Baker v. Blades

Filing 21

MEMORANDUM DECISION & ORDER The Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus (Dkt. 3 ) is DENIED, and this entire action is DISMISSED with prejudice. Signed by Judge Ronald E. Bush. (caused to be mailed to non Registered Participants at the addresses listed on the Notice of Electronic Filing (NEF) by (jp)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF IDAHO

JOHN KIM BAKER,
Case No. 1:18-cv-00010-REB
Petitioner,
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND
ORDER

v.
RANDY BLADES,
Respondent.

Pending before the Court is a Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus filed by Idaho
state prisoner John Kim Baker (“Petitioner” or “Baker”). The Petition challenges
Petitioner’s Ada County conviction of felony eluding, including a persistent violator
enhancement. Dkt. 3. The Petition is now fully briefed and ripe for adjudication. The
Court takes judicial notice of the records from Petitioner’s state court proceedings, which
have been lodged by Respondent. Dkt. 13; see Fed. R. Evid. 201(b); Dawson v. Mahoney,
451 F.3d 550, 551 n.1 (9th Cir. 2006).
All parties have consented to the jurisdiction of a United States Magistrate Judge
to conduct all proceedings in this case in accordance with 28 U.S.C. § 636(c) and Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 73. See Dkt. 12. Having carefully reviewed the record in this
matter, including the state court record, the Court concludes that oral argument is
unnecessary. See D. Idaho L. Civ. R. 7.1(d). Accordingly, the Court enters the following
Order denying habeas corpus relief.
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 1

BACKGROUND
Absent clear and convincing evidence to the contrary, see 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1),
the following facts of Petitioner’s case, as described by the Idaho Court of Appeals, are
presumed correct:
At 12:03 a.m. on March 31, 2015, Ada County dispatch
advised of an attempt to locate a vehicle regarding a possible
aggravated assault with a firearm incident that occurred at a
hotel located in Boise. Five minutes later, three Ada County
Sheriff deputies were en route to assist. Boise Police officers
were en route at the same time to investigate the claim of the
aggravated assault. One of the deputies located a vehicle,
driven by Baker and matching the description of the suspect
vehicle, at a drive-thru of a restaurant. The deputy pulled
behind Baker after he left the drive-thru and engaged his
overhead lights. The deputy testified that the suspect vehicle
then fled, attempting to elude. Thereafter, a chase ensued
through two large store parking lots, twice around a hotel, and
then back to the store parking lots. During this time, the
deputy’s flashing overhead lights were on as well as the
deputy’s auxiliary front, back, and side lights. Baker then
drove through the parking lot of a strip mall, over a curb, and
started driving east in the westbound lanes of Overland Road.
Baker eventually corrected into the eastbound lanes, turned
south on Cole Road, and entered the freeway. Both Ada
County Sheriff’s office and Boise Police units were involved
in the pursuit with their lights and sirens on. The deputy in the
lead position testified that Baker was driving between 110
and 120 miles per hour in an area where the speed limit was
65 miles per hour. The pursuit was terminated at 12:19 a.m.
Prior to this, the deputy had requested assistance from the
Elmore County Sheriff’s office to deploy spike strips in the
area near the Ada and Elmore County line. However, because
the pursuit was terminated prior to the arrival of the deputies
from Elmore County, the Elmore County deputies did not
deploy spike strips and instead returned to cover I-84 Exits 90
and 95, because there was some concern Baker would try to
enter Mountain Home through one of these exits. While
positioned at the exits, there was some testimony that the
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 2

deputies’ lights may have been deployed, though none of the
officers saw Baker’s vehicle while waiting at the exits, and
they thereafter resumed their normal patrol activities at about
1:00 a.m.
At approximately 2:30 a.m. Elmore County dispatch advised
that Baker was reported to be in Elmore County and had
made phone calls stating he was going to provoke an incident
with officers so that they would shoot him. A sergeant that
had previously covered Exit 95 started to travel west on I-84
as dispatch advised that Baker was traveling eastbound in the
westbound lanes of I-84. The sergeant located the vehicle and
made a U-turn and deployed his emergency lights while
following Baker. Baker turned his headlights on and off to
acknowledge the sergeant. The sergeant testified that when he
approached with his emergency lights on, Baker fled
eastbound on I-84. Baker traveled between thirty-five and
forty miles per hour, significantly lower than the posted speed
limit of eighty miles per hour. The sergeant pursued Baker
with his lights and siren on; however, Baker did not stop.
Spike strips were deployed and approximately two miles after
Baker’s vehicle was disabled by the spike strips, he was
arrested ….
State’s Lodging B-4 at 1–2.
Petitioner was charged with misdemeanor eluding a peace officer in Elmore
County. He pleaded guilty to that charge and was sentenced to sixty days in jail. Id. at 2–
3.
Petitioner was later charged, in Ada County, with felony eluding—the charge
challenged in the instant petition. Petitioner moved to dismiss, arguing that the
prosecution in Ada County violated the Double Jeopardy Clause because Petitioner had
been charged with the same offense in Elmore County. The trial court denied the motion.
Petitioner pleaded guilty, to both the eluding charge and a persistent violator
enhancement, but he reserved the right to appeal the denial of the motion to dismiss.
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 3

Petitioner was sentenced to a unified term of ten years in prison with two years fixed. Id.
at 3. The Idaho Court of Appeals affirmed, and the Idaho Supreme Court denied review.
Id. at 3–5; State’s Lodging B-7.
In his federal Petition, Petitioner asserts a single claim: that his felony eluding
conviction in Ada County violates the Double Jeopardy Clause because Petitioner was
charged and convicted of misdemeanor eluding in Elmore County. Petitioner contends
that his avoidance of the police in the early morning hours of March 31, 2015, constituted
“one continuing event” in which he intended “to elude police for the entire three hour
time frame.” Dkt. 3 at 3–10. Therefore, Petitioner argues, he committed a single offense
and could not constitutionally be convicted of two different eluding offenses.
HABEAS CORPUS STANDARD OF LAW
A federal court may grant habeas corpus relief when it determines that the
petitioner “is in custody in violation of the Constitution or laws or treaties of the United
States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a). If the state court has adjudicated a claim on the merits,
habeas relief is further limited by § 2254(d), as amended by the Anti-terrorism and
Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”). Under AEDPA, federal habeas relief
may be granted only where the state court’s adjudication of the petitioner’s claim:
(1)

resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or
involved an unreasonable application of, clearly
established Federal law, as determined by the
Supreme Court of the United States; or

(2)

resulted in a decision that was based on an
unreasonable determination of the facts in light
of the evidence presented in the State court
proceeding.

MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 4

28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). “Deciding whether a state court’s decision involved an
unreasonable application of federal law or was based on an unreasonable determination
of fact requires the federal habeas court to train its attention on the particular reasons—
both legal and factual—why state courts rejected a state prisoner’s federal claims and to
give appropriate deference to that decision.” Wilson v. Sellers, 138 S. Ct. 1188, 1191-92
(2018) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).
When a party contests the state court’s legal conclusions, including application of
the law to the facts, § 2254(d)(1) governs. That section consists of two alternative tests:
the “contrary to” test and the “unreasonable application” test.
Under the first test, a state court’s decision is “contrary to” clearly established
federal law “if the state court applies a rule different from the governing law set forth in
[the Supreme Court’s] cases, or if it decides a case differently than [the Supreme Court]
[has] done on a set of materially indistinguishable facts.” Bell v. Cone, 535 U.S. 685, 694
(2002). Under the second test, to satisfy the “unreasonable application” clause of
§ 2254(d)(1), the petitioner must show that the state court—although identifying “the
correct governing legal rule” from Supreme Court precedent—nonetheless “unreasonably
applie[d] it to the facts of the particular state prisoner’s case.” Williams (Terry) v. Taylor,
529 U.S. 362, 407 (2000). “Section 2254(d)(1) provides a remedy for instances in which
a state court unreasonably applies [Supreme Court] precedent; it does not require state
courts to extend that precedent or license federal courts to treat the failure to do so as
error.” White v. Woodall, 134 S. Ct. 1697, 1706 (2014) (emphasis omitted).
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 5

A federal court cannot grant habeas relief simply because it concludes in its
independent judgment that the state court’s decision is incorrect or wrong; rather, the
state court’s application of federal law must be objectively unreasonable to warrant relief.
Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U.S. 63, 75 (2003); Bell, 535 U.S. at 694. If there is any
possibility that fair-minded jurists could disagree on the correctness of the state court’s
decision, then relief is not warranted under § 2254(d)(1). Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S.
86, 102 (2011). The Supreme Court has emphasized that “even a strong case for relief
does not mean the state court’s contrary conclusion was unreasonable.” Id. To be entitled
to habeas relief under § 2254(d)(1), “a state prisoner must show that the state court’s
ruling on the claim being presented in federal court was so lacking in justification that
there was an error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any
possibility for fairminded disagreement.” Id. at 103.
The source of clearly established federal law must come only from the holdings of
the United States Supreme Court. Although circuit precedent may be persuasive authority
for determining whether a state court decision is an unreasonable application of Supreme
Court precedent, Duhaime v. Ducharme, 200 F.3d 597, 600-01 (9th Cir. 2000), circuit
law may not be used “to refine or sharpen a general principle of Supreme Court
jurisprudence into a specific legal rule that th[e] Court has not announced,” Marshall v.
Rodgers, 569 U.S. 58, 64 (2013).
“[R]eview under § 2254(d)(1) is limited to the record that was before the state
court that adjudicated the claim on the merits.” Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S. 170, 180
(2011). Therefore, evidence that was not presented to the state court cannot be introduced
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 6

on federal habeas review if a claim was adjudicated on the merits in state court and if the
underlying factual determinations of the state court were reasonable. See Murray v.
Schriro, 745 F.3d 984, 999-1000 (9th Cir. 2014) (“After Pinholster, a federal habeas
court may consider new evidence only on de novo review, subject to the limitations of
§ 2254(e)(2).”); Hurles v. Ryan, 752 F.3d 768, 778 (9th Cir. 2014) (“If we determine,
considering only the evidence before the state court, that the adjudication of a claim on
the merits ... was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts, we evaluate the
claim de novo, and we may consider evidence properly presented for the first time in
federal court.”).
To be eligible for relief under § 2254(d)(2), the petitioner must show that the state
court decision was based upon factual determinations that were “unreasonable ... in light
of the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” A “state-court factual
determination is not unreasonable merely because the federal habeas court would have
reached a different conclusion in the first instance.” Wood v. Allen, 558 U.S. 290, 301
(2010); see also Schriro v. Landrigan, 550 U.S. 465, 473 (2007) (“The question under
AEDPA is not whether a federal court believes the state court’s determination was
incorrect but whether that determination was unreasonable—a substantially higher
threshold.”). State court factual findings are presumed to be correct and are binding on
the federal court unless the petitioner rebuts this presumption by clear and convincing
evidence. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1).
If a petitioner satisfies § 2254(d)—either by showing that the state court’s
adjudication of the claim was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of Supreme
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 7

Court precedent or by establishing that the state court’s factual findings were
unreasonable—then the federal habeas court must review the petitioner’s claim de novo,
meaning without deference to the state court’s decision. Hurles, 752 F.3d at 778.
When considering a habeas claim de novo, a district court may, as in the preAEDPA era, draw from both United States Supreme Court and well as circuit precedent,
limited only by the non-retroactivity rule of Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989). Even
under de novo review, however, if the factual findings of the state court are not
unreasonable under § 2254(d)(2), the Court must apply the presumption of correctness
found in 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1) to any facts found by the state courts. Pirtle, 313 F.3d at
1167-68. Conversely, if a state court factual determination is unreasonable, the federal
court is not limited by § 2254(e)(1) and may consider evidence outside the state court
record, except to the extent that § 2254(e)(2) might apply. Murray v. Schriro, 745 F.3d at
1000.
DISCUSSION
1.

Clearly Established Law
The Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment includes three basic

protections: it protects a defendant from (1) “a second prosecution for the same offense
after acquittal,” (2) “a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction”, and (3)
“multiple punishments for the same offense.” Ohio v. Johnson, 467 U.S. 493, 498 (1984).
This case involves the third protection. Petitioner claims that he could not have been
convicted of the felony eluding charge in Ada County—in addition to the misdemeanor
eluding charge in Elmore County—because his eluding conduct in both counties was part
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 8

of the same course of conduct and, therefore, constituted a single offense prohibiting
multiple punishments.
Because the protection against cumulative punishments “is designed to ensure that
the sentencing discretion of courts is confined to the limits established by the legislature,”
the question “whether punishments are ‘multiple’ is essentially one of legislative intent.”
Johnson, 467 U.S. at 499. That is, “the Double Jeopardy Clause does no more than
prevent the sentencing court from prescribing greater punishment than the legislature
intended.” Missouri v. Hunter, 459 U.S. 359, 366 (1983). The Clause is not implicated if
the legislature intended to impose multiple or cumulative punishments. Id. at 367–68.
Additionally, “[w]hether a particular course of conduct involves one or more
distinct offenses under the statute depends on [legislative] choice.” Sanabria v. United
States, 437 U.S. 54, 70 (1978). Thus, it is Idaho law that defines whether Petitioner’s
conduct in Ada and Elmore Counties constituted the same offense—which would
implicate double jeopardy—or two separate offenses—which would not.
2.

State Court Decision
The Idaho Court of Appeals rejected Petitioner’s double jeopardy claim, holding

that Petitioner’s conduct in Ada County and his conduct in Elmore County constituted
two separate eluding offenses. The court’s reasoning was based on the fact that “the two
charges did not arise from the same factual circumstance such that one offense was the
means by which the other was committed”:
In Ada County, Baker was traveling between 110 and 120
miles per hour, well over the posted speed limit of 65 miles
per hour, resulting in the charge being elevated to a felony.
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 9

The high speed chase in Ada County ended at 12:19 a.m. and
both the Ada County Sheriff's office and Boise Police
terminated the pursuit while still in Ada County.
Thereafter, the Elmore County Sheriff's deputies covered
Interstate Exits 90 and 95; however, they resumed their
normal patrol activities at about 1:00 a.m. since they did not
see Baker from these locations. It was not until 2:30 a.m. that
the Elmore County dispatch advised that Baker was traveling
in the area, and his vehicle was located and pursued by the
sergeant who deployed his emergency lights while behind
Baker. Then a separate eluding incident began, as Baker fled
from the pursuing sergeant at a speed significantly lower than
the posted speed limit before his vehicle was disabled by
spike strips and he was arrested.
Therefore, between 1:00 a.m. and 2:30 a.m., there was no
contact between any law enforcement agency and Baker's
vehicle. Baker was not eluding during this significant time
period since the statute for both misdemeanor and felony
eluding require a pursuing police officer and a visual or
audible signal to stop, both of which were absent. I.C. §§ 491401(1), 49-1401(2). In fact, his conduct was unknown to
officers during this time frame. Consequently, the first offense
that resulted in the felony charge of eluding started when the
officer turned on his lights and siren in Ada County and a
high speed chase ensued and ended when police terminated
the pursuit and resumed normal patrol activities. The second
offense that resulted in the misdemeanor charge of eluding
started in Elmore County when the sergeant turned on his
lights and Baker fled at a low speed.
State’s Lodging B-4 at 4–5 (emphasis added).
The court of appeals acknowledged Petitioner’s argument that—from his
perspective—the incidents should be treated as a single offense because he was
continually attempting to elude detection the entire time. However, the court upheld the
trial judge’s finding that Petitioner’s alleged perspective was “not a reasonable or
objective view of what was happening out there.” Id. at 4.
MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 10

As a result, the state court determined that the two charges were “separate and
independent offenses” and that, therefore, “the charges did not violate Baker’s rights
against double jeopardy.” Id. at 5.
3.

The Idaho Court of Appeals Reasonably Rejected Petitioner’s Double
Jeopardy Claim
Petitioner has not established that the decision of the Idaho Court of Appeals was

unreasonable under § 2254(d)(1) or (d)(2). As an initial matter, this Court cannot review
the state court’s interpretation that the two charges resulted from separate, independent
offenses. That is an interpretation of Idaho state law by which this Court is bound. See
Estelle v. McGuire, 502 U.S. 62, 67–68, (1991) (“[I]t is not the province of a federal
habeas court to reexamine state-court determinations on state-law questions. In
conducting habeas review, a federal court is limited to deciding whether a conviction
violated the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States.”); Sanabria, 437 U.S. at
70 (“Whether a particular course of conduct involves one or more distinct offenses under
the statute depends on this congressional choice.”).
Moreover, the Court has found no United States Supreme Court precedent that
prohibits a state from treating conduct like Petitioner’s as two separate offenses for
purposes of double jeopardy. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1).
Finally, the state court found, as a factual matter, that Petitioner’s purported belief
that his course of conduct constituted a single, ongoing offense—rather than two separate
eluding offenses—was unreasonable. That finding is not unreasonable under
§ 2254(d)(2), particularly given that there was no law enforcement contact with Petitioner

MEMORANDUM DECISION AND ORDER - 11

for approximately an hour-and-a-half. Accordingly, the Idaho Court of Appeals
reasonably rejected Petitioner’s double jeopardy claim.
CONCLUSION
The Court concludes that the state court’s rejection of Petitioner’s claim was not
contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established Supreme Court
precedent, nor was it based on an unreasonable determination of the facts. See 28 U.S.C.
§ 2254(d). Therefore, Petitioner is not entitled to habeas relief under AEDPA.
ORDER
IT IS ORDERED:
1.

The Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus (Dkt. 3) is DENIED, and this entire
action is DISMISSED with prejudice.

2.

The Court does not find its resolution of this habeas matter to be reasonably
debatable, and a certificate of appealability will not issue. See 28 U.S.C.
§ 2253(c); Rule 11 of the Rules Governing Section 2254 Cases. If
Petitioner wishes to appeal, he must file a timely notice of appeal with the
Clerk of Court. Petitioner may seek a certificate of appealability from the
Ninth Circuit by filing a request in that court.

DATED: December 23, 2019
_________________________
Ronald E. Bush
Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge

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