Bourguignon v. Superintendent

Background

Nixon Bourguignon, who was incarcerated at Upstate Correctional Facility and represented himself, sent the court a letter about challenging his Rockland County state-court conviction. He stated that he had appealed the conviction and exhausted his state-court remedies. He also said that he wanted to wait to pursue a federal petition challenging his custody until after filing a motion under § 440.10 of New York’s Criminal Procedure Law.

Court’s analysis

The court explained that a petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 is the proper way for a person in state custody to challenge a state-court judgment on the ground that the custody violates federal constitutional or statutory law. The court also explained that the petition must identify every available ground for relief, the facts supporting each ground, the legal theory supporting each ground, and the relief requested. Bourguignon’s letter did not meet those requirements, and the court concluded that he did not intend to file a § 2254 petition at that time.

Order

The court granted Bourguignon leave to file, within 60 days of the order, an application to proceed without prepaying fees or costs and a § 2254 petition using the attached forms. If he did not intend to pursue the challenge at that time and did not respond, the action would be dismissed without prejudice. The court also stated that any submitted petition would first be reviewed for substantive sufficiency and, if proper, reassigned to a district judge under the Clerk’s Office procedures. The court certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to proceed without prepaying fees for an appeal. Judge Colleen McMahon did not decide the merits of Bourguignon’s conviction challenge.