Woods v. Donald

Cite as: 575 U. S. ____ (2015) 1

Per Curiam

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

JEFFREY WOODS, WARDEN v. CORY DONALD

ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED

STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

No. 14–618. Decided March 30, 2015

PER CURIAM.

Federal courts may grant habeas corpus relief if the

underlying state-court decision was “contrary to, or in­

volved an unreasonable application of, clearly established

Federal law, as determined by” this Court. 28 U. S. C.

§2254(d)(1). Here, the Sixth Circuit held that respondent

Cory Donald’s attorney provided per se ineffective assis­

tance of counsel under United States v. Cronic, 466 U. S.

648 (1984), when he was briefly absent during testimony

concerning other defendants. Because no decision from

this Court clearly establishes that Donald is entitled to

relief under Cronic, we reverse.

I

After a day of drinking and smoking marijuana, Cory

Donald and four others—Seante Liggins, Rashad Moore,

Dewayne Saine, and Fawzi Zaya—decided to rob a drug

dealer named Mohammed Makki. Donald, Moore, and

Liggins drove to Makki’s home in Dearborn, Michigan,

wearing black skull caps and coats. Moore and Donald

entered the house, while Liggins waited in the car.

Michael McGinnis, one of Makki’s drug runners, was in

the house at the time. When Donald and Moore came

through the door, McGinnis raised his hands and dropped

face-down to the floor. He heard a scuffle in the kitchen

and two gunshots as someone said, “ ‘[L]et it go.’ ” Donald

v. Rapelje, 580 Fed. Appx. 277, 279 (CA6 2014). After

that, McGinnnis felt a gun on the back of his head while

someone rifled through his pockets saying, “ ‘[W]hat you

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got, what you got?’ ” Donald v. Rapelje, 2012 WL 6047130,

*3 (ED Mich., Dec. 5, 2012). He also heard one of the two

men whisper to the other, “ ‘I got shot, I got shot.’ ” 580

Fed. Appx., at 279. After Moore and Donald left, McGin­

nis found Makki slumped against the refrigerator dying.

About seven minutes after they entered the house,

Moore and Donald returned, guns in hand, to Liggins’ car.

Donald told the others that he had stolen $320 and that

Moore had accidentally shot him during the crime. That

night, Donald checked into a hospital for a gunshot wound

to his foot. Police arrested him about three weeks later.

The State charged Donald with one count of first-degree

felony murder and two counts of armed robbery. Liggins

and Zaya pleaded guilty, and Donald was tried with Moore

and Saine. His defense theory was that he was present at

the scene of the crime but he did not participate. At trial,

the government sought to admit a chart chronicling phone

calls from the day of the crime among Moore, Saine, and

Zaya. Moore and Saine’s attorneys objected, but Donald’s

attorney declined, saying: “ ‘I don’t have a dog in this race.

It does not affect me at all.’ ” Id., at 280. The court admit­

ted the exhibit and took a short recess.

When the trial resumed, Donald’s counsel was not in the

courtroom. At first, the judge indicated that he would

wait for the attorney. But he then decided to proceed

because Donald’s counsel had already indicated that the

exhibit and testimony did not apply to his client. About 10

minutes later, the lawyer returned. The judge informed

him that “ ‘up until that point we only were discussing the

telephone chart,’ ” to which the attorney replied, “ ‘[ Y ]es,

your Honor, and as I had indicated on the record, I had no

dog in the race and no interest in that.’ ” Ibid.

The jury found Donald guilty on all three counts. He

was sentenced to life imprisonment for the felony-murder

count and to concurrent prison terms of 10½ to 20 years

for each of the armed robbery counts. On appeal, Donald

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argued that he was entitled to a new trial because his

attorney’s absence during the phone call testimony denied

him his Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of

counsel. The Michigan Court of Appeals rejected his

claim, and the Michigan Supreme Court denied review.

The United States District Court for the Eastern Dis­

trict of Michigan granted federal habeas relief, and the

Sixth Circuit affirmed. The Sixth Circuit held that the

Michigan Court of Appeals’ decision was both contrary to

and involved an unreasonable application of this Court’s

decision in Cronic. In the normal course, defendants

claiming ineffective assistance of counsel must satisfy the

familiar framework of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S.

668, 687 (1984), which requires a showing that “counsel’s

performance was deficient” and “that the deficient perfor­

mance prejudiced the defense.” And when reviewing an

ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim, “a court must

indulge a strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls

within the wide range of reasonable professional assis­

tance.” Id., at 689.

In Cronic, however, we held that courts may presume

that a defendant has suffered unconstitutional prejudice if

he “is denied counsel at a critical stage of his trial.” 466

U. S., at 659. And in Bell v. Cone, 535 U. S. 685, 696

(2002), we characterized a “critical stage” as one that “held

significant consequences for the accused.” According to

the Sixth Circuit, these statements should have compelled

the Michigan court to hold that the phone call testimony

was a “critical stage” and that counsel’s absence consti­

tuted per se ineffective assistance. Without identifying any

decision from this Court directly in point, the Sixth Circuit

concluded that the relevant testimony in this case was

“similar to” our cases applying Cronic. 580 Fed. Appx., at

284.

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Per Curiam

II

A

Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty

Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 110 Stat. 1214, a federal court may

grant habeas relief only when a state court’s decision on

the merits was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable

application of, clearly established Federal law, as deter­

mined by” decisions from this Court, or was “based on an

unreasonable determination of the facts.” 28 U. S. C.

§2254(d). Donald does not argue that the state-court

decision in his case was factually erroneous. Instead, he

argues that the decision was both contrary to and involved

an unreasonable application of this Court’s ineffective-

assistance-of-counsel cases.

AEDPA’s standard is intentionally “ ‘ “difficult to

meet.” ’ ” White v. Woodall, 572 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip

op., at 3) (quoting Metrish v. Lancaster, 569 U. S. ___, ___

(2013) (slip op., at 5)). We have explained that “ ‘clearly

established Federal law’ for purposes of §2254(d)(1) in­

cludes only the holdings, as opposed to the dicta, of this

Court’s decisions.” White, 572 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 3)

(some internal quotation marks omitted). “And an ‘unrea­

sonable application of ’ those holdings must be objectively

unreasonable, not merely wrong; even clear error will not

suffice.” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 3–4) (same). To satisfy this

high bar, a habeas petitioner is required to “show that the

state court’s ruling on the claim being presented in federal

court was so lacking in justification that there was an

error well understood and comprehended in existing law

beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement.”

Harrington v. Richter, 562 U. S. 83, 103 (2011).

Adherence to these principles serves important interests

of federalism and comity. AEDPA’s requirements reflect a

“presumption that state courts know and follow the law.”

Woodford v. Visciotti, 537 U. S. 19, 24 (2002) ( per curiam).

When reviewing state criminal convictions on collateral

Cite as: 575 U. S. ____ (2015) 5

Per Curiam

review, federal judges are required to afford state courts

due respect by overturning their decisions only when there

could be no reasonable dispute that they were wrong.

Federal habeas review thus exists as “a guard against

extreme malfunctions in the state criminal justice sys­

tems, not a substitute for ordinary error correction

through appeal.” Harrington, supra, at 102–103 (internal

quotation marks omitted). This is especially true for

claims of ineffective assistance of counsel, where AEDPA

review must be “ ‘ “doubly deferential” ’ ” in order to afford

“both the state court and the defense attorney the benefit

of the doubt.” Burt v. Titlow, 571 U. S. ___, ___ (2013)

(slip op., at 1) (quoting Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U. S. 170,

___ (2011) (slip op., at 17)).

B

The Sixth Circuit should not have affirmed the Cronic­

based grant of habeas relief in this case. The Michigan

Court of Appeals’ decision was not contrary to any clearly

established holding of this Court. We have never ad­

dressed whether the rule announced in Cronic applies to

testimony regarding codefendants’ actions. In Cronic

itself, we rejected the defendant’s claim that his counsel’s

lack of experience and short time for preparation warranted

a presumption of prejudice, not a claim based on coun-

sel’s absence. See 466 U. S., at 663–666. When announc­

ing the rule in Cronic, we cited earlier cases finding

prejudice where “counsel was either totally absent, or

prevented from assisting the accused during a critical

stage of the proceeding.” Id., at 659, n. 25. But none of

those cases dealt with circumstances like those present

here. And Bell did not involve the absence of counsel;

instead, we declined to presume prejudice where a capital

defendant’s counsel “failed to ‘mount some case for life’

after the prosecution introduced evidence in the sentenc­

ing hearing and gave a closing statement.” 535 U. S., at

6 WOODS v. DONALD

Per Curiam

696.

Because none of our cases confront “the specific question

presented by this case,” the state court’s decision could not

be “contrary to” any holding from this Court. Lopez v.

Smith, 574 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (per curiam) (slip op., at

5). The most that the Sixth Circuit could muster was that

“[t]he testimony of a government witness is similar to the

trial events that th[is] Court has deemed to be critical

stages.” 580 Fed. Appx., at 284. But that conclusion is

doubly wrong. First, if the circumstances of a case are

only “similar to” our precedents, then the state court’s

decision is not “contrary to” the holdings in those cases.

See, e.g., Carey v. Musladin, 549 U. S. 70, 76–77, and n. 2

(2006). Second, the Sixth Circuit framed the issue at too

high a level of generality. See, e.g., Lopez, supra, at ___

(slip op., at 5). The relevant testimony was not merely

“testimony of a government witness”; it was prosecution

testimony about other defendants. To be sure, the Sixth

Circuit considered the testimony relevant to Donald be­

cause he was being prosecuted on an aiding-and-abetting

theory for felony murder. But Donald’s position was that

he had nothing to do with the planning among his code­

fendants. And none of our holdings address counsel’s

absence during testimony that is irrelevant within the

defendant’s own theory of the case.

Nor was the state court’s decision an unreasonable

application of our cases. The Sixth Circuit stated “that a

critical stage of trial is a ‘step of a criminal proceeding . . .

that h[olds] significant consequences for the accused.’ ”

580 Fed. Appx., at 284 (quoting Bell, supra, at 696). And

it held that the Michigan Court of Appeals’ decision was

“objectively unreasonable” because the phone call evidence

might have indirectly inculpated Donald in the eyes of the

jury. But that holding is not correct. Just last Term we

warned the Sixth Circuit that “where the ‘ “precise con­

tours” ’ of [a] right remain ‘ “unclear,” ’ state courts enjoy

Cite as: 575 U. S. ____ (2015) 7

Per Curiam

‘broad discretion’ in their adjudication of a prisoner’s

claims.” White, 572 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 9) (quoting

Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U. S. 63, 76 (2003), in turn quot­

ing Harmelin v. Michigan, 501 U. S. 957, 998 (1991)

(KENNEDY, J., concurring in part and in judgment)).

Within the contours of Cronic, a fairminded jurist could

conclude that a presumption of prejudice is not warranted

by counsel’s short absence during testimony about other

defendants where that testimony was irrelevant to the

defendant’s theory of the case.

Cronic applies in “circumstances that are so likely to

prejudice the accused that the cost of litigating their effect

in a particular case is unjustified.” 466 U. S., at 658. The

Michigan Court of Appeals’ refusal to apply it to these

circumstances was not the “extreme malfunction” required

for federal habeas relief. Harrington, 562 U. S., at 102.

III

Because we consider this case only in the narrow con­

text of federal habeas review, we “expres[s] no view on the

merits of the underlying Sixth Amendment principle.”

Marshall v. Rodgers, 569 U. S. ___, ___ (2013) ( per curiam)

(slip op., at 7). All that matters here, and all that should

have mattered to the Sixth Circuit, is that we have not

held that Cronic applies to the circumstances presented in

this case. For that reason, federal habeas relief based

upon Cronic is unavailable.

The petition for a writ of certiorari and respondent’s

motion to proceed in forma pauperis are granted. The

judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the

Sixth Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for

further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.