Stanley Holmes v. Christopher Holme

Filing

NOT PRECEDENTIAL OPINION Coram: MCKEE*, Chief Judge, FISHER and GREENAWAY JR., Circuit Judges. Total Pages: 10. Judge: FISHER Authoring. *Judge McKee concluded his term as Chief of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on September 30, 2016.

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NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
____________
No. 14-1665
____________
STANLEY L. HOLMES,
Appellant
v.
CHRISTOPHER HOLMES;
ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY
____________
On Appeal from United States District Court
for the District of New Jersey
(D. C. No. 2-11-cv-04617)
District Judge: Honorable Faith S. Hochberg
____________
Argued June 22, 2016
Before: McKEE , Chief Judge, FISHER, and GREENAWAY, JR., Circuit Judges.
*

(Filed: January 18, 2017)
Lorraine S. Gauli-Rufo, Esq. [ARGUED]
130 Pompton Avenue
Verona, NJ 07044
Counsel for Appellant
Laura A. Cohen, Esq. [ARGUED]
Rutgers University School of Law
123 Washington Street
Newark, NJ 07102

*

Judge McKee concluded his term as Chief of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Third Circuit on September 30, 2016.

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Michael J. Sullivan, Esq.
Coughlin Duffy
350 Mount Kemble Avenue
P.O. Box 1917
Morristown, NJ 07962
Counsel for Amicus Appellant
Catherine A. Foddai, Esq. [ARGUED]
Bergen County Office of Prosecutor
10 Main Street
Bergen County Justice Center
Hackensack, NJ 07601
Attorney General New Jersey
Office of Attorney General of New Jersey
Division of Criminal Justice
25 Market Street
Richard J. Hughes Justice Complex
Trenton, NJ 08625
Counsel for Appellees
____________
OPINION*
____________
FISHER, Circuit Judge.
Appellant Stanley Holmes was convicted of multiple charges following a second
jury trial, after the first trial resulted in a partial acquittal and a partial hung jury. Holmes
challenges his convictions under the Fifth Amendment’s Double Jeopardy Clause. We
will affirm.

*

This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7
does not constitute binding precedent.
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I.
We write principally for the parties, who are familiar with the factual context and
legal history of this case. Therefore, we will set forth only those facts that are necessary
to our analysis.
Holmes was the driver for a home invasion that ended in murder. Two of his codefendants burglarized and robbed the home of Mary and Nathan Johnson and enlisted
Holmes to drive them to and from the Johnson home. Once the co-defendants entered the
home, they handcuffed the Johnsons and forced them face-first onto the ground. The codefendants then used firearms to elicit information from the Johnsons about where
valuables were kept in the home. When Nathan attempted to fight back, he was shot
twice. The co-defendants fled the home and Mary, who had remained face-first on the
ground, was able to remove her handcuffs, escape, and contact authorities. Unfortunately,
Nathan perished before he could be helped.
The co-defendants eventually led authorities to Holmes, and he confessed to
driving the co-defendants to the Johnson home but asserted that he was unaware of
exactly what the co-defendants had planned. Based on his conduct, Holmes was named in
a multi-count, multi-defendant indictment in a New Jersey trial court in 2003. He was
charged with the following: murder (count 2), two counts of first degree robbery (counts
3 and 4), conspiracy to commit first degree robbery (count 5), felony murder (robbery)
(count 6), second degree burglary (count 7), conspiracy to commit burglary (count 8),
felony murder (burglary) (count 9), two counts of first degree kidnapping (counts 10 and
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11), felony murder (kidnapping) (count 12), possession of a firearm for an unlawful
purpose (count 13), and unlawful possession of a firearm (count 14).
Holmes elected to go to trial on the charges. Holmes was acquitted of counts 2, 5,
6, 8, 9, 12, 13, and 14—murder, conspiracy, all three felony murder counts, and the two
counts of unlawful possession of a firearm. The jury could not reach a unanimous verdict
on the remaining counts of robbery, burglary, and kidnapping (counts 3, 4, 7, 10, and 11).
The prosecution sought to re-try Holmes on the five remaining counts. Holmes
moved to dismiss the indictment, pursuant to the Double Jeopardy Clause, but his motion
was denied. At the second jury trial, Holmes was convicted on all five remaining counts.
The trial court imposed an aggregate sentence of thirty-five years. Holmes, with the
assistance of counsel, filed a state appeal.
On direct appeal, the Appellate Division affirmed Holmes’s conviction. Holmes
had raised several claims, one of which asserted that, under Blockburger v. United
States,† his Fifth Amendment right to be free from double jeopardy had been violated.
Holmes did not specifically invoke the collateral estoppel rule that is applied in criminal
cases.
The Appellate Division found that a hung jury trial, followed by a re-trial of the
remaining counts, was a continuation of the previous trial and was not a violation of the
Double Jeopardy Clause. It also summarily found that a collateral estoppel violation had
not occurred.
†

284 U.S. 299 (1932).
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Holmes’s request for certification of his appeal was denied by the New Jersey
Supreme Court on February 5, 2008. Holmes did not file a writ of certiorari with the
Supreme Court. His petition for state post-conviction relief was denied by the state trial
court without an evidentiary hearing, which was affirmed by the Appellate Division. The
New Jersey Supreme Court denied certification on March 16, 2011.
Holmes then filed a pro se petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C.
§ 2254 with the District Court. He asserted eleven claims in his petition but did not raise
the collateral estoppel claim until his reply brief. Holmes also requested that the first jury
trial transcript be added to the record and that he be afforded an evidentiary hearing. The
District Court rejected all of his claims and his evidentiary requests. However, the
District Court did not review the collateral estoppel claim.
Holmes filed a pro se appeal and a request for a certificate of appealability. This
Court granted his request and appellate counsel was appointed. Holmes’s appellate brief
has one focus: the collateral estoppel rule.
II.
The District Court had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). This Court
has appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and 28 U.S.C. § 2253(a).
A district court’s denial of habeas corpus based on the state court record, where an
evidentiary hearing is not held, is subject to plenary review.‡ Its factual findings are

‡

Fahy v. Horn, 516 F.3d 169, 179 (3d Cir. 2008).
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reviewed for clear error.§ If a habeas claim was adjudicated on the merits in state court,
the district court and this Court review whether the state court resolution was contrary to,
or an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law.**
III.
Before reaching the merits, we must ensure that Holmes has satisfactorily
exhausted his collateral estoppel claim. If Holmes failed to exhaust it, we will not reach
the merits of his claim.
The parties disagree as to whether Holmes’s collateral estoppel claim was
preserved. While Holmes conducted a Blockburger analysis in his Appellate Division
brief, he did not specifically raise the collateral estoppel issue. Moreover, he did not
include the first jury trial transcript in the state court record. Nevertheless, the Appellate
Division mentioned the collateral estoppel issue in passing, finding that “[t]here was no
double jeopardy and no collateral estoppel [violations].”†† The court then cited an
Appellate Division case, New Jersey v. Triano,‡‡ in support of its conclusion. Holmes
now urges us to find exhaustion on the basis of this one line in the Appellate Division’s
decision. He argues that the inclusion of that line indicates that he sufficiently exhausted
the collateral estoppel issue. We disagree.

§

Rolan v. Vaughn, 445 F.3d 671, 677 (3d Cir. 2006).
28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1).
††
Supp. App. 1817.
‡‡
371 A.2d 734 (N.J. Super. Ct. App. Div. 1974).
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**

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After Holmes had finished his direct appeal and state post-conviction relief bids,
he filed a § 2254 petition with the District Court. He alleged in his reply brief, for the first
time, that his re-trial was a violation of the collateral estoppel rule. Further, he sought to
include the first trial transcript in the record but his request was denied.
A claim raised under § 2254
must have been “fairly presented” to the state courts, i.e., it must be the
substantial equivalent of that presented to the state courts. In addition the
state court must have available to it the same method of legal analysis as
that to be employed in federal court.§§
Holmes has the burden to prove that he has met this requirement.***
In order to determine whether the state courts had the substantial equivalent
presented to them, an understanding of Holmes’s claims is required. The claim that we
review for exhaustion here is one that rests under the Fifth Amendment’s Double
Jeopardy Clause. The Clause “protects against a second prosecution for the same offense
after acquittal, a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction, and multiple
punishments for the same offense.”†††
The test for determining whether two offenses are sufficiently distinguishable to
permit cumulative punishment is set forth in Blockburger. Under the Blockburger test,
this Court must ensure that an accused is not convicted of two offenses that have the

§§

Werts v. Vaughn, 228 F.3d 178, 192 (3d Cir. 2000) (quoting Lambert v.
Blackwell, 134 F.3d 506, 513 (3d Cir. 1997)).
***
Id.
†††
Dep't of Revenue of Mont. v. Kurth Ranch, 511 U.S. 767, 769 n.1 (1994).
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same elements, each offense must have an additional fact that the other does not.‡‡‡ If the
two offenses do not each have an additional fact, prosecution of both offenses is
prohibited because it may lead to successive prosecutions or cumulative punishment.§§§
The federal collateral estoppel rule also falls under the Clause’s protection and is
encompassed in Ashe v. Swenson.**** The collateral estoppel rule “protects the accused
from attempts to relitigate the facts underlying a prior acquittal . . . .”†††† Thus, “an issue
of ultimate fact [that] has once been determined by a valid and final judgment [of
acquittal], . . . cannot again be litigated between the same parties in any future
[proceeding].”‡‡‡‡ Specifically, where a general verdict is received, as is the case here,
this Court must review the “pleadings, evidence, charge, and other relevant matter, and
conclude whether a rational jury could have grounded its verdict upon an issue other than
that which the defendant seeks to foreclose from consideration.”§§§§
Based on this record, the exhaustion requirement has not been met. The exhaustion
requirement is based in principles of comity and is not jurisdictional. Where a state court
has only considered a claim based on state law because a federal claim was not asserted
before it, this Court will find that the claim has not been exhausted.***** In contrast, if a

‡‡‡

Blockburger, 284 U.S. at 304.
Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 166 (1977).
****
397 U.S. 436 (1970).
††††
Brown, 432 U.S. at 165.
‡‡‡‡
Ashe, 397 U.S. at 443.
§§§§
Id. at 444.
*****
Robinson v. Beard, 762 F.3d 316, 329 (3d Cir. 2014).
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petitioner raises a straightforward claim that is judged by the same standard under both
state and federal law, we may proceed.†††††
The collateral estoppel issue was not considered by the state court. Holmes did not
raise the collateral estoppel claim in his Appellate Division brief. But, the Appellate
Division stated cursorily that there was no collateral estoppel violation. The Appellate
Division cited Triano,‡‡‡‡‡ a New Jersey case, in undertaking its short analysis. Triano
does not undertake the same collateral estoppel analysis as in Ashe and does not parallel
the federal standard. The court in Triano did not do a factual comparison of the first jury
trial versus the second. Rather, Triano parallels the reasoning in Richardson v. United
States,§§§§§ and holds that, where a defendant is acquitted of some counts but the jury is
unable to unanimously agree on other counts at a first trial, a second trial may be held if
based on the same indictment because that is a continuing jeopardy rather than double
jeopardy. Triano is not equivalent to Ashe.
Holmes has failed to exhaust his collateral estoppel claim because he failed to
properly allege the collateral estoppel claim in state court. Although the Appellate
Division considered the claim briefly, it relied on a legally different state court case—
Triano. Accordingly, the collateral estoppel claim was not properly presented to the state
courts, and Holmes has failed to properly exhaust his claim.

†††††

Id.
371 A.2d 734.
§§§§§
468 U.S. 317, 325 (1984).
‡‡‡‡‡

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IV.
For the reasons set forth above, we will affirm.

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