The Supreme Court opened the new year by unanimously reversing two 9th Circuit cases within one week of January 1. Unsurprisingly, Ryan v. Gonzales involved the death penalty, a case written by a 9th Circuit judge who has never affirmed a capital case in the last decade. (The other Supreme Court case involved polluted water.)
Although the Supreme Court decision does not include the date of Gonzales’ conviction for the crime of murder, he was sentenced in 1999 for brutally stabbing a husband and wife during a burglary. Gonzales was sentenced to death, the case affirmed on appeal in state court, and his round of state collateral reviews exhausted. Defense counsel for Gonzales filed habeas corpus in U.S. district court. While the petition was pending, counsel filed mandate in the 9th Circuit alleging his mentally incompetent client could not assist him in preparing the petition and sought a stay of proceedings.
Instead of conforming to AEDPA governing federal habeas review of state court rulings, the 9th Circuit panel in Gonzales applied 18 U.S.C. 3599, a little known federal statute authorizing payment of funds to habeas corpus counsel in capital cases. The statute says nothing about mental incompetence or delay of proceedings, but the 9th Circuit held an inmate is entitled to effective assistance of counsel in habeas corpus cases. 623 F.3d 1242 (9th Cir. 2010). The panel cited Rohan v. Woodford, 334 F.3d 803 (9th Cir. 2003) and Nash v. Ryan, 581 F.3d 1048 (9th Cir. 2009) as precedent for their opinion. Both these cases held the district court must stay habeas corpus proceedings of a mentally incompetent inmate until competence is restored. In other words, eliminating the death penalty.
Neither the statute nor the 6th Amendment right to counsel say anything about approving appellate court delay attributable to mentally incompetent inmates. As the Supreme Court points out, review of habeas cases by counsel differs from legal assistance of counsel at trial, and includes only review of the state court record. Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S._There is no need for input by the inmate. Moreover, in habeas proceedings, there is no right to counsel at all. Murray v. Giarratano, 492 U.S. 1 (1989).
Not only did the Supreme Court reverse the 9th Circuit, it also specifically reversed the two precedents, Rohan and Nash, on which the 9th Circuit relied for its opinion in Gonzales. In all three cases the 9th Circuit panels tried to avoid AEDPA and relied on a statute unrelated to any question of assistance of counsel or staying proceedings. In other words, the Supreme Court in a single case reversed the 9th Circuit in all three cases.