The opinion
RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
Pursuant to Sixth Circuit Rule 206
File Name: 10a0329p.06
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
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GREGORY LEE WILSON,
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Plaintiff-Appellant,
v. -
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No. 09-6306
JOHN D. REES,
,
>
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Defendant,
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THOMAS SIMPSON, in his official capacity as
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Warden, Kentucky State Penitentiary; SCOTT
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HAAS, in his official capacity as Medical
Director for the Kentucky Department of -
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Corrections; STEVE BESHEAR, in his official
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capacity as Governor of the Commonwealth
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of Kentucky; LADONNA H. THOMPSON, in her
official capacity as Commissioner, Kentucky -
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Department of Corrections,
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Defendants-Appellees.
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Filed: October 14, 2010
Before: BATCHELDER, Chief Judge; MARTIN, BOGGS, MOORE, COLE, CLAY,
GILMAN, GIBBONS, ROGERS, SUTTON, COOK, McKEAGUE, GRIFFIN,
KETHLEDGE, and WHITE, Circuit Judges.
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AMENDED ORDER
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This matter came before the court upon the petition for rehearing en banc of the
September 3, 2010 judgment of the three-judge panel and the response of the appellees
thereto. A poll having been taken of the active judges of the court on the question of
whether to grant the petition for rehearing en banc, and less than a majority of the judges
having favored doing so, the request for rehearing has been referred to the original panel.
Upon consideration of the petition and response the panel denies the petition.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
1
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 2
BOYCE F. MARTIN, JR., Circuit Judge, dissenting from denial of rehearing en
banc. I continue to disagree with the claim-accrual analysis for method-of-execution
claims announced in Cooey v. Strickland (Cooey II), 479 F.3d 412 (6th Cir. 2007), and
therefore I dissent from the denial of rehearing en banc. See, e.g., Cooey v. Strickland,
489 F.3d 775, 776-78 (6th Cir. 2007) (Gilman, J., dissenting from the denial of rehearing
en banc). In addition, I write to highlight this particularly ugly example of why “the
death penalty in this country is arbitrary, biased, and so fundamentally flawed at its very
core that it is beyond repair.” Moore v. Parker, 425 F.3d 250, 268 (6th Cir. 2005)
(Martin, J., dissenting).
The rape and murder of Debbie Pooley was a heartbreaking and reprehensible
act. But at Gregory Wilson’s murder trial, the state’s ignominy began. Of all the people
involved in this case, only two have behaved in a manner worthy of the ideals of our
justice system: the courageous Franklin Circuit Court judge who stayed Wilson’s
execution; and Andrew Wolfson, the diligent Courier-Journal reporter who exposed the
glaring deficiencies in Wilson’s trial. I quote extensively from Mr. Wolfson’s article
because he appears to have worked more conscientiously than many of the participants
in this case, and he highlights how virtually every branch of our justice system failed —
from the judiciary, which allowed a sex scandal between a colleague of the trial judge
and Wilson’s co-defendant to jeopardize the fairness of Wilson’s trial; to the defense
counsel, who were woefully unqualified and left Wilson abandoned at trial.
The judiciary failed both Wilson and our legal system in this case because a
judge’s unseemly conduct created a risk of bias that undermined the fairness of Wilson’s
trial. Brenda Humphrey, Wilson’s co-defendant and the woman who identified him as
Pooley’s killer, was having an illicit sexual affair with Judge James Gilliece, a colleague
and good friend of the trial judge during Wilson’s trial:
Years later, it would be revealed in court papers that Wilson’s co-
defendant, Brenda Humphrey, who testified against him, was taken each
day of the trial to the chambers of Lape’s colleague, Circuit Judge James
Gilliece, where they had sex.
His trysts with the former prostitute began three years earlier and
continued until his death in 1993. Gilliece wrote Humphrey 280 sexually
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 3
explicit letters in which he called her his “doll baby” and assured her —
erroneously, it turned out — that “you are sure to be free very soon.”
Andrew Wolfson, Kentucky Death-Row Inmate’s Trial Littered with Problems, Courier-
Journal, Sept. 8, 2010, at A1.
This shocking impropriety not only degraded our judicial system, but also created
a real risk of unfairness at Wilson’s trial:
[In] 2001 . . . Humphrey filed a motion seeking a new trial,
revealing her relationship with Gilliece. She argued that he forced
himself on her and that kept her from getting effective representation.
Humphrey testified that after being charged with prostitution in
1985, she began seeing Gilliece about once a week in his chambers for
sex, even after she was charged in Pooley’s kidnapping and murder.
Records showed that Gilliece put $3,000 in her jail account,
bought her a new dress for trial and wrote her florid love letters.
Kenton Circuit Judge Steven Jaeger eventually rejected
Humphrey’s motion, saying she was a “willing participant” and “mistress
of her own fate.”
Jaeger, however, wouldn’t let Wilson participate in the hearing
he granted Humphrey, and [Wilson’s attorney] Goyette says that denied
Wilson the chance to prove that the relationship between Gilliece and
Humphrey may have affected how Lape conducted the trial.
If Wilson had known of the relationship at the time of the trial,
Goyette said, he could have used it to undermine Humphrey’s credibility
when she testified against him.
Id.
This scandal is an embarrassment to all segments of the judiciary, from the judge
who violated the Code of Judicial Conduct by having a sexual relationship with a
defendant to the court officers who broke their oath of office by ferrying this defendant
to and from the judge’s chambers for sex. When any trial is infiltrated by this sort of
sordid corruption, it demeans our judicial system and undermines public confidence in
its judgments. When a criminal defendant’s life is at stake, it is horrifying.
Perhaps even more egregiously than the judiciary, Wilson’s defense counsel
failed him and the principles of our legal system. From the very beginning of the case,
Wilson’s defense was clearly a charade:
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 4
The judge posted his plea on the courtroom door: “PLEASE
HELP. DESPERATE. THIS CASE CANNOT BE CONTINUED
AGAIN.”
After more than a year of begging for lawyers to defend Gregory
Wilson’s capital-murder case for the maximum state fee of $2,500, Chief
Kenton Circuit Judge Raymond Lape Jr. finally found two takers in May
1988.
But one of them, John Foote of Florence, had never tried a felony,
let alone a murder case. And the other was William Hagedorn of
Newport, a “semi-retired” lawyer who volunteered to serve as lead
counsel for free, though he had no office, no staff, no copy machine and
no law books.
Hagedorn practiced out of his home, where he displayed a
flashing “Budweiser” sign. His business card gave the phone number of
“Kelly’s Keg,” a local bar. And as Foote would later say in an affidavit,
Hagedorn “manifested all the signs of a burned-out alcoholic.”
....
As Goyette later summarized it in court papers, Hagedorn “was
a troubled lawyer with drinking problems, bar association disciplinary
problems and legal problems of the criminal variety,” investigated on
allegations of hiding stolen property under his office floor.
“Even if he was not drinking . . . he would ramble and digress,”
Foote said. “He seemed incapable of having a meaningful discussion
about the case.”
Id.
Unsurprisingly, these two wholly unqualified attorneys did a deplorable job
representing Wilson:
According to briefs later filed on Wilson’s behalf, Hagedorn
visited his client once in jail before trial. He failed to investigate
evidence collected by police, including a knife-like letter opener owned
by Humphrey, to see if it was stained with blood.
Hagedorn also failed to interview a jailhouse informant who
claimed Wilson had confessed. And he neglected to interview or
subpoena Humphrey’s sister, who had told police that Brenda Humphrey
had admitted cutting the victim’s throat.
Perhaps most egregiously, Goyette said, Hagedorn failed to
prepare early for the penalty phase of the trial, so that family members
who later said they would have testified on behalf of sparing Wilson’s
life were never contacted.
Id.
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 5
Multiple sources have noted the appalling quality of representation that Wilson’s
defense counsel provided:
In an interview, Goyette said Wilson’s trial was a “complete farce
and a mockery.” In a brief, one of Wilson’s previous lawyers likened the
appointment of Hagedorn, who died in 1991, to “drafting a chiropractor
to do brain surgery.”
And Stephen Bright, president and senior counsel for the
Southern Center for Human Rights, who has written about the case, said
in an e-mail that it is a “travesty of justice” and among the worst
examples he’s ever seen of a defendant tried for his life with unqualified
counsel.
Id.
Wilson found himself in the impossible position of having no competent counsel
and sorely lacking any skills and resources to defend himself:
For the first two days of jury selection, Wilson allowed Hagedorn
and Foote to represent him.
But he continually complained they weren’t competent.
Lape, the trial judge, ordered the lawyers to assist Wilson during
the trial, but they came and went, according to witnesses, one of whom
estimated that Hagedorn was present less than half the time.
Wilson delivered his own opening statement. According to a
transcript, it read, in its entirety: “I am not a lawyer, and I’m not guilty.”
For the first two days of trial, Wilson questioned none of the
prosecution witnesses.
“I don’t know how to question,” he said.
He didn’t challenge Humphrey’s testimony that he strangled
Pooley, and he didn’t call as a witness her sister, Lisa Mains, who had
told police that “Brenda said she was the one that cut her throat.”
Neither Wilson nor Hagedorn cross-examined the two other key
prosecution witnesses, Finkenstead and Willis Maloney, the jailhouse
witness, and the jury never learned that Maloney once dated Humphrey
and allegedly beat her for dating Wilson.
Wilson allowed Hagedorn to cross-examine several expert
witnesses, and he did so effectively, the Kentucky Supreme Court would
later find.
He got one expert to admit he couldn’t establish the cause of
Pooley’s death and found no evidence she’d been raped, and one of the
Holiday Inn maids to concede she couldn’t remember anything about the
man she said was with Humphrey other than that he was black.
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 6
But trial records show Hagedorn was missing from the courtroom
during the direct examination of the forensic pathologist, and later had
to ask the judge to summarize that witness’s testimony before his cross-
examination.
Wilson gave a closing argument that took 1½ pages to transcribe;
the prosecutor’s took 54.
Id.
Thus, the defense in this case began with a handwritten note begging for
volunteers, and ended with Wilson clumsily attempting to defend himself because he
lacked competent counsel. I cannot reflect on this case without recalling the landmark
decision Gideon v. Wainwright and its admonition:
From the very beginning, our state and national constitutions and laws
have laid great emphasis on procedural and substantive safeguards
designed to assure fair trials before impartial tribunals in which every
defendant stands equal before the law. This noble ideal cannot be
realized if the poor man charged with crime has to face his accusers
without a lawyer to assist him.
372 U.S. 335, 344 (1963). Nearly half a century after Gideon, its promise remains
unfulfilled. Capital defendants like Wilson are routinely appointed counsel without the
experience, skill, or commitment to adequately represent them. Much of the arbitrary
and discriminatory nature of our current death penalty stems from the fact that quality
of representation is the single greatest factor in determining when it is applied. The
proficiency of a capital defendant’s attorney should not mean the difference between life
and death. I hope that if any good comes from this egregious case, it might serve as a
clarion call for a recommitment to achieving Gideon’s guarantee of competent counsel
for all defendants.
Over my more than thirty years on the bench, Wilson’s trial stands out as one of
the worst examples that I have seen of the unfairness and abysmal lawyering that
pervade capital trials. Although I will continue to apply the law of the Supreme Court
as required by my oath, I must reiterate my belief that “the idea that the death penalty
is fairly and rationally imposed in this country is a farce.” Moore v. Parker, 425 F.3d
No. 09-6306 Wilson v. Rees, et al. Page 7
250, 270 (6th Cir. 2005) (Martin, J., dissenting). To maintain the legitimacy of our
adversarial system of justice, we must be confident that its two foundational components
are sound: a neutral and fair arbiter, and adequate legal representation for both parties.
If either pillar is fractured, as in this case, then we are left with a system that does not
function. Its results cannot be trusted, particularly when a life is at stake. When a
person is sentenced to death in a kangaroo court such as Wilson’s, with an illicit sexual
affair taking place between a co-defendant and a colleague of the trial judge and no
semblance of qualified defense counsel, it irreparably tarnishes our legal system. Until
we reform this broken system, we cannot rely on it to determine life and death.
ENTERED BY ORDER OF THE COURT
/s/ Leonard Green
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Clerk