner.

Christopher J. Schmidt, Office of Attorney General, Harrisburg, PA, for Respondents.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Goldberg, District Judge

On October 1, 1997, following a bench trial in the Chester County Court of Common Pleas, Dennis Miller (hereinafter "Petitioner") was convicted of raping and murdering his wife, and was subsequently sentenced to death. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court affirmed the conviction and sentence on direct appeal, and also affirmed the denial of Petitioner's claims for post-conviction collateral relief. Petitioner has now filed a federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, seeking relief from his convictions and death sentence. He raises nine claims for relief, challenging the constitutionality of both his trial and sentencing hearing. For the reasons set forth below, I will deny the habeas petition as to the first degree murder conviction, but will grant habeas relief on the rape conviction and death sentence.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In its direct appeal opinion, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court set out the facts underlying Petitioner's conviction as follows:

Miller resided with his wife, Sherry, and their two children, Barbara and Dennis, who at the time were twelve and four, at 301 Church Alley, Londongrove Township, Chester County. Miller's marital relationship was, however, strained as a consequence of drug use, as well as jealousy and physical abuse directed toward his wife. Notably, in July of 1994, Miller pled guilty to harassment and disorderly conduct arising from an altercation with Sherry, and, in April of 1995, he pled guilty to aggravated assault in connection with an incident in which he held a gun to Sherry's head. As a result of the later conviction, Miller was imprisoned for a term of nine to twenty-three months.

While in prison, Miller professed a desire to kill Sherry, and on the day of his release in September 1995, he told his cellmate, "I'll be back for killing my wife." Following his release from prison, Miller resumed living with his wife and children.

On November 18, 1995, Miller made arrangements with his mother, Agnes Miller, to supervise his children while he and Sherry visited a local tavern, Trib's Waystation. At the bar, Miller and his wife drank beer and, at one point, ingested methamphetamine. Although Miller did not appear to be intoxicated, during the course of the evening he became angry whenever his wife either spoke to another man or used the telephone. [FN1: Sherry used the telephone at the bar to page Sean Smith, a man she dated during Miller's incarceration. Smith then telephoned Sherry in response to the page.] At approximately 12:30 a.m. Miller and his wife left the bar.

On Sunday, November 19, Agnes Miller was surprised when Miller and his wife did not arrive during the breakfast hour as planned to retrieve their children. As the day progressed, she became increasingly concerned. Miller's daughter, Barbara, repeatedly telephoned the family residence, but no one answered. In addition, Agnes Miller drove to Miller's home on two or more occasions. On each occasion, she observed that the house was locked, no one answered the door, and Sherry's vehicle was missing. Initially, Agnes Miller was concerned because Barbara was asthmatic and the medicine was located in Miller's home. Indeed, later that day, Barbara was taken to the hospital for treatment of an asthmatic attack. Ultimately, on Monday, November 20, Agnes Miller contacted Sherry's mother, Mary Folk, to determine whether she had heard from her daughter. As Ms. Folk had not, she filed a missing persons report with the Pennsylvania State Police.

In response to the report, the investigating trooper contacted the employers for Miller and his wife, checked with local prisons and hospitals, and interviewed family members. Both Agnes Miller and Ms. Folk related to the police that Miller and his wife had used illicit drugs and speculated that they might have traveled to Philadelphia to purchase drugs. The police also went to the Miller home, knocked on the door, and after receiving no response, checked the doors, finding them locked. When these efforts failed, the troopers asked Agnes Miller to meet them at the residence. Once there, Agnes Miller again expressed concern that something may have happened to her son and daughter-in-law because of their history of drug abuse. The troopers who met Agnes Miller were familiar with Miller's drug problem and were aware of Miller's history of spousal abuse. At Agnes Miller's request, and after receiving assurance from her that she would be responsible for the property, the troopers agreed to forcibly enter the residence.

The troopers gained access through a basement window, checked the basement area, climbed a set of stairs to the kitchen, and briefly surveyed the kitchen. Upon hearing a fan on the second story, the troopers announced themselves and proceeded upstairs. In the master bedroom, the troopers observed the contents of a purse strewn about the floor, an open suitcase, and the naked, blood-spattered body of Sherry Miller lying on a bed with her legs spread, knees bent, and with a bloody pillow over her face. After confirming that Miller was not also in the bedroom, the troopers left, secured the house, and waited until investigators arrived with a search warrant.

An autopsy of Sherry Miller revealed that she died as a result of more than thirty stab wounds to her head, neck, chest, arms, and hands. The murder weapon, a knife, was found in a trash can; the tip had been broken off and was recovered from the shoulder of Sherry Miller. In addition to determining the cause of death, the forensic pathologist conducting the autopsy concluded that Sherry Miller had been subjected to forcible intercourse at the time of her death. This finding was premised, in part, upon the position in which her body was found, the defensive wounds on her hands and arms, the seminal material recovered from her vaginal vault, the absence of such material outside her vagina, and the absence of blood spatter in the area just above her vagina and between her legs.

From the crime scene, the police recovered Miller's bloody handprints on the pillow that was used to cover Sherry Miller's face. Furthermore, the police discovered a bloody footprint of Miller and a bandage with Miller's bloody fingerprint in the bathroom area. In addition, the police obtained a partial thumbprint from the murder weapon. [FN2: Although the print contained several characteristics consistent with Miller's right thumb, the partial print was insufficient for a positive identification.] The police noted that the box spring from the bed where Sherry Miller was found was broken, and the bed frame was bent. On the kitchen table, the police found a partially empty cup of coffee next to a vengeful note in Miller's handwriting. [FN3: In his note, Miller stated:

Now I hope some of Sherry's whore friends learn something from this. I didn't want it to go this far, but you people don't understand what she put me through. Some know, but they don't want to say something about her. Everybody told her everything I did, but me, I had to find out for myself what she did. All of my so-called friends f--- me one way or another. I had no friends. And I wish I had more time to get even with some of you assholes. I just want to say that you, Larry Brown, I would have killed you, and you, Sean Smith, I told Donny one time before to tell you to leave her alone. I don't know if he did. And if he did, the next time somebody tells you something, you better do what they say. I would have got you too. I hope somebody in my family takes care of Barb, Dennis. I do love you all. I will see some of you in hell.]

The police continued to search for Miller, contacting his friends and family members in an effort to locate him. Although their efforts were unsuccessful, the police were able to trace Miller's flight from the crime scene to Maryland from his use of his wife's automated teller machine card, and the police found Sherry's vehicle in Maryland; the vehicle contained a baseball cap belonging to Miller and a number of ATM receipts. Miller was ultimately apprehended six months later in Florida, after a tip following a description of the unsolved crime on the America's Most Wanted television program.

Commonwealth v. Miller (Miller I) , 555 Pa. 354, 724 A.2d 895, 897–98 (1999).

Trial commenced on September 29, 1997, following the denial of a motion to suppress and a waiver of Petitioner's right to a jury trial. At the conclusion of the trial, the court found Petitioner guilty of first degree murder, rape, indecent assault, recklessly endangering another person, possessing an instrument of crime, and flight to avoid apprehension. After the penalty phase, the court, sitting as fact-finder, issued a sentence of death, which was formally imposed on October 27, 1997. The court considered the aggravating circumstance of committing the murder while perpetrating a felony, the rape, and the mitigating circumstance of the Defendant's substantially impaired capacity to confirm his conduct to the requirements of law. The court found the aggravating circumstance to outweigh the mitigating circumstance and thus imposed the sentence of death.¹

Petitioner filed a direct appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, challenging his conviction and sentence. That court affirmed both the verdict and the death sentence. Miller I , 724 A.2d 895. Petitioner's writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court of the United States was denied on October 4, 1999. Miller v. Pennsylvania , 528 U.S. 903, 120 S.Ct. 242, 145 L.Ed.2d 204 (1...