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Thread: Kenneth Clair - California

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    Kenneth Clair - California




    Summary of Offense:

    Was sentenced to death in Orange County on December 4, 1987 for the sexual assault, beating and strangulation of babysitter Linda Faye Rodgers, 25, on November 15, 1984. Rodgers, who suffered from cerebral palsy, was watching her six-year-old daughter and four other children in a Santa Ana home when she was surprised by an intruder. Rodgers was sexually assaulted, tied-up and gagged, stabbed in the neck and back, strangled with clothing, and beaten on the head with a pipe.

    Clair's death sentence has been affirmed by the California Supreme Court.

  2. #2
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    On December 22, 2008, Clair filed an appeal in the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit over the denial of his habeas petition in Federal District Court.

    http://dockets.justia.com/docket/cir.../ca9/08-75135/

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    In today's Supreme Court orders, writ of certiorari was granted to the state.

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    This case is scheduled for argument before the United States Supreme Court tomorrow. Keep in mind SCOTUS granted the state cert.

    Martel v. Clair

    Issue: Whether a condemned state prisoner in federal habeas corpus proceedings is entitled to replace his court-appointed counsel with another court appointed lawyer just because he expresses dissatisfaction and alleges that his counsel was failing to pursue potentially important evidence.

    Plain English Issue: Whether a state death row inmate is entitled to receive a new court-appointed lawyer when he alleges that his first court-appointed counsel was not pursuing important evidence.

    SCOTUSblog Coverage


    Briefs and Documents

    Merits Briefs for the Petitioner

    Merits Briefs for the Respondent

    Amicus Briefs in Support of the Petitioner

    Certiorari-stage documents





    Editorial
    Lawyers in Capital Cases
    Published: December 5, 2011


    Problems with lawyers routinely plague death penalty cases. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a case involving a California death-row inmate’s request that his court-appointed lawyer be replaced. The court should not use this narrow case to limit the ability of defendants to get the representation they need.

    The issue in Martel v. Clair is the legal standard to use in deciding whether a condemned inmate can get a new lawyer. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that the district judge handling the case was required to examine the facts and decide “whether the interests of justice required substitution of counsel” when the inmate, Kenneth Clair, complained that his lawyer was not pursuing important evidence in his federal habeas corpus appeal.

    Mr. Clair was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1987. In 2005, a federal judge denied his habeas corpus petition challenging his conviction as well as his request for a new lawyer. Mr. Clair’s lawyer appealed the judge’s ruling but also wrote a letter saying it would be best for new counsel to be appointed because the attorney-client relationship had “broken down.” After that judge retired, the Ninth Circuit appointed a new lawyer for Mr. Clair and a new judge was assigned to the case.

    California contends that the appellate court was wrong to allow Mr. Clair to change lawyers “just because he expresses dissatisfaction” and that doing so sets off delays. It argues that, in capital habeas cases, substitution of counsel should be allowed only when the lawyer has abandoned the client, has a disabling conflict or does not have the required experience. The federal statute on appointment of counsel does not contain these restrictions, and there is no reason for the Supreme Court to impose such restrictions in capital cases involving replacing counsel.

    California also argues that allowing the appellate court decision to stand would be an invitation to death penalty inmates to file “Clair motions” to seek new counsel as a delaying strategy. But there is no danger of that happening because that ruling is an unpublished opinion that sets no precedent at all. The Supreme Court should uphold the Ninth Circuit’s narrow decision in this case, which is limited by its unusual facts.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/06/op...tal-cases.html

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Is the Ninth Circuit in trouble again?

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    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    They may well be. They've been getting smacked down a lot lately by the US Supreme Court--often unanimously.

  7. #7
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    In a unanimous decision the United States Supreme Court has reversed the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Martel v. Clair. The Court holds that when a court is evaluating a motion to substitute counsel in a capital case, it should use the same "interest of justice" standard that applies in non-capital cases.

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    Supreme Court says death row inmate cannot change court-appointed lawyer

    The Supreme Court says a death row inmate can't change his court-appointed appeals lawyer because he didn't like the lawyer's defense tactics.

    The justices on Monday turned away the appeal from Kenneth Clair, who was sentenced to death in California in 1987 for burglary and murder.

    Clair wanted to change his federal public defender in 2005 because he says they were trying to stop his execution instead of trying to prove his innocence. A federal judge denied his request but the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned that decision.

    The justices ruled unanimously that the appeals court's decision was incorrect

    Justice Elena Kagan wrote that Clair's request came just as a judge was about to make a final ruling so any change would have been too late.

    http://www.startribune.com/nation/141424703.html

  9. #9
    Administrator Moh's Avatar
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    Death Sentence Thrown Out for California Killer

    By KATHERINE PROCTOR
    Courthouse News Service

    A convicted murder represented by "woefully incompetent" counsel when sentenced to death should instead serve life in prison, the 9th Circuit ruled Tuesday.

    Because the San Quentin inmate in question has suffered "disturbing sexual abuse," his habeas petition was filed under seal.

    The 85-page opinion is silent as to most identifying information in the case, and a footnote explains that the 9th Circuit "ordered the record unsealed for the limited purpose of discussing the evidence in this opinion."

    In addition to replacing the inmate's name with Doe and the names of others with initials, the court also omitted citations to the procedural history of this case.

    Another footnote offers a "brief timeline of Doe's life and criminal history."

    "He grew up in the South," it says. "In 1976, at the age of 17, he was convicted of robbery and incarcerated in a state prison. He was released in 1982. By 1983, Doe had moved to California; he was convicted of murder there in 1984."

    L.R., the woman Doe killed, babysat for the family near where Doe lived.

    In his federal habeas petition, Doe complained that the attorney who represented him at sentencing failed to adequately investigate Doe's past and interview his friends and family members.

    The 9th Circuit agreed Tuesday that such an investigation would have produced evidence that Doe's mother beat and neglected him from infancy, and that his uncle abused him as well, at one point even attempting to run him over with a car.

    Evidence concerning Doe's "chilling, brutal experience in prison" after he was convicted at the age of 17 for robbing two women at gunpoint also could have "stirred sufficient compassion or understanding in the jury to result in a life sentence," Judge Stephen Reinhardt wrote for a three-person panel.

    It was at "a notorious prison in the South" where Doe suffered "the most disturbing of multiple episodes in a horrific series that stretched back to his birth," according to the ruling.

    Though the attorney whose representation Doe is now challenging says the client never mentioned his rape during their conversations, Reinhardt said that "a lawyer has not fulfilled his duties to his client if he ceases investigating because his client has not been forthcoming about his background."

    "There are often reasons why a person who has been chronically abused and neglected might well decline to disclose the details of difficult and embarrassing personal history," he said. "That Doe did not volunteer more about the trauma he experienced during his childhood and in prison did not absolve [the lawyer] of the need to conduct an adequate mitigation investigation.

    "Doe simply did what most capital defendants - and most people - do, and did not volunteer deeply painful, shameful information when not pressed for details."

    The ruling also faults Doe's attorney for failing to investigate the inmate's history of mental illness, a disease that has "ravaged" Doe in prison.

    Though the lawyer hired a psychologist to interview Doe, this woman met with Doe for only an hour and provided a "relatively brief evaluation," the court found. The lawyer never asked her to provide expert assistance in preparing or presenting a mitigation case.

    Reinhardt said that the lawyer also neglected to give attention to Doe's history of dependence on alcohol, marijuana and cocaine, and that he also did not prepare his penalty-phase witnesses before he called them to the stand, even though "witness preparation is a critical function of counsel."

    "In short, the evidence that [the lawyer's] performance at the penalty phase fell well below the constitutional minimum is overwhelming," he said.

    According to the opinion, the lawyer admitted after Doe was sentenced to death that he "did not adequately prepare for a penalty phase in this case because of a combination of inexperience and overconfidence."

    "We cannot help but agree," Reinhardt said.

    The panel returned the case to the state court to reduce Doe's sentence to life without parole, unless California decides to hold a new capital sentence proceeding.

    http://www.courthousenews.com/2015/0...nia-killer.htm

  10. #10
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    Santa Ana killer is spared death row -- but not because of online petition

    By Tony Saavedra
    The Orange County Register

    Nearly three decades after Santa Ana transient Kenneth Clair landed on California’s death row, the convicted killer quietly has received a reprieve and no longer faces execution.

    Clair, the subject of a viral social media campaign that has attracted 152,000 supporters, now will serve a sentence of life without parole because of errors made by his defense attorney during his trial, according to court documents obtained by The Orange County Register.

    The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals secretly overturned Clair’s death sentence in March and sealed the records. The three-judge panel, however, upheld Clair’s conviction for the 1984 murder of a Santa Ana nanny and noted conflicting DNA evidence uncovered since his trial.

    Orange County prosecutors said Friday they won’t retry the trial’s penalty phase or challenge the appellate ruling, which the court sealed because of concerns Clair might be attacked in prison because of his history.

    “We made this decision months ago in consultation with the state Attorney General’s Office,” said Senior Deputy District Attorney Scott Simmons. He cited the age of the case, as well as the difficulty in locating witnesses.

    Prosecutors are trying to determine whether Clair, currently at San Quentin Prison, needs to come back to Orange County to be resentenced.

    Clair was 25 and living in an abandoned house next door to the victim when police arrested him in the strangulation death. He had been out of prison for a year after serving six years for purse snatching. Clair was sentenced to death in 1987.

    For more than a decade, private investigator C.J. Ford has championed Clair’s cause, arguing his innocence to mostly deaf ears.

    Since November, Ford’s efforts gained attention online amid Orange County’s nationally watched informant controversy and allegations that prosecutors and police misused jailhouse snitches and withheld evidence.

    Although Clair’s case does not involve jailhouse informants, his supporters contend his conviction is an example of the Orange County District Attorney’s Office’s “win-at-all-costs” mentality.

    Ford launched his petition to free Clair on Change.org. He struck a chord.

    People from across the nation have signed the online document – more than the signatures collected on another petition supporting two prison inmates featured on Netflix’s “Making a Murderer.”

    Ford said Friday he plans to take the signatures supporting Clair’s release to Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas next week.

    Ford was unaware, until contacted Friday by a Register reporter, that Clair’s death sentence had been overturned in March.

    The reason: During his trial, Clair’s defense attorney failed to present evidence that he was repeatedly raped behind bars as a teenager during his previous prison stint for purse snatching. Such evidence may have swayed the jury toward compassion, the appellate court found.

    Julian Bailey, Clair’s attorney at the time and now an Orange County Superior Court judge, conceded in court documents he could have done a better job on what was his first death penalty case.

    “I did not adequately prepare for a penalty phase in this case because of a combination of inexperience and overconfidence,” Bailey said, according to the appellate ruling. “I did not ask the right questions of [Clair], his family, myself or my investigator to obtain an adequate understanding of my client and his case.”

    Bailey could not be reached for comment Friday.

    The appeals court called Bailey’s performance during the trial’s penalty phase “subpar,” “virtually without value” and “woefully incompetent.” Justices noted that Bailey barely looked at Clair’s prison history and interviewed him only once.

    Clair’s life is no longer on the line. But supporters insist he is innocent. They contend he deserves to be exonerated in the killing of 25-year-old Linda Faye Rodgers because of DNA evidence found at the crime scene that belongs to someone other than Clair.

    “He didn’t commit the crime, so he shouldn’t be in jail for life,” Ford said. “The D.A. doesn’t have a case. Period. They don’t want to go back to court and lose.”

    For more than seven years, Rackauckas has known that DNA evidence taken from Rodger’s body does not belong to Clair. Prosecutors maintain there is ample evidence of his guilt.

    They have declined to discuss the nature of the disputed evidence and, backed by a Superior Court judge, declined to release to the defense the identity of the person tied to the DNA evidence. Prosecutors on Friday said they could not talk further about the case because of a gag order by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

    The refusal to exonerate Clair has triggered a storm of protests on social media since November.

    “I’m signing in this matter because DNA evidence should not in any case be held back,” wrote Robert Harol of Tustin at change.org. “There are too many people in jail because of this type of corruption in the justice system.”

    “The desire of prosecutors to win rather than serve justice is destroying our legal system,” wrote Efrem Lipkin of Berkeley. “Evidence is hidden, plea bargains driven by threats of long sentences, destroy(ing) innocent lives.”

    For 28 years, Clair has been imprisoned on a case filled with contradictory evidence.

    Rodgers was strangled with her own clothing, stabbed and bashed on the head in the Santa Ana house where she worked. She died from strangulation.

    Her 5-year-old daughter and four other children were in an adjacent room when the killer struck, splattering blood on the walls and floor with a knife taken from the kitchen.

    One of the children, age 5, told police the culprit was a “white man” and had been in the house earlier, demanding money. Clair is black. The child, years later, recanted at the behest of his mother’s husband, who was a member of a white motorcycle gang, according to appeals court records and news reports.

    The appeals court opinion noted the victim had threatened to call police on her employer for allegedly selling drugs from the house.

    About a week before the killing, the house was burglarized, with $450 stolen from a coffee can.

    Clair, a transient, had been living next door to the victim in an abandoned house. He had been arrested on suspicion of the burglary and released a few hours before the killing.

    Prosecutors based the murder case, in part, on the testimony of Clair’s ex-girlfriend, who said he showed her items taken from the house during the killing. She also wore a wire, which recorded Clair equivocating when asked why he killed Rodgers. He didn’t deny the murder but falls short of confessing, according to the recording.

    “They can run hair fibers until the cows come home; they’re not going to walk away from that tape,” former prosecutor Mike Jacobs said in a 2008 interview.

    Clair can be heard on the recording saying: “They can’t prove a ... thing, not unless you open your ... mouth.”

    When the woman said she saw blood on him the night of the killing, he replied, “Ain’t on me no more.” The girlfriend later recanted some of her statements.

    http://www.ocregister.com/articles/c...-evidence.html

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