Barnes v. Covello
- William Orrick
- 3:22-cv-00541
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 3
In Barnes v. Covello, Judge Orrick dismissed Barnes’s unexhausted habeas petition without prejudice, granted fee-waiver status, and denied his venue-change request.
Antoine Deshawn Barnes’s federal habeas case was dismissed without prejudice because he had not exhausted his state-court claims; Patrick Covello was listed as the sole respondent.
What happened
In Barnes v. Covello, Antoine Deshawn Barnes sought federal review of his state conviction for indecent exposure. He had pleaded no contest and received a four-year sentence, but he had not presented his claims to the California Supreme Court, and a state appeal was still pending.
The court explained that people challenging their state custody in federal court must first give the state courts, including the highest available state court, a fair opportunity to consider every claim. Because Barnes had not done so, his federal petition was premature.
Judge William H. Orrick dismissed the petition without prejudice, allowing Barnes to seek reopening and file an amended petition after exhausting his state claims and completing his state appellate proceedings. The court granted Barnes permission to proceed without prepaying filing fees, denied his request to modify or change venue, and directed the clerk to list Patrick Covello as the sole respondent.
The detailed version
- Barnes v. Covello · No. 3:22-cv-00541
- William Orrick
- May 18, 2022
Background
Antoine Deshawn Barnes sought federal habeas relief from his state conviction for indecent exposure. According to the petition, Barnes pleaded no contest in 2020 in Monterey County Superior Court and admitted a prior strike in exchange for a four-year sentence. The petition described related proceedings in the state appellate court, the Monterey County Superior Court, and the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The opinion stated that there was no indication Barnes had presented his claims to the California Supreme Court.
Exhaustion requirement
Before a person in state custody may challenge the fact or length of that custody through a federal habeas petition, the person generally must exhaust available state judicial remedies. This means presenting each federal claim to the highest available state court and giving that court a fair opportunity to decide it. The court found that Barnes had not exhausted his claims because he had not presented them to the California Supreme Court. His pending state appeal also made the federal petition premature.
Rulings
The court dismissed the federal habeas action without prejudice to Barnes filing a motion to reopen and an amended petition after he exhausted his claims in state court and his state appellate proceedings concluded. Any motion to reopen must identify itself on the first page and include an amended petition stating that Barnes had exhausted his claims and had no pending proceedings in another court. The amended petition must include all claims Barnes wished to present and could not incorporate earlier petitions by reference.
The court granted Barnes’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis, meaning without prepaying the filing fee. It denied his request for modification and change of venue. The court also directed the clerk to identify Patrick Covello as the sole respondent and terminate all pending motions.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.