U.S. Supreme Court Agrees to Hear Virginia Case on Quality of Representation

On May 12, the U.S. Supreme Court grant­ed cer­tio­rari in Bell v. Kelly, No. 07 – 1223, where the peti­tion­er chal­lenged a low­er court’s dis­missal of his claim of inef­fec­tive­ness of coun­sel. Edward Nathaniel Bell stat­ed that his tri­al lawyers pre­sent­ed no mit­i­gat­ing evi­dence on his behalf at his sen­tenc­ing hear­ing, despite the exis­tence of many sym­pa­thet­ic facts that might have led a jury to vote for a life sen­tence. The state court pre­sent­ed with this claim did not hold a hear­ing on whether Bell was put at a dis­ad­van­tage because of his lawyers’ fail­ures. When the case reached the fed­er­al courts through a habeas cor­pus peti­tion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit believed it was bound by the state court’s find­ing of no prej­u­dice to Bell, even though this issue had not been devel­oped in the state court. The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether the 4^th Circuit was cor­rect in using this high­ly defer­ren­tial stan­dard.Bell

had been sched­uled for exe­cu­tion on April 8, 2008 in Virginia. Gov. Tim Kaine grant­ed a reprieve while the U.S. Supreme Court resolved a chal­lenge to lethal injec­tions that could affect Virginia exe­cu­tions. The Court decid­ed the lethal injec­tion case, Baze v. Rees, on April 16, 2008. The gov­er­nor’s reprieve last­ed until July 24, which became the new exe­cu­tion date for Bell. Now that he has an issue before the Supreme Court that is inde­pen­dent of the lethal injec­tion issue, he has received a stay until the case is decid­ed in the Court’s next term.

The for­mal issue upon which the Supreme Court grant­ed certiorari was:

Did the Fourth Circuit err when, in con­flict with deci­sions of the Ninth and Tenth Circuits, it applied the def­er­en­tial stan­dard of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), which is reserved for claims ​“adju­di­cat­ed on the mer­its” in state court, to eval­u­ate a claim pred­i­cat­ed on evi­dence of prej­u­dice the state court refused to con­sid­er and that was prop­er­ly received for the first time in a fed­er­al evidentiary hearing?

Posted May 12, 2008. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) is part of a law known as the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996. See Supreme Court and Representation.