Spikes v. Matteson
- Pitt
- 5:22-cv-07293
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 10
In Spikes v. Matteson, Judge Pitt denied the dismissal motion without prejudice and required Spikes to choose how to proceed with his partly unexhausted petition.
Demond A. Spikes must choose how to proceed with his mixed federal petition. Respondent Giselle Matteson’s motion to dismiss was denied without prejudice, so the challenged arguments may be raised again.
What happened
Demond A. Spikes, a state prisoner without a lawyer, filed a federal petition challenging his conviction. After he amended it, Respondent Giselle Matteson argued that some claims were too late, had not been presented to the state courts, or could not be considered in this type of case.
The court found that four claims had not been presented to the state courts, making the petition a mixture of exhausted and unexhausted claims. It did not decide whether those claims would ultimately succeed, were too late, or could be considered. Instead, it allowed Spikes to choose among dismissing the whole case and returning to state court, dismissing only the unexhausted claims, or asking for a stay while he exhausts those claims.
In Spikes v. Matteson, Judge P. Casey Pitt vacated the order requiring the parties to explain why the case should not be stayed, denied Spikes’s extension request as moot, and denied Respondent’s motion to dismiss without prejudice. Spikes must make an election or file a stay motion within 42 days of the order; otherwise, the court will assume he chose to proceed only with the exhausted claims.
The detailed version
- Spikes v. Matteson · No. 5:22-cv-07293
- Pitt
- Sept. 3, 2024
Background
Demond A. Spikes, a state prisoner proceeding without a lawyer, filed a petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 challenging his first-degree murder conviction. After the case was closed for failure to prosecute, it was reopened when Spikes filed an amended petition. The amended petition added two claims and changed two claims from the original petition.
The court had previously found eight claims sufficient to proceed at that stage. They alleged insufficient evidence of deliberation and premeditation; improper exclusion of third-party-culpability evidence; improper admission of other-crimes evidence; prosecutorial misconduct; ineffective assistance of trial counsel; ineffective assistance of appellate and collateral-review counsel; cumulative error; and ineffective assistance of habeas counsel.
Respondent moved to dismiss some claims as untimely, meaning filed after the applicable deadline; unexhausted, meaning not first presented to the state courts; or not cognizable, meaning not legally available in a federal petition of this type. The court also issued an order requiring the parties to explain why the case should not be stayed. Respondent explained that the appellate decision discussed in that order no longer applied because Spikes’s state proceedings had ended and he had not filed a timely state-court appeal.
Court’s analysis
The court vacated the order requiring an explanation about a possible stay under that appellate decision. Spikes had also requested more time to respond and to provide evidence supporting a stay under a different procedure. Because the order was vacated, the court denied that extension request as moot.
The court determined that Spikes was required to exhaust four claims in state court and had not done so. The amended petition was therefore a “mixed petition,” meaning it contained both exhausted and unexhausted claims. Under the procedure recognized in Rhines v. Weber, a federal court may, in limited circumstances, stay a mixed petition while the petitioner returns to state court. A stay requires a showing of good cause for the failure to exhaust earlier, potentially meritorious claims, and no intentional delay.
The court concluded that deciding Respondent’s timeliness and cognizability arguments was premature. A successful stay request could affect the timeliness issue, and the court had previously construed the claims liberally enough to find them cognizable at the initial stage. The court expressed serious doubts about the cognizability of Claim 8 and parts of Claim 6, but it did not decide those issues. It stated that allowing Spikes to seek a stay did not mean Claims 6 or 8 would ultimately receive relief or that Respondent could not raise the arguments again.
Ruling and required election
Judge P. Casey Pitt ordered that Respondent’s motion to dismiss be DENIED without prejudice. The order did not decide the merits of Spikes’s conviction-related claims or whether any claim would ultimately obtain federal relief.
Within 42 days from the date of the order, Spikes must choose one of three options:
- Dismiss the entire case, return to state court to exhaust the unexhausted claims, and later file a new federal petition presenting all claims.
- Dismiss the unexhausted claims and continue this case only with the exhausted claims.
- Move for a stay while exhausting the unexhausted claims in state court. A stay motion must address the required good-cause, potential-merit, and no-intentional-delay showings.
The court also described a fourth procedure under Kelly v. Small involving deletion, stay, and later reattachment of unexhausted claims, but the conclusion required Spikes to choose among the three listed options. If he does not make a choice or file a motion by the deadline, the court will assume he selected option two, dismiss the unexhausted claims, and set a briefing schedule for the amended petition.
Read the full 10-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.