Polk v. Parker
- Vince Chhabria
- 3:24-cv-06460
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 6
In Polk v. Parker, Judge Chhabria dismissed Polk’s federal custody petition and denied a certificate of appealability.
Susan Mae Polk was denied federal relief from the state court’s denial of her California resentencing request. The petition was dismissed, and the court denied a certificate of appealability.
What happened
Polk v. Parker involved Susan Mae Polk’s federal petition challenging the denial of her request for resentencing under California law. Polk, who was incarcerated at California Institution for Women and represented herself, raised five claims involving judicial bias, appellate counsel, due process, and jury instructions.
The court held that Polk’s challenge to the state resentencing process did not present a claim that could be decided under federal custody law. It explained that federal law does not provide a right to resentencing or to a lawyer during this type of state resentencing proceeding. The court also found that Polk had not shown actual judicial bias, an arbitrary and capricious sentencing error, or a conviction under the types of murder theories covered by the California resentencing statute.
Judge Chhabria dismissed the petition and denied a certificate of appealability because reasonable judges would not debate the result. The court directed the Clerk to enter a separate judgment and close the case.
The detailed version
- Polk v. Parker · No. 3:24-cv-06460
- Vince Chhabria
- June 5, 2025
Background
Susan Mae Polk, a state prisoner incarcerated at California Institution for Women, filed a self-represented application in the Ninth Circuit for authorization to file a second or successive petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The Ninth Circuit denied authorization as unnecessary because the petition was not second or successive. It transferred part of the petition to the Northern District of California to be processed as a § 2254 petition challenging the denial of Polk’s request for resentencing under California Penal Code § 1170.95. The petition was treated as filed in that court on November 27, 2023. The court also granted Polk permission to proceed without paying the filing fee.
Polk had been convicted by a Contra Costa County Superior Court jury in 2006 of killing her husband with a knife and was sentenced to sixteen years to life in prison. California later enacted Senate Bill 1437, which changed the felony-murder rule and the natural-and-probable-consequences doctrine and created a resentencing procedure for certain people previously convicted under theories affected by those changes. Section 1170.95 was later renumbered as section 1172.6, but the court continued using the former number to match Polk’s petition.
Polk sought resentencing under section 1170.95. The state superior court denied the request on February 7, 2020, finding that Polk had not made the required initial showing that she was eligible. The superior court concluded that she was not convicted of felony murder or murder under the natural-and-probable-consequences doctrine and that the record did not show she could have been convicted of second-degree murder under the amended law. The California Court of Appeal affirmed on March 11, 2022. It found that the record did not establish that Polk was convicted under either of those theories, that the jury had not been instructed on them, and that the changes to California murder law therefore did not apply to her.
Claims and analysis
Polk raised five claims challenging the denial of resentencing:
- She argued that the trial judge had admitted bias by failing to respond within a specified period to a judicial-disqualification challenge, making the order denying resentencing void for lack of jurisdiction.
- She argued that appellate counsel in the resentencing appeal violated her Fourteenth Amendment rights by appealing to ethnic bias and distorting the evidence.
- She argued that appellate counsel failed to cite what she described as the judge’s pattern of violating her due-process rights, depriving her of equal protection and independent counsel.
- She argued that the judge violated due process by relying on factual misstatements and failing to consider her response.
- She argued that the prosecutor’s and judge’s instructions concerning natural and probable consequences relieved the prosecution of proving the elements of the crime for which she was convicted.
A federal court may grant relief under § 2254 only when a person is held under a state-court judgment in violation of the Constitution, federal laws, or treaties. The court may summarily dismiss a petition when it plainly shows that the petitioner is not entitled to relief.
The court explained that challenges to denials of section 1170.95 resentencing generally are not cognizable on federal review because they concern the interpretation and application of state law. It also stated that federal law does not create a right to be resentenced after a valid conviction and sentence. A state court’s mistake in applying state sentencing law can support a federal due-process claim only when the mistake is so arbitrary or capricious that it independently violates due process. Merely labeling a state-law dispute as a federal constitutional violation is not enough.
The court rejected claims two and three because federal law does not provide a right to post-conviction counsel for a resentencing proceeding. The right to counsel applies to a criminal trial and the first appeal as of right, but not to later state discretionary or collateral review. Because there was no federal constitutional right to counsel in this proceeding, the court concluded that Polk could not bring a federal ineffective-assistance claim based on that representation.
The court rejected claim one because Polk did not allege facts showing actual bias. It applied the general presumption that judges are unbiased and honest and found that the alleged failure to respond within the state-law timeframe did not establish a federal due-process violation.
The court rejected claim four because Polk did not show any sentencing error, much less an error so arbitrary and capricious that it independently violated due process. The court concluded that the state court correctly found that the resentencing law did not apply to Polk.
The court rejected claim five because Polk was not charged with or convicted of felony murder, murder under the natural-and-probable-consequences doctrine, or murder based on imputed malice. The court therefore concluded that her case was not one in which a person had been convicted under a theory later prohibited by state law.
Disposition
The court dismissed the petition. It denied a certificate of appealability because reasonable jurists would not find the result debatable. The Clerk was directed to issue a separate judgment and close the file.
Read the full 6-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.