Fenney v. Beltz
- John Tunheim
- 0:21-cv-01679
- U.S. District Court · District of Minnesota
- 19
In Fenney v. Beltz, Judge Tunheim dismissed Fenney’s federal custody challenge as untimely and denied a certificate of appealability.
Justin Michael Fenney’s federal challenge to his Minnesota conviction was dismissed; Tracy Beltz prevailed on the motion to dismiss.
What happened
In Fenney v. Beltz, Justin Michael Fenney asked the federal court to overturn his Minnesota conviction based on evidence he said showed a trial witness gave incomplete or false testimony. The evidence included a May 2018 letter from D.W. and a later affidavit describing consensual sex between D.W. and L.H. before Fenney arrived.
The court ruled that Fenney’s one-year filing period began no later than May 2018, when he learned the facts supporting his claim. Getting a later affidavit did not restart the deadline. The court also found that Fenney had not shown the extraordinary proof of actual innocence needed to overcome the deadline.
The court overruled Fenney’s objections, adopted the result recommended by the magistrate judge, and granted the motion to dismiss. Judge Tunheim dismissed the petition with prejudice and denied a certificate of appealability.
The detailed version
- Fenney v. Beltz · No. 0:21-cv-01679
- John Tunheim
- Mar. 11, 2022
Background
Justin Michael Fenney filed a petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 challenging his custody following a Minnesota conviction for first-degree criminal sexual conduct. He argued that newly discovered evidence showed prosecution witness D.W. gave incomplete or false testimony at trial. According to Fenney, D.W.’s May 2018 letter said that D.W. and L.H. had engaged in consensual anal intercourse shortly before Fenney arrived, providing an alternative explanation for L.H.’s injuries. Fenney later obtained a March 25, 2019 affidavit from D.W. confirming the letter’s contents.
Fenney sought state post-conviction relief on August 6,
- The Minnesota courts denied relief, and the Minnesota Supreme Court declined further review on November 17,
- Fenney filed his federal petition on July 21,
- The respondent moved to dismiss on several procedural grounds and on the merits. A magistrate judge recommended denying the petition because it was untimely and because Fenney had not properly presented a federal claim to the state courts. Fenney objected.
Court’s analysis
The court resolved the petition on timeliness and did not decide the respondent’s other grounds. Under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1)(D), a federal petition challenging custody based on a state conviction generally must be filed within one year after the factual basis of the claim was discovered or could have been discovered with reasonable diligence. The court held that the factual basis was known no later than May 31, 2018, when Fenney received D.W.’s letter. The later affidavit supported or strengthened the claim but did not add new facts or restart the limitations period.
The court concluded that Fenney did not begin state post-conviction proceedings until August 6, 2019—fourteen months after the factual basis had accrued. Even accounting for the time during which the state proceedings paused the federal limitations period, the federal petition was untimely. The court also rejected Fenney’s argument that the actual-innocence exception should excuse the deadline. That exception requires extraordinary evidence showing that no reasonable factfinder would have found the petitioner guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. The court found that the evidence of Fenney’s violent assault of L.H., his statements to investigators, the medical and physical evidence, and the trial testimony could reasonably support his conviction.
The court overruled Fenney’s objections and adopted the result of the magistrate judge’s recommendation. It did not adopt or address the other reasons given in the recommendation for denying the petition because the limitations period independently barred the claim. Judge John R. Tunheim granted the respondent’s motion to dismiss, dismissed Fenney’s petition with prejudice, and denied a certificate of appealability, which is the document generally required to appeal the denial of a federal habeas petition.
Read the full 19-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.