Morrissette v. Matesanz , 27 F. App'x 4 ( 2001 )

[NOT FOR PUBLICATION – NOT TO BE CITED AS PRECEDENT]
United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 01-1151
MICHAEL MORRISSETTE,
Petitioner, Appellant,
v.
JAMES MATESANZ, SUPERINTENDENT,
Respondent, Appellee.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. Morris E. Lasker, Senior U.S. District Judge]
Before
Selya, Circuit Judge,
Coffin, Senior Circuit Judge,
and Saris,* District Judge.
Brian P. Carey, with whom Nicholas C. Theodorou, John A.
Shope, and Foley, Hoag & Eliot LLP, were on brief, for
petitioner, appellant.
James J. Arguin, Assistant Attorney General, Criminal
Bureau, with whom Thomas F. Reilly, Attorney General, was on
brief, for respondent, appellee.
*Of the District of Massachusetts, sitting by designation.
November 27, 2001
Per curiam. Michael Morrissette appeals from the district
court's denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus,
claiming that his 1991 state court conviction for second-degree
murder was tainted by the admission of trial evidence obtained
in violation of his Fifth Amendment right against self-
incrimination. Given the highly deferential standard applicable
to review of state court judgments by federal courts under the
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA),
see 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1), we affirm.
We state the facts briefly. Petitioner was one of three
young males charged in the stabbing death of a 73-year-old man
in an alley in Lowell, Massachusetts, late on the night of
September 18, 1988. Two of the young men, including petitioner,
were charged as joint venturers, with only the third accused of
directly committing the attack. Trial evidence pointed to
petitioner as owner of one of two knives used in the killing,
and he was alleged to have encouraged the friend who initiated
the stabbing to "finish off" the seriously wounded victim to
prevent identification.
Several hours after the crime, at about 3 a.m., petitioner
was stopped in the vicinity for questioning by police officers.
-2-
He was asked to remove a shoe for comparison with footprints
found at the murder scene and was told his print matched, an
assertion that appears to have been an intentional
misrepresentation.1 Petitioner agreed to accompany the officers
to the police station. He was given Miranda warnings and
eventually signed two statements admitting his presence at the
crime scene. He also agreed to a blood test that showed traces
of another individual's blood on his hand. Petitioner claims
these statements and blood test results were obtained
involuntarily and thus were admitted into evidence in violation
of the Fifth Amendment. See Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503,
513-14 (1963).
Petitioner cites a number of factors to support his
contention that the officers obtained the challenged evidence by
overbearing his will, including his age (seventeen), his limited
education (ninth grade), the time of day (early hours of the
morning), his fatigue, his lack of contact with a lawyer or
guardian, and the officers' intentional misstatement that they
had evidence placing him at the murder scene. He asserts that
1 A police report detailed this exchange between petitioner
and officers, but the officers involved testified at a
suppression hearing more than two years later that they did not
recall asking for the shoe or observing that it matched
footprints at the crime scene. Testimony at trial indicated
that, in fact, no footprints had been found at the scene.
-3-
the totality of these circumstances compels the conclusion that
his cooperation with the officers was involuntary, requiring
suppression of the inculpatory evidence resulting from the
interview.
Whether or not this would be a close case on direct review,
it is far from that in its present posture. To obtain a writ of
habeas corpus, petitioner must show both that the Commonwealth
denied his constitutional rights and that the Massachusetts
courts made a determination that was contrary to, or an
unreasonable application of, federal law in rejecting his claim.
See McCambridge v. Hall, 266 F.3d 12, 17 (lst Cir. 2001);
Hurtado v. Tucker, 245 F.3d 7, 16 (lst Cir. 2001); 28 U.S.C. §
2254(d)(1).2 A state court determination is unreasonable only
if it is "so offensive to existing precedent, so devoid of
record support, or so arbitrary, as to indicate that it is
outside the universe of plausible, credible outcomes." O'Brien
v. Dubois, 145 F.3d 16, 25 (lst Cir. 1998); see also Williams v.
Matesanz, 230 F.3d 421, 425 (lst Cir. 2000).
2 Petitioner does not argue that the state court ruling was
"contrary to" clearly established federal law or, under 28
U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2), that it was "based on an unreasonable
determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in
the State court proceeding." We therefore consider only whether
the decision represented an "unreasonable application" of
clearly established federal law.
-4-
This is not such a case. During his six hours of detention,
petitioner was unrestrained, afforded access to a restroom, and
offered coffee. He was advised of his Miranda rights before
giving the statements or consenting to the blood test. Although
the hour was late, the trial court found no evidence of
weariness, and petitioner can point to no evidence in the record
that he was sleep-deprived. He was stopped on the street, not
taken from his home. Indeed, petitioner was alert enough, and
comfortable enough, to point out a typographical error in the
transcription of his first statement. The officers' fabrication
of evidence adverse to petitioner – the supposed footprints – is
insufficient in this context to render unreasonable the state
courts' conclusion that he acted voluntarily. There is no
evidence of a causal connection between the deception and either
petitioner's willingness to accompany the officers to the police
station or his later decision, after Miranda warnings, to give
a statement and allow the blood test. See United States v.
Byram, 145 F.3d 405, 408 (lst Cir. 1998) ("trickery is not
automatically coercion").
Petitioner maintains that the state trial court's decision
was unreasonable because the judge did not explicitly consider
all of the relevant factors in a "totality of the circumstances"
review. He points out, for example, that the judge's decision
-5-
failed to address his age, lack of education, and the footprint
deception. The district court, however, carefully reviewed each
of the factors raised by petitioner in concluding that, even
"taken together," they do not permit a finding that the state
court unreasonably applied federal law in rejecting petitioner's
Fifth Amendment claim. Our own review leads us to the same
determination. Accordingly, the district court did not err in
denying the application for a writ.
Affirmed.
-6-