Supreme Court Takes Up Capital Habeas Corpus Case

The U.S. Supreme Court this morning decided to take up for full briefing and argument the Arizona capital habeas corpus case of Shinn v. Ramirez, No. 20-1009.

The case involves the interaction between the Court’s “equitable exception” to the procedural default rule in Martinez v. Ryan and one of the lesser-known habeas reforms of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2).

The statutory provision forbids holding an evidentiary hearing in federal court when the petitioner failed to develop the facts in state court. The provision has exceptions for new rules and facts that could not have been discovered earlier through due diligence. However, there is no exception for ineffective assistance of state habeas counsel, i.e., lack of due diligence.