Woodberry v. Bruce ( 2006 )

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES CO URT O F APPEALS
October 11, 2006
FO R TH E TENTH CIRCUIT Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
TH O MA S WO O D B ER RY ,
Petitioner-A ppellant,
No. 05-3291
v. (D.C. No. 00-CV-3407-SAC)
(D . Kan.)
LOU IS E. BRU CE, W arden; STATE
OF KANSAS,
Respondents-Appellees.
OR D ER AND JUDGM ENT *
Before B ROR B Y and EBEL, Circuit Judges, and KANE, ** District Judge.
M r. W oodberry is a “frequent filer” in both the state and federal courts.
Here, he appeals from the district court’s denial of his Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(b)
motion, filed in his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 habeas case.
*
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist the determination of
this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is
therefore ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is
not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata,
and collateral estoppel. The court generally disfavors the citation of orders and
judgments; nevertheless, an order and judgment may be cited under the terms and
conditions of 10th Cir. R. 36.3.
**
The Honorable John L. Kane, Senior District Judge, United States District
Court for the District of Colorado, sitting by designation.
Factual and Procedural H istory
In 1979, M r. W oodberry was convicted in state court of three counts of
aggravated robbery and one count of aggravated battery. The Kansas Supreme
Court affirmed his conviction and sentence. In 1984, he was convicted of
aggravated battery, committed while on parole from his previous sentence. The
sentence for this offense was made to run consecutive to his previous sentence.
The Kansas Court of Appeals affirmed his 1984 conviction. In 1993,
M r. W oodberry pled guilty to one count of conspiracy to comm it aggravated
robbery, and one count of misdemeanor theft. His state court sentence for these
offenses was made to run concurrently to his two prior sentences.
M r. W oodberry filed multiple state motions for post-conviction relief.
These w ere denied, or dismissed without opinion. M r. W oodberry then filed tw o
separate federal habeas corpus petitions, challenging the application of Kansas
statutes to his criminal history and to his 1979 and 1993 consecutive sentences,
and contending that his counsel had been ineffective by failing to advise him of
the effect of the statutes on the length of his sentences. The district court denied
the petitions and also denied his Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) motion for reconsideration.
M r. W oodberry appealed. W e granted a certificate of appealability (COA),
affirmed in part, and remanded for further consideration of his ineffective
assistance of counsel claims. Woodberry v. Bruce, 13 F. App’x 780 (10th Cir.
2001).
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The district court thereafter stayed the case to permit Mr. W oodberry to
exhaust his ineffective assistance claims in state court. In two separate decisions,
the Kansas Court of Appeals rejected the ineffective assistance claims, finding
them procedurally barred, barred by laches, and/or lacking in merit. See
Woodberry v. State, 101 P.3d 727 (Kan. Ct. App. 2004); Woodberry v. State, No.
89, 193, 2003 W L 22990144 (Kan. Ct. App. Dec. 19, 2003). The Kansas Supreme
Court denied review.
On June 10, 2004, the federal district court lifted its order staying
proceedings for exhaustion purposes and proceeded to adjudicate
M r. W oodberry’s ineffective assistance claims. 1 In an order dated November 9,
2004, the habeas court (1) upheld the state court’s application of procedural bar to
his ineffective assistance of counsel claim regarding his 1979 criminal case and
his claims regarding his 1993 criminal case; (2) upheld the state court’s
conclusion that those claims were without merit; and (3) denied habeas relief and
dismissed M r. W oodberry’s petition.
On M arch 1, 2005, this court denied COA for M r. W oodberry’s appeal from
the district court’s order of November 9, 2004 and dismissed his appeal.
Woodberry v. Bruce, 124 F. App’x 623 (10th Cir. M ar. 1, 2005), cert. dismissed,
1
In the meantime, M r. W oodberry filed another habeas petition, raising
essentially the same issues with respect to his 1984 conviction. W e affirmed the
judgment of the district court denying relief. Woodberry v. Hannigan, 37 F.
App’x 404 (10th Cir. 2002).
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125 S. Ct. 2552 (2005). On June 15, 2005, M r. W oodberry filed in district court
his “M otion To Vacate Judgement (Fraud Upon the Court) ‘Pursuant To Rule
60(b)’.” This filing attacked both the disposition of M r. W oodberry’s claims in
state court and the habeas court’s application of procedural bar. As a basis for his
contention of “fraud on the [habeas] court,” M r. W oodberry asserted that the state
had fraudulently misrepresented that procedural bar applied to his case, because
the Kansas courts do not uniformly apply the procedural bar to which his state
court applications w ere subjected. He also asserted that the state had engaged in
fraud by entering unspecified evidence it knew to be fraudulent into his federal
habeas proceedings.
On July 7, 2005, the district court denied M r. W oodberry’s Rule 60(b)
motion, reasoning that such motions are not to be used simply to reiterate
arguments previously made; that the Tenth Circuit had already upheld the
dismissal on procedural grounds of M r. W oodberry’s petition; and that the motion
presented “no legal basis to grant additional review.” Id., doc. 40, at 2. The
district court further ordered M r. W oodberry to seek permission before filing any
further pleadings in the case. M r. W oodberry appealed from the district court’s
July 7, 2005 order.
Analysis
M r. W oodberry raised four claims in his Rule 60(b) motion. He first
contended that he was wrongfully denied a CO A to appeal from the district
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court’s November 9, 2004, order. Second, he argued that the state courts and the
federal district court improperly applied procedural bar to his claims. Third, he
asserted that “fraudulent evidence” w as presented in the habeas proceedings.
Finally, he contended that the district court should have granted him an
evidentiary hearing on his claims.
Under our procedure for evaluating an appeal from the denial of a Rule
60(b) motion in a habeas case, we first ask whether the claims asserted in the
motion are “true” 60(b) claims, or are second or successive habeas claims. See
Spitznas v. Boone, No. 05-6236, 2006 W L 2789868, at *1 (10th Cir. Sept. 29,
2006). If the claims are true 60(b) claims, we review the district court’s decision
as we do any other case involving the denial of Rule 60(b) relief. See id. at *1 -
*2. If the claims are second or successive habeas claims, however, then we
cannot review the district court’s decision on the merits, because the district court
lacked jurisdiction to rule on them, and should have transferred them to this court
for authorization under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b). See id. at *2
1. CO A claim
Both the district court and this court denied M r. W oodberry a COA to
appeal from the district court’s order of November 9, 2004, denying his habeas
petition. In his Rule 60(b) motion, he challenged these decisions on his requests
for COA, contending that he should have been granted a CO A to appeal from the
district court’s order. The issue of whether this issue represents a second habeas
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petition or a true 60(b) claim is a difficult one. Since the district court denied
relief in its underlying order on procedural grounds, to obtain a COA to appeal
that denial, M r. Woodberry had to show both that the district court’s ruling
upholding the procedural bar was debatable among jurists, and that the issue of
whether the underlying claims had merit was also debatable among jurists. See
Slack v. M cDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000). M r. W oodberry in fact argued both
that he should have received a COA on the procedural bar issue, and that his
underlying claims had merit. His attack on the denial of a CO A on the procedural
bar issue represents a “true” Rule 60(b) claim, for which authorization is not
required. See Gonzalez v. Crosby, 125 S. Ct. 2641, 2648 n.4 (2005). His
contention that his underlying habeas claims had merit sufficient to justify the
issuance of a CO A, however, could be viewed as the reassertion of his habeas
claims, which w ould be barred under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b).
Fortunately, we need not untangle this problem, because a threshold,
jurisdictional issue bars this claim in any event. M r. W oodberry’s attack on the
district court’s denial of COA was mooted by our denial of COA on the same
claims and our dismissal of his prior appeal. A controversy becomes moot when
a court can no longer grant any effective relief. Osborn v. Durant Bank & Trust
Co. (In re Osborn), 24 F.3d 1199, 1203 (10th Cir. 1994). The COA statute
permits a petitioner to address his arguments in favor of a CO A to the court of
appeals, irrespective of a denial in the district court. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c).
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M r. W oodberry did so, this court considered his arguments, and it denied COA
and dismissed his appeal. This denial and dismissal divested the district court of
any power to grant further, effective relief in the form of granting him a COA as
to the issues he previously appealed and lost on. The district court should
therefore have dismissed this Rule 60(b) claim as moot.
2. Procedural default
M r. W oodberry’s claim that procedural default was inappropriate represents
a “true” ground for Rule 60(b) relief, because it asserts only that the district
court’s ruling that precluded a determination on the merits (due to state
procedural bar) was in error. See Gonzalez, 125 S. Ct. at 2648 n.4.
M r. W oodberry must obtain a COA to appeal the district court’s denial of this
claim.
The Kansas Court of Appeals noted that M r. W oodberry had filed several
previous petitions for post-conviction relief and had failed to show exceptional
circumstances that would justify his attempt to raise, in yet another such
application, twenty-five years after the fact, his claims of ineffective assistance of
counsel. Woodberry, 101 P.3d at 174-75. The district court relied on this
procedural bar to bar his claims in the habeas proceeding. M r. W oodberry fails to
present any argument that would raise a debatable issue concerning whether the
district court’s ruling upholding the procedural bar applied by the Kansas state
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courts was correct. W e therefore deny COA on this claim. See Slack v.
M cDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000).
3. “Fraudulent evidence” claim
M r. W oodberry also raised a claim that “fraudulent” evidence was
presented at his habeas proceedings. He failed to specify what this fraudulent
evidence consisted of. Assuming that his allegations of fraud related only to the
federal habeas court proceedings, and were separate and distinct from a claim of
fraud in the state court proceedings, this claim would present a true 60(b) claim.
See Spitznas, 2006 W L 2789868, at *2. Nevertheless, M r. W oodberry does not
meet the standard for obtaining the required COA as to this claim, because he
fails to specify what evidence was fraudulent and instead makes only conclusory
allegations. Assuming, alternatively, that he raised a claim of fraud the
disposition of which would be inextricably intertwined with the merits of his
habeas petition, such a claim would constitute a second or successive habeas
petition, which we deny him relief to file, because he failed to meet the standards
described in 28 U.S.C. § 2244 for filing such a claim.
4. Evidentiary hearing claim
M r. W oodberry’s claim that he was entitled to an evidentiary hearing, is a
true 60(b) claim. W e deny him a COA on this claim, however, as he fails to show
his entitlement to an evidentiary hearing under the applicable standards.
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Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, we VACATE in part, for lack of jurisdiction, the
district court’s decision denying on the m erits the portion of M r. W oodberry’s
Rule 60(b) motion that was moot. To the extent M r. W oodberry presented
allegations of fraud that w ere intertwined with the merits of his habeas claims, w e
V A CA TE the district court’s decision denying such claims and DENY
M r. W oodberry leave to file a second or successive habeas petition raising such
claims, and we thus D ISM ISS the portion of his Rule 60(b) motion properly
deemed a second or successive petition. W e DENY M r. W oodberry’s request for
a COA to appeal the district court’s decision denying on the merits the portion of
his Rule 60(b) motion challenging the habeas court’s procedural disposition of his
§ 2254 claims, defects in the integrity of the habeas corpus proceedings, and the
denial of an evidentiary hearing, which constitute true Rule 60(b) issues; and w e
thus DISM ISS that portion of his appeal. M r. W oodberry’s request to proceed on
appeal in form a pauperis is granted.
Entered for the Court
David M . Ebel
Circuit Judge
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