DiVentura v. Wynder , 325 F. App'x 71 ( 2009 )

Opinions of the United
2009 Decisions States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit
4-21-2009
DiVentura v. Wynder
Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential
Docket No. 07-4341
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NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
No. 07-4341
MITCHELL D. DIVENTURA,
Appellant
v.
JAMES WYNDER, SUPERINTENDENT,
STATE CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION
AT DALLAS, ET AL.
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
District Court No. 07-cv-02846
District Judge: The Honorable John R. Padova
No. 07-4342
MITCHELL D. DIVENTURA,
Appellant
v.
JOHN MORGANELLI, ESQ., DISTRICT ATTORNEY
NORTHAMPTON COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
District Court No. 07-cv-03975
District Judge: The Honorable John R. Padova
Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
April 14, 2009
Before: McKEE, SMITH, Circuit Judges
and STEARNS, District Judge*
(Filed: April 21, 2009)
OPINION
SMITH, Circuit Judge.
Mitchell D. Diventura was convicted by a jury in 1977 of the first degree murder
of his wife. On direct appeal, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania concluded that he had
been denied the effective assistance of trial counsel because of counsel’s failure to request
a jury instruction on involuntary manslaughter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v.
Diventura, 411 A.2d 815, 818 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1979), aff’d 439 A.2d 1154 (Pa. 1982). On
retrial, a jury again convicted Diventura of first degree murder, and he was sentenced to
life imprisonment. Diventura did not file a direct appeal.
Thereafter, he filed a pro se petition for relief under the Pennsylvania Post
Conviction Hearing Act (PCHA), which has since been repealed and replaced with the
Post Conviction Relief Act (PCRA), 42 Pa. Cons. Stat. §§ 9541-9546. According to
Diventura, he withdrew his PCHA petition without prejudice pursuant to an agreement
with the prosecution by which he would receive letters from the trial judge and the
prosecutor in support of his pending application for executive clemency from the
*
The Honorable Richard G. Stearns, District Judge for the United States District
Court of Massachusetts, sitting by designation.
2
prosecutor and the trial judge. When the Governor of Pennsylvania denied Diventura’s
application for clemency, he filed a motion to reinstate his PCHA petition. Despite the
fact that he had withdrawn his PCHA without prejudice, the trial court denied
reinstatement. Thereafter, Diventura filed a PCRA, which was rejected by the trial court.
Diventura’s first petition for habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 followed in
1995. Diventura v. Stepniak, No. 95-CV-0443, 1996 WL 107852, at *1 (E.D. Pa. March
11, 1996). The District Court denied the petition. Thereafter, Diventura filed a third
PCRA petition in June of 1996. This was rejected by both the state trial and appellate
courts. Commonwealth v. Diventura, 734 A.2d 397, 398 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1999). A fourth
PCRA petition, filed in October of 1998, met a similar fate. Id.Diventura applied for executive clemency in 2003. This time he was unable to
obtain a letter of support from the District Attorney. After the Board of Pardons denied
Diventura’s application, Diventura sought relief in the Pennsylvania Superior Court,
alleging that the Commonwealth breached the 1987 agreement by failing to support his
most recent clemency application, and that his right to file a direct appeal should be
granted nunc pro tunc. The application was denied, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court
affirmed.
Diventura turned to the federal district court again, filing a pro se “Motion for
Equitable Relief in the Exercise of this Court’s Inherent Article III Powers and/or for
Relief from Judgment 28 U.S.C. Rule 60(b).” In addition to Diventura’s pro se motion,
counsel filed a “Complaint for Equitable Relief Pursuant to Article III, [the] U.S.
Constitution and Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(b)(6).” Diventura’s motion and the counseled
3
complaint alleged that he had withdrawn his PCHA petition without prejudice as part of
an agreement with the Commonwealth to support his application for clemency. He
asserted that the District Attorney’s opposition to his clemency application was a breach
of the agreement entered into in 1987 and he prayed for reinstatement of his original
PCHA petition so that he could litigate the issues which would have been litigated had no
agreement been made. According to Diventura, reinstatement of his PCHA would
remedy a breach of an agreement that “hoodwinked [him] out of his constitutional rights
to appeal.”
The District Court construed the pro se motion and the counseled complaint as
habeas corpus petitions seeking the reinstatement of his PCHA petition and dismissed
them as unauthorized second or successive applications pursuant to § 2244(b)(1) of the
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). A motions panel of
this Court granted a certificate of appealability “on the jurisdictional and/or procedural
question whether the District Court erred in applying 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b) to bar
consideration on the merits of [Diventura’s] pro se motion . . . and counseled complaint.”1
The order identified the “‘valid’ underlying constitutional claim” as whether Diventura
“was induced by the Commonwealth to waive a remedy that could have restored his right
to a direct appeal by a promise, since broken, to recommend clemency.” Neither party,
1
We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253. Our review regarding
exhaustion and procedural default is plenary. Fahy v. Horn, 516 F.3d 169, 179 (3d Cir.
2008).
4
however, addressed whether § 2244(b) was properly applied.2
The AEDPA established new procedural and substantive requirements for habeas
petitions. One of the new procedural hurdles was the requirement in § 2244(b) that a
second or successive petition must satisfy certain criteria. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b).
Although this gatekeeping provision seems to apply to Diventura’s motion and complaint
filed in 2007, we must be mindful that Diventura’s initial § 2254 habeas petition was filed
in 1995, before AEDPA was enacted. Because application of § 2244(b) would have a
retroactive effect upon Diventura if it foreclosed habeas review that would have been
available under the pre-AEDPA abuse of the writ doctrine, In re Minarik, 166 F.3d 591,
602 (3d Cir. 1999), we must apply pre-AEDPA law and determine whether Diventura’s
2
Section 2244(b) provides:
(1) A claim presented in a second or successive habeas corpus application
under section 2254 that was presented in a prior application shall be
dismissed.
(2) A claim presented in a second or successive habeas corpus application
under section 2254 that was not presented in a prior application shall be
dismissed unless—
(A) the applicant shows that the claim relies on a new rule of
constitutional law, made retroactive to cases on collateral
review by the Supreme Court, that was previously
unavailable; or
(B) (I) the factual predicate for the claim could not have been
discovered previously through the exercise of due diligence;
and
(ii) the facts underlying the claim, if proven and viewed in
light of the evidence as a whole, would be sufficient to
establish by clear and convincing evidence that, but for
constitutional error, no reasonable factfinder would have
found the applicant guilty of the underlying offense.
28 U.S.C. § 2244(b).
5
claim was raised in an earlier habeas petition. If so, the claim would have been barred
and we may apply § 2244(b)’s gatekeeping provisions to Diventura’s most recent filings.
If Diventura’s claim is new, however, we must determine whether Diventura has
demonstrated cause and prejudice for failing to present it in the state court. See
McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U.S. 467, 494 (1991).3 “In the absence of such a showing,
however, . . . the AEDPA standard must be applied . . . .” Minarik, 166 F.3d at 602.
Diventura’s claim, that as a result of agreeing to withdraw his PCHA petition he
“was hoodwinked out of his constitutional rights to appeal,” is new. It was not presented
in his PCHA petition, or in any of the collateral attacks he has filed.
Under pre-AEDPA law, he may proceed with this new claim if he demonstrates
cause and prejudice for failing to raise it in his earlier petition. McCleskey, 499 U.S. at
494.
[T]he cause standard requires the petitioner to show that some objective
factor external to the defense impeded counsel’s efforts to raise the claim in
state court. Objective factors that constitute cause include interference by
officials that makes compliance with the State’s procedural rule
impracticable, and a showing that the factual or legal basis for a claim was
not reasonably available to counsel.
Id. Diventura asserts that he was prevented from raising this claim in his earlier petitions
3
The cause and prejudice standard also may be satisfied if the petitioner can
demonstrate that “a fundamental miscarriage of justice would result from a failure to
entertain the claim.” McCleskey, 499 U.S. at 495. This requires a showing that a
“constitutional violation has probably resulted in the conviction of one who is actually
innocent.” Schlup v. Delo, 513 U.S. 298, 327 (1995) (internal citation and quotation
marks omitted). No such claim has been pressed here, and we are persuaded by the
District Court’s analysis in Diventura’s first § 2254 petition that Diventura cannot
establish a claim of actual innocence. Diventura, 1996 WL 107852, at *7-9.
6
because of the agreement he made with the prosecutor in 1987 to withdraw his PCHA
petition in exchange for the support of his clemency application by the trial judge and the
prosecutor, and that it was only after the District Attorney refused in 2004 to support his
clemency application that this claim was ripe.
We are not persuaded. Even if we assume that the agreement alleged by Diventura
existed and in some way interfered with the restoration of Diventura’s right to file a direct
appeal, he cannot show that the factual basis for this ground for relief was not reasonably
available prior to the District Attorney’s refusal in 2004 to support his application for
clemency. The state court docket indicates that after Diventura’s first application for
clemency was denied in 1990, Diventura promptly filed a petition to reinstate his PCHA
petition. Contrary to the alleged agreement to withdraw the petition without prejudice,
the trial court denied the petition for reinstatement. This was a breach of the agreement
that he would be able to reinstate his PCHA petition (which, if successful, would have
allegedly restored his right to file a direct appeal). As a result of this breach, Diventura
had an opportunity at that point to file an appeal to the Superior Court, raising this very
ground for relief. He did not. A21.
In short, Diventura cannot establish cause under pre-AEDPA law for failing to
raise this claim in state court. Accordingly, we must apply AEDPA’s gatekeeping
provision in § 2244(b). Minarik, 166 F.3d at 602.
Section 2244(b) bars the filing of a second or successive petition unless it meets
certain requirements. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b). In Gonzalez v. Crosby, 545 U.S. 524 (2005),
the Supreme Court instructed that a motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b)
7
should be treated as a second or successive habeas petition for purposes of § 2244(b) if it
“assert[s] a federal basis for relief from a state court’s judgment of conviction.” Id. at
530. As an example of a Rule 60(b) motion that qualified as a successive petition, the
Gonzalez Court cited a motion that sought leave to add a claim of constitutional error that
had been omitted from an earlier petition. 545 U.S. at 531.
Here, Diventura’s motion and complaint seek the reinstatement of his PCHA
petition as a means of restoring his right to file a direct appeal. This constitutional ground
for relief, however, was omitted from his PCHA petition, as well as his PCRA petitions
and his initial § 2254 petition. Under Gonzalez, a motion seeking to add a ground for
relief should be treated as a successive habeas petition. 545 U.S. at 531. Because these
successive petitions cannot satisfy § 2244(b)(2)’s requirements, we will affirm the
District Court’s dismissal of Diventura’s pro se motion and counseled complaint.3
3
We have considered the other arguments raised in Diventura’s appellate brief and
find them lacking in merit.
8