Chester v. Vannoy et al

Filing 52

ORDER AND REASONS - IT IS ORDERED that Teddy Chester's petition for a writ of habeas corpus be and hereby is GRANTED. IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that within 120 days of this Order, the State of Louisiana either retry Teddy Chester or set him free. Signed by Judge Susie Morgan on 6/11/2018. (Attachments: # 1 Appendix I)(sa) (Additional attachment(s) added on 6/12/2018: # 2 Certified Mail Receipts) (sa).

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA
TEDDY CHESTER, #359559

CIVIL ACTION

VERSUS

NO. 16-17754

DARREL VANNOY

SECTION “E”
ORDER & REASONS

Before the Court is a Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus filed by Petitioner Teddy
Chester. 1 Chester was indicted by a Jefferson Parish, Louisiana grand jury on April 25,
1996 for the murder of John Adams. On May 14, 1997, after a two-day trial, the jury found
Chester guilty of first degree murder. On May 16, 1997, the jury recommended a sentence
of death. Chester unsuccessfully challenged his conviction and sentence in the state
courts. 2 Having exhausted all avenues of relief in the state system, Chester filed a federal
petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d), raising thirty-two claims
for relief. For the reasons that follow, the Court grants the writ and orders the State of
Louisiana to either retry Chester or release him from state custody within 120 days. 3
BACKGROUND
During the guilt phase of Chester’s trial, the State theorized that in the early
morning of December 27, 1995, between 4:00 and 5:00 a.m., then 18-year-old Teddy
R. Doc. 1. This Order refers to documents on this Court’s CM/ECF docket as “R. Doc. [#]” and refers to
documents on the record before the Louisiana Supreme Court as “R. [#],” which consists of a paper docket
only. For reference, the paper docket is split into twenty-six volumes; the bottom right corner of each page
in the first eight volumes has been marked for citation purposes—these are the numbers to which “R. [#]”
refers. For documents on the paper record that have not been repaginated but are cited to by this Court, the
Court attaches those documents to this opinion as Appendix I.
2 See State v. Chester (Chester I), 97-2790 (La. 12/1/98), 724 So. 2d 1276 (affirming conviction and death
sentence on direct appeal); State v. Chester (Chester II), 2015-2304 (La. 12/16/16), 208 So. 3d 338 (denying
application for post-conviction relief).
3 Fed. R. App. P. 23(c); See Hilton v. Braunskill, 481 U.S. 770, 774 (1987) (“Rule 23(c) undoubtedly creates
a presumption of release from custody in [successful habeas] cases . . . .”); Waiters v. Lee, 168 F. Supp. 3d
447, 451 & n.5 (E.D.N.Y. 2016).
1

1

Chester was attempting to sell fake drugs known as “bunk” on Calhoun Street in Kenner,
Louisiana, an area known for drug trafficking. Meanwhile, 25-year-old Elbert “Feller”
Ratcliff was also on Calhoun Street. 4 Ratcliff was attempting to sell a Guess t-shirt, which
he was carrying in a plastic shopping bag, when a cab driven by Adams came to a stop on
Calhoun Street. The State asserted that Chester and Ratcliff approached the cab, and
Chester got in the rear driver’s side seat. According to the State, after Adams refused to
buy anything from them, Chester pointed a gun at Adams, demanding money. The State
alleged that, when the cab began to accelerate forward, Chester shot Adams in the back of
the head, killing him instantly.
Crime scene investigators discovered a bloody plastic bag containing a Guess tshirt hanging from the inside of the rear driver’s side door and fingerprints on several of
Adams’ business cards, which had been strewn about the front driver’s side floorboard.
Although the money pouch Adams kept around his neck was missing, Adams had $284.64
elsewhere on his person. 5 A forensic analysis revealed the fingerprints on the business
cards were Ratcliff’s, which led the police to him. 6 Once in custody, Ratcliff told the police
that Chester shot Adams. The police then apprehended Chester. Chester told the police
he had been in the back passenger side of the cab and that it was Ratcliff who shot Adams.
Several weeks later, the police conducted a search of Chester’s home, recovering a
pair of jeans and a Raiders baseball cap with two drops of blood on it: one on the bill and

Throughout the trial and during the pre-trial investigation, witnesses discuss “Fella,” “Feller,” and
“Fellow,” all of which refer to Ratcliff.
5 R. 1349.
6 Angela Horton informed the police that a man called “Feller,” one of Ratcliff’s nicknames, committed the
murder. Based on this information, the police compared the fingerprints found on Adams’ business cards
to Ratcliff’s fingerprints, finding a match. See R. Doc. 1-1 at 131–32. Horton did not testify at trial.
4

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one on the inside of the cap. 7 The State’s forensic expert concluded that the DNA on the
cap was a mixture of blood contributed by multiple people, and that Chester and Adams
could not be excluded as contributors to the mixture. Ratcliff’s blood was not tested. The
State’s DNA testing on the cap consumed the entire sample, and no independent
evaluation of the State’s results could be conducted.
Although there were reddish-brown transfer stains on Chester’s jeans, the crime
laboratory’s testing of the jeans revealed there was no blood on them. The State conducted
a search of Ratcliff’s home, but discovered no evidence and did not recover the clothes
Ratcliff was wearing the night of the murder.
At trial, among other witnesses, 8 the Government presented the testimony of
forensic investigator Mark Goldman, Sergeant Dennis Thornton, Quinice Pollard, 9 and
Kaprice Pollard. Goldman testified that he did not see any blood spatter present on the
rear passenger side of the vehicle. Sergeant Thornton testified that, in his experience as a
police officer, blood spatter from a gunshot wound “blows back” in the direction from
which it is fired. A stipulation was read to the jury that the blood found on the Raiders

The State’s DNA analyst described the blood found on the cap as “very small . . . portions . . . very tiny
spatters of blood present on the cap.” R. 370. Additionally, the exact location of the blood cannot be
determined, as the cap was destroyed, and neither the crime lab, nor the DNA lab photographed the cap.
8 In addition to Goldman, Sergeant Thornton, and the Pollard sisters, the State called: (1) Hazel Adams, the
victim’s mother, who testified about Adams’ good character and that he usually wore a money pouch around
his neck, R. 1321–25; (2) Fraser Mackenzie, a physician who does autopsies for the Jefferson Parish
Coroner’s Office, who testified the victim died of a gunshot wound to the head, R. 1326–32; (3) Deputy
Robert Murphy, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s deputy who first arrived on the murder scene, who testified
he “didn’t notice any blood” in the back passenger side of the cab, R. 1332–42; (4) Deputy Steven Hymel,
the second officer to arrive on the scene, who testified that it was apparent Adams had been shot in the
head, R. 1342–46; (5) Deputy William Vieira, a crime scene technician, who testified that he took
photographs and recovered evidence from the scene, R. 1355–59; (6) Thomas Victory, the general manager
of the King Cab Company, who testified that Adams’ cab was dispatched to 713 Calhoun Street at 4:03 a.m.,
R. 1363, and that the cab was released back to the cab company the day after the murder occurred, id.; (7)
Deputy Vincent Bosco, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s deputy dispatched to Kaprice Pollard’s house after
Chester refused to leave, resulting in Chester’s arrest, R. 1384–97; and (8) Detective Ralph Sacks, who was
the primary investigator in Adams’ murder, R. 1513–73.
9 The record contains various spellings of Quinice’s name. Consistent with the Louisiana Supreme Court’s
opinion, this Court spells Ms. Pollard’s name “Quinice.”
7

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cap “was determined to consist of a combination of [Chester’s] DNA and the victim’s
DNA.” 10
The State argued Goldman’s and Sergeant Thornton’s testimony along with the
presence of Adams’ blood on Chester’s cap proved Chester was the shooter. They adduced
that, if Chester had blood spatter on him, he must have been in the rear driver’s side of
the cab, where the shooter was, when the gun was fired.
With respect to the Pollard sisters’ testimony, Quinice testified that Chester had
confessed to her that he shot Adams. On cross-examination, defense counsel impeached
Quinice, pointing out that, up until two weeks before the trial, Quinice had maintained
that on the night of the shooting Chester told her Ratcliff shot Adams. Kaprice testified
that she overheard Chester’s confession to Quinice on the night of the shooting.
The defense rested after presenting a single witness, Chester’s brother, Darren
Chester. Darren testified that Quinice was at his apartment the night of December 26, that
Kaprice was not there that night, and that Chester had not mentioned Adams’ murder to
him when Chester came home the next morning. On cross-examination, however, the
following exchange took place:
Q: [Y]ou don’t know if the night that you just talked about is the same night
the cab driver was murdered at all; do you?
A: No, sir. . . .
Q: So we might be talking about two different nights completely; correct?
A: It’s probable. . . .
Q: [W]hen was the first time you were asked to remember that December
night?
A: It was like about two weeks ago probably. 11
After over four hours of deliberation, the jury returned a verdict of guilty.

R. 1297, 1306. As a result of the stipulation, the State’s DNA expert did not testify at trial. R. 1296–97.
R. 1602, 1605. Two weeks prior to trial, May 1, 1997, was approximately four months after the murder
took place on December 27, 1996.

10
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During the punishment phase, Defense counsel offered evidence of Chester’s
mental impairments and volatile family history as mitigating evidence. The prosecution
argued Chester knew right from wrong and presented the testimony of Adams’s parents,
both of whom spoke of the victim’s good character.
On May 16, 1997, the jury recommended a sentence of death. 12
ANALYSIS
In his habeas petition, Chester raises thirty-two claims of for relief. 13 Each of
Chester’s claims, and the appropriate standard of review, must be examined separately.
LEGAL STANDARD
Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”), a
federal habeas court may not grant a state prisoner’s application for a writ of habeas
corpus with respect to claims adjudicated on the merits in state court unless the state
court adjudication resulted in a decision that was: (1) contrary to, or involved an
unreasonable application of clearly established Federal law, as determined by the U.S.
Supreme Court; or (2) based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the
evidence presented in the state court proceeding. 14 The state court’s findings of fact are
entitled to a presumption of correctness, rebuttable only by clear and convincing
evidence. 15
Courts have held that the “‘contrary to’ and ‘unreasonable application’ clauses [of
§ 2254(d)(1)] have independent meaning.” 16 Regarding the “contrary to” clause, the Fifth
Circuit has explained:
R. 225.
See R. Doc. 1 at 2–6.
14 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
15 See § 2254(e)(1).
16 Bell v. Cone, 535 U.S. 685, 694 (2002) (quoting Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 404–05 (2000)).
12
13

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A state court decision is contrary to clearly established precedent if the state
court applies a rule that contradicts the governing law set forth in the [U.S.]
Supreme Court’s cases. A state-court decision will also be contrary to clearly
established precedent if the state court confronts a set of facts that are
materially indistinguishable from a decision of the [U.S.] Supreme Court
and nevertheless arrives at a result different from [U.S.] Supreme Court
precedent. 17
Regarding the “unreasonable application” clause, the U.S. Supreme Court has held
that “a state-court decision is an unreasonable application of our clearly established
precedent if it correctly identifies the governing legal rule but applies that rule
unreasonably to the facts of a particular prisoner’s case.” 18 However, the Supreme Court
cautioned:
Section 2254(d)(1) provides a remedy for instances in which a state court
unreasonably applies this Court’s precedent; it does not require state courts
to extend that precedent or license federal courts to treat the failure to do so
as error. Thus, if a habeas court must extend a rationale before it can apply
to the facts at hand, then by definition the rationale was not clearly
established at the time of the state-court decision. AEDPA’s carefully
constructed framework would be undermined if habeas courts introduced
rules not clearly established under the guise of extensions to existing law. 19
As a result, when the Supreme Court’s “cases give no clear answer to the question
presented, let alone one in [the petitioner’s] favor, it cannot be said that the state court
unreasonably applied clearly established Federal law.” 20 The Supreme Court has also
expressly cautioned that “an unreasonable application is different from an incorrect

Wooten v. Thaler, 598 F.3d 215, 218 (5th Cir. 2010) (internal quotation marks, ellipses, brackets, and
footnotes omitted).
18 White v. Woodall, 134 S. Ct. 1697, 1706 (2014).
19 Id. (internal citations and quotation marks omitted).
20 Wright v. Van Patten, 552 U.S. 120, 126 (2008) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted).
17

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one.” 21 Accordingly, a state court’s merely incorrect application of Supreme Court
precedent does not warrant habeas relief. 22
I.

Chester’s Conflict of Interest Claim

Richie Thompson, the Chief Public Defender for the 24th Judicial District, and
Carol Kiff represented Ratcliff. Thompson assigned Chester’s case to two members of the
Jefferson Parish Indigent Defender Board (“IDB”), Graham da Ponte and Cesar Vasquez.
Chester contends that, while representing Ratcliff, Thompson continued to supervise da
Ponte and Vasquez in their representation of Chester. Chester argues that, therefore, all
the IDB lawyers labored under a conflict of interest. 23
According to Chester, at the time of his trial, the IDB attorneys shared secretarial
staff and investigators, frequently collaborated on cases, and shared computer databases,
printers, and photocopiers. Chester alleges the trial court was “put on notice” of this
conflict, but failed to appoint non-IDB counsel or seek a waiver of the conflict from
Chester, in violation of his right to conflict-free counsel under the Sixth and Fourteenth
Amendments. 24 Notably, Chester provided no evidence that the trial court was notified or
otherwise should have known of this alleged conflict of interest.25 Chester raised the issue
for the first time in his direct appeal of his conviction.

Bell, 535 U.S. at 694.
See, e.g., Puckett v. Epps, 641 F.3d 657, 663 (5th Cir. 2011) (“Importantly, ‘unreasonable’ is not the same
as ‘erroneous’ or ‘incorrect’; an incorrect application of the law by a state court will nonetheless be affirmed
if it is not simultaneously unreasonable.”).
23 R. Doc. 1 at 61.
24 Id.
25 To the extent Chester argues the trial court should have known of the potential conflict, “trial courts may
assume either that multiple representation entails no conflict or that the lawyer and his clients knowingly
accept such risk of conflict as may exist.” Cuyler v. Sullivan, 446 U.S. 335, 347 (1980); see also Mickens v.
Taylor, 535 U.S. 162, 192–93 (2002) (“[In Cuyler,] [t]his Court held that multiple representation did not
raise enough risk of impaired representation in a coming trial to trigger a trial court’s duty to enquire
further, in the absence of ‘special circumstances.’ The most obvious special circumstance would be an
objection. Indeed, because multiple representation was not suspect per se, and because counsel was in the
21

22

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Chester contends that “[a]s a result of this conflict,” his trial counsel “failed to
investigate or present ample evidence of Elbert Ratcliff’s culpability” by not: (1) testing
“physical evidence against Elbert Ratcliff’s DNA”; (2) “present[ing] known witnesses who
identified Elbert Ratcliff as the shooter”; and (3) “locat[ing] and present[ing] a witness
who observed Elbert Ratcliff fleeing the crime scene with a gun in his hands.” 26
In support of his argument, Chester points to Holloway v. Arkansas, 27 in which
the U.S. Supreme Court held that when the trial court is alerted to a potential conflict of
interest, its failure to “appoint separate counsel or to take adequate steps to ascertain
whether the risk was too remote to warrant separate counsel” deprives the defendant of
the guarantee of assistance of counsel. 28 When the trial court is made aware of a potential
conflict of interest, but does not take corrective action, “prejudice is presumed regardless
of whether it was independently shown.” 29 When a defendant raises the issue of a conflict
of interest after trial, however, he must establish that an “actual conflict” of interest
adversely affected his lawyer’s performance. 30
“An ‘actual conflict’ exists when defense counsel is compelled to compromise his
or her duty of loyalty or zealous advocacy to the accused by choosing between or blending
the divergent or competing interests of a former or current client.” 31 The “‘guiding
principle in this important area of Sixth Amendment jurisprudence’ . . . is whether
counsel’s allegiance to the accused was compromised by competing obligations owed to

best position to anticipate a risk of conflict, the Court spoke at one point as though nothing but an objection
would place a court on notice of a prospective conflict.” (Souter, J., dissenting) (internal citations omitted)).
26 R. Doc. 1 at 63–64.
27 435 U.S. 475 (1978).
28 Id. at 484.
29 Id. at 489.
30 Cuyler, 446 U.S. at 348–50.
31 Perillo v. Johnson, 205 F.3d 775, 781 (5th Cir. 2000) (citing Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 692
(1984)).

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other clients.” 32 In finding an actual conflict of interest existed, the ethical rules “may be
informative but are not determinative with respect to whether there is an actual conflict
for Sixth Amendment purposes.” 33 “Assuming the [petitioner] establishes an actual
conflict that adversely affected counsel’s performance, prejudice is presumed without any
further inquiry into the effect of the actual conflict on the outcome of the defendant’s
trial.” 34
The Louisiana Supreme Court found that “[Chester] did not raise the issue pretrial,” and, as a result, concluded that he must present evidence that his counsels’ “actual
conflict” of interest “adversely affected his lawyer’s [sic] performance” to be entitled to
relief. 35 With respect to Chester’s argument that his trial counsel’s representation met
both requirements, the Louisiana Supreme Court found “no merit to this contention.” 36
It reasoned,
Defendant contends that his court-appointed public defenders, Graham da
Ponte and Cesar Vasquez, labored under a conflict of interest because their
supervisor, Richie Thompson, represented Elbert Ratcliff, his codefendant. He argues that the decision of Mr. Thompson to appoint these
persons as counsel, neither of whom had tried a case in Jefferson Parish and
who were less skilled than he, implied that Mr. Thompson wished to
increase the chances for Thompson’s own client. He further argued that his
counsel were inexperienced. . . .

Id. at 798 (quoting United States v. Alvarez, 580 F.2d 1251, 1254 (5th Cir. 1978)).
Id. (citing Strickland, 466 U.S. at 688).
34 Id. at 781–82 (citing Strickland, 466 U.S. at 692; Cuyler, 446 U.S. at 349; Beets v. Scott, 65 F.3d 1258,
1265 (5th Cir. 1995) (en banc)); see also Perillo v. Johnson, 79 F.3d 441, 448 (5th Cir. 1996) (“While
Strickland requires a showing of actual prejudice, that is, that the result of the trial probably would have
been different, Cuyler merely requires that the petitioner show ‘adverse effect,’ a lower threshold. To prove
adverse effect, a petitioner need not show that the conflict changed the outcome of the trial.” (citing United
States v. Greig, 967 F.2d 1018, 1024 (5th Cir. 1992), Nealy, 782 F.2d at 1365); Mitchell v. Maggio, 679 F.2d
77, 79 (5th Cir. 1982) (“Once it has been established that an actual conflict exists, prejudice to the defendant
must be presumed.”)); Nealy v. Cabana, 782 F.2d 1362, 1365 (5th Cir. 1986) (“Adverse effect is not the
equivalent of prejudice, the reasonable probability of a different result, as the term “prejudice” is defined in
Strickland.” (citing Strickland, 466 U.S. at 692)).
35 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at I.
36 Id.
32
33

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Although defendant and Ratcliff had antagonistic defenses, they were not
tried together, thus eliminating an actual conflict of interest and any chance
of prejudice. A review of the record shows that Ms. Da Ponte had over ten
years[’] experience with mostly criminal cases and Mr. Vasquez had
between five and ten years[’] experience.” 37
The Louisiana Supreme Court’s factual findings are not clearly erroneous. In his
petition before this Court, Chester has not offered sufficient allegations that his trial
counsel labored under an “actual conflict.” 38 He offers no evidence Thompson had any
involvement in Chester’s representation, beyond the fact that Chester’s attorneys were
supervised by Thompson. 39 Moreover, in his petition to this Court, Chester’s arguments
focus primarily on his contention that the IDB is “a ‘firm,’ imputing each IDB attorney’s
conflict of interest to all IDB attorneys.” 40 Essentially, Chester argues that, because
Thompson had a conflict, and da Ponte and Vasquez were in the same “firm” as
Thompson, da Ponte and Vasquez could not represent him. As previously stated, although
such a claim might make out a violation of Louisiana’s Rules of Professional Conduct, 41

Id.
Therefore, the Court finds Chester is not entitled to an evidentiary hearing with respect to this claim. See
28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2) (allowing a federal district court to hold an evidentiary hearing if: (1) the petition’s
factual allegations, if true, would entitle the petitioner to relief; and (2) for reasons beyond the petitioner’s
control, the factual claims were not previously the subject of a full and fair hearing in the state court).
39 See Reynolds v. Chapman, 253 F.3d 1337, 1345 (11th Cir. 2001) (“The ultimate fact is that Reynolds
cannot identify any flaw in Hankins’s performance that was related to the fact that Hankins’s co-workers
represented [his co-defendants,] Harris and Thomas.”); see also Mickens v. Taylor, 535 U.S. 162, 171 (2002)
(explaining that “an actual conflict of interest” means “precisely a conflict that affected counsel’s
performance—as opposed to a mere theoretical division of loyalties”); Nealy, 782 F.2d at 1366 (“The lawyer
who represented both [defendants] was torn in his loyalty and unable to make a decision purely in the
interest of one client to whom he owed undivided allegiance.”).
40 R. Doc. 1 at 62.
41 See Louisiana Rules of Professional Conduct 1.10(a) (“While lawyers are associated in a firm, none of
them shall knowingly represent a client when any one of them practicing alone would be prohibited from
doing so by Rules 1.7 or 1.9, unless the prohibition is based on a personal interest of the prohibited lawyer
and does not present a significant risk of materially limiting the representation of the client by the
remaining lawyers in the firm.”); see cf. Cuyler, 446 U.S. at 348 (“Holloway reaffirmed that multiple
representation does not violate the Sixth Amendment unless it gives rise to a conflict of interest.” (citing
Holloway, 435 U.S. at 482)).
37

38

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the ethical rules “are not determinative with respect to whether there is an actual conflict
for Sixth Amendment purposes.” 42
The Louisiana Supreme Court’s discussion in State v. Garcia of what constitutes
an “actual” conflict is instructive. 43 In Garcia, three capital defendants were all
represented by the same indigent defender board, and the attorneys were supervised by
the same public defender, Jerome D’Aquila, who also served as lead counsel for the
defendant, Garcia. 44 The Louisiana Supreme Court found there was no conflict of interest,
reasoning that,
there was no actual conflict in the attorneys’ representation of defendant at
trial because none of these attorneys’ loyalties were divided. None of his
attorneys jointly represented other defendants to whom the attorneys owed
duties of loyalty. None of defendant’s counsel was called upon to crossexamine any of his former or current clients in the State’s prosecution,
mandating reversal. Nor were any of defendant’s attorneys called upon to
take some action, or prevented from taking some action, based on a loyalty
to another. Defendant was tried separately from his co-defendants. 45
The factual underpinnings of this case are strikingly similar. Although Chester’s trial
counsel were members of the same IDB board as Ratcliffs’ counsel and were supervised
by Ratcliff’s counsel, there is no evidence suggesting Chester’s counsel collaborated with
Ratcliff’s counsel in any way, that Chester’s counsel owed any loyalties to Ratcliff, or that
Thompson exercised any influence or control over Chester’s defense. 46

Perillo, 205 F.3d at 798 (citing Strickland, 466 U.S. at 688).
State v. Garcia, 09-1578 (La. 11/16/12), 108 So. 3d 1.
44 Id. at 13, 33–34.
45 Id. at 33.
46 In the Court’s estimation, as discussed in greater detail infra notes 262–358, the evidence Chester offers
of an actual conflict—that his trial counsel did not investigate the DNA sample found on Chester’s cap and
did not interview potential eye-witnesses that, had they been interviewed, would have implicated Ratcliff—
evinces counsel’s general ineffectiveness, not an effort to protect Ratcliff. For an example of a case finding
an actual conflict existed, see Glasser v. United States, 315 U.S. 60, 72–75 (1942) (finding defense counsel’s
failure to cross-examine a prosecution witness whose testimony linked the defendant with the crime and
failure to resist the presentation of arguably inadmissible evidence “resulted from” counsel’s desire to
diminish the jury’s perception of a codefendant’s guilt, and stating the evidence of counsel’s “struggle to
serve two masters [could not] seriously be doubted”). The Court notes, however, that the standard for
42
43

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In light of the fact that Chester did not raise this issue until his case was on appeal,
and the Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding that his trial counsel’s performance was not
adversely affected by an actual conflict of interest, the Court finds this assertion of error
lacks merit, as Chester has not offered clear and convincing evidence that such findings
were incorrect. 47
II.

Prosecutorial Misconduct

Chester next contends the prosecutors in his trial, Ronald Bodenheimer and
Michael Reynolds, engaged in prosecutorial misconduct leading up to and during the trial.
He argues the State violated: (1) Brady v. Maryland 48 by suppressing inconsistent
statements made by the Pollard sisters; 49 (2) Batson v. Kentucky 50 for striking the only
prospective black jurors from the jury venire; 51 (3) Napue v. Illinois 52 by “knowingly
allowing” the Pollard sisters to testify falsely; 53 (4) Arizona v. Youngblood 54 by destroying
potentially exculpatory evidence before the defense had the opportunity to inspect it; 55
and (5) Donnelly v. DeChristoforo 56 by making several misleading, prejudicial statements
throughout trial. 57

finding counsel’s performance was “adversely affected” by an actual conflict of interest is a lesser burden
than a finding of ineffective assistance. See Perillo, 205 F.3d at 781–82. Although the Court concludes
counsel’s performance was ineffective under the more stringent Strickland standard, it nevertheless denies
the writ with respect to Chester’s conflict of interest claim, as Chester has not shown that counsel’s
ineffectiveness was a product of an “actual conflict.”
47 See § 2254(e)(1).
48 383 U.S. 163 (1963).
49 R. Doc. 1 at 67.
50 476 U.S. 79 (1986).
51 R. Doc. 1 at 151.
52 360 U.S. 264 (1959).
53 R. Doc. 1 at 82.
54 488 U.S. 51, 57 (1988).
55 R. Doc. 1 at 98.
56 416 U.S. 637 (1974).
57 R. Doc. 1 at 90.

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A. Brady Claim
On March 18, 1996, Kaprice Pollard called the police, complaining that her sister’s
boyfriend, Chester, refused to leave Kaprice’s apartment at 1108 Newton Street. When
police arrived, Kaprice told the officers her name was Keisha Gordon and that her sister
Quinice’s name was Latrisha Gordon. Police then arrested Chester after he jumped out of
a bedroom window. Kaprice and Quinice, using the names Keisha and Latrisha,
respectively, made statements to police that morning. Later, once police learned the
sisters’ true identities, they each made a second statement.
In her first statement, Kaprice told police that on the night of Adams’ murder, she
and Quinice were at 1108 Newton Street when Chester came to Kaprice’s apartment.
Kaprice claimed Chester came to the apartment at about 10:00 p.m. and told her and
Quinice “him and Fellow had just, uh, killed a cab driver. [Chester] said he pulled the
trigger and the man swung and hit the pole or something.” 58 Kaprice also indicated
Chester was wearing shorts and a black leather jacket. 59 She also told Sergeant Thornton
that there was no blood on the jacket. 60
Five hours later, Kaprice made a second statement. This time, she told police
Chester arrived at her apartment at around three or four in the morning and that Chester
and Quinice went into a bathroom. 61 She explained that, when Chester and Quinice went
into the bathroom, she overheard Chester tell Quinice “he had just shot a cab driver over
some dope.” 62 This time, when Sergeant Thornton asked what Chester was wearing that

R. Doc. 1-1 at 192–93.
Id. at 194, 196.
60 Id. at 196.
61 R. Doc. 1-2 at 8–9.
62 Id. at 6–14.
58
59

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night, Kaprice said Chester had on “blue jeans” and that there was “definitely [blood] on
his blue Girbaud pants.” 63
Quinice made a statement to police that same day. She said that the night of
Adams’ murder, Chester ran to his house on Jackson Street and that she did not see him
until the next day at Flake’s Store. She told the interviewing officer that, after she saw
Chester at Flake’s Store, she and Chester walked to his apartment on Jackson Street.
When the interviewing officer asked Quinice whether Kaprice was with her the first
time she saw Chester following the murder, Quinice said:
No. No. No. I was by my . . . it was just me and Teddy in the kitchen that night
talking. Just me and Teddy. When I did . . . now wait, let me tell you how it
went. When Teddy told me what happened across the track, I went and told
Prisa. I said, well Prisa, I say uh . . . you know I said they saying Teddy got
something to do with the cab driver over there. I said. Teddy said that he
didn’t have nothing. I said Teddy said that Fella the one pulled the trigger. I
said he said that he just was there. Like that. That’s all that was said. 64
Sergeant Thornton then asked Quinice at what point she told Kaprice that Chester told
her Ratcliff shot Adams, and Quinice stated:
The . . . it was like the day after. That part was true. The day after I did tell
her but he did not. . . . Only thing came up when I told her, I said Teddy said
that Fella said . . . no. That Teddy . . . Teddy said that Fella killed the cab
driver and that he know he gonna put him in it. I said he at the house scared
now. I was over there by my sister house by myself that day. I said he over
at the house scared now. So she said well you, do you think put . . . so she
asked me, she said, do you think he did it. I said, no he said Fella did it. 65
Two weeks before trial, Quinice changed her story and said that, when she saw Chester
after the murder, he confessed to shooting Adams during an attempted robbery gone
awry. 66

Id. at 10.
R. Doc. 1-1 at 31.
65 Id. at 31–32.
66 Chester I, 724 So. 2d at 1281.
63

64

14

On May 17, 1996, defense counsel filed a motion for disclosure of evidence
favorable to Chester pursuant to Brady and Kyles. 67 With respect to the Pollard sisters,
the State filed a notice of possible Brady material, addressing the sisters’ prior convictions
and stating it would not object to an in camera review of the sisters’ statements to police. 68
Following the trial court’s review of the statements, the trial court provided defense
counsel only with the portion of Quinice’s statement in which she said Chester told her
Ratcliff had shot Adams.
On May 17, 1996, defense counsel also filed a motion to “reveal the deal,” including
“any deals, implicit or explicit.” 69 The State responded that there were no deals, 70 but did
not disclose that it had declined to prosecute either Kaprice or Quinice for alleged criminal
activities. Notably, Kaprice and Quinice explained in the second statements they to gave
to police that they initially gave police officers false names because Quinice was on
probation for possession of crack cocaine and Kaprice had a warrant out for her arrest
based on a probation violation. 71
Chester alleges that his trial counsel was unable to adequately cross-examine
Kaprice and Quinice at trial because the only inconsistency of which trial counsel was
aware was Quinice’s prior statement that Chester told her Ratcliff shot Adams. Chester
submits that “both individually and cumulatively, the State’s failure to disclose all of the
above impeachment evidence on the Pollard sisters was material under Brady and
harmed the Petitioner’s case.” 72

R. 97–105. See Brady, 383 U.S. at 163; Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419 (1995).
R. 168.
69 R. 87–89.
70 R. 143.
71 R. 1420, 1465–69.
72 R. Doc. 1 at 82, 14.
67

68

15

The Louisiana Supreme Court held that Chester “fail[ed] to show that any
suppression occurred as to the portion of Quinice’s statement that would have been
suitable for impeachment,” noting that “the state disclosed the portion of Quinice’s
statement in which she initially told police [Chester] informed her that Ratcliff was the
shooter.” The court went on to state:
Moreover, even assuming the state withheld the remainder of both sisters’
initial statements, Chester fails to show it did so in violation of Brady. The
only other inconsistencies he points to do not rise to a level capable of
undermining the verdict because they pertain to the sisters’ particular
recollections about when and how they learned Chester was the shooter—
i.e., on the night of the crime or the next day—not to the material issue of
whether they learned Chester was the shooter. 73
To make a Brady claim, a habeas petitioner must prove: (1) that the “evidence at
issue [is] favorable to the accused, either because it is exculpatory, or because it is
impeaching”; (2) that the “evidence [has] been suppressed by the State, either willfully or
inadvertently”; and (3) that “prejudice [has] ensued.” 74
In United States v. Bagley, 75 the U.S. Supreme Court “disavowed any difference
between exculpatory and impeachment evidence for Brady purposes,” 76 and held that
“regardless of request, favorable evidence is material, and constitutional error results
from its suppression by the government, ‘if there is a reasonable probability that, had the
evidence been disclosed to the defense, the result of the proceeding would have been
different.’” 77 Moreover, “a showing of materiality does not require demonstration by a

Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 348.
Strickler v. Greene, 527 U.S. 263, 281-82 (1999).
75 473 U.S. 667 (1985).
76 Kyles, 514 U.S. at 433 (discussing Bagley, 473 U.S. at 682).
77 Bagley, 473 U.S. at 682.
73

74

16

preponderance that disclosure of the suppressed evidence would have resulted ultimately
in the defendant’s acquittal.” 78
Even without the complete statements, trial counsel was able to impeach Quinice
on her prior statement to police and was able to elicit testimony that called into question
the veracity of her trial testimony:
Q: Did Elbert Ratcliff ever threaten you to do harm?
A: Yes. . . .
Q: Did you also tell me that you had been threatened by the police if you did
not cooperate?
A: I told you that when we was in the room about being questioned, I was
nervous and everything. I also told you that, the man, Detective Thornton
told me if I can’t get up and say what I said, he would “F” me. . . .
Q: And, you also told me that—let me ask you: Did you also tell me that
Detective Thornton told you that you had to tell what you said in Court?
A: Yes ma’am. 79
Although trial counsel’s cross-examination of Quinice and Kaprice would likely
have been more effective had she been able to point out other contradictions in their
statements, the Louisiana Supreme Court’s conclusion that Chester was not prejudiced
by the State’s failure to disclose this information is not an unreasonable application of
Brady.
B. Batson Claim
Chester argues the State acted in a discriminatory manner when it struck both of
the only two prospective black jurors in the venire, and as a result, Chester was tried for
a cross-racial crime before an all-white jury. 80

514 U.S. at 434.
R. 1424–27.
80 Chester also argues that, because he is black and the victim was white, trial counsel’s failure to conduct
any questioning of the venire on racial prejudice was constitutionally deficient, pointing to Turner v.
Murray, 476 U.S. 28 (1986) (holding that a capital defendant accused of a cross-racial crime has the right
to question jurors on racial bias and inform them about the race of the victim). R. Doc. 1 at 151. Having
offered no evidence of racial bias, the Court cannot agree, and finds this Strickland claim lacks merit.
78
79

17

“Discrimination in jury selection . . . causes harms to the litigants, the community,
and the individual jurors who are wrongfully excluded from participation in the judicial
process.” 81 In Batson, the U.S. Supreme Court established a framework for determining
whether peremptory strikes are racially motivated. Both the U.S. Supreme Court and the
Fifth Circuit have granted writs of habeas corpus based on a finding that a state court
made unreasonable factual determinations in rejecting a petitioner’s Batson claim. 82 In
those cases, the court relied heavily on a so-called “comparative juror analysis,” wherein
the reviewing court determines whether the reasons given by the prosecutor for striking
black jurors apply equally to white jurors the prosecutor accepted. 83 Before a court
undertakes such an analysis, however, the defendant must have first made a prima facie
showing that the prosecutor exercised peremptory challenges on the basis of race; in
response, the prosecutor must have articulated a race-neutral reason for striking the juror
in question. 84 “‘[B]ecause a timely objection is an essential prerequisite to a Batson claim,’
a defendant is not entitled to raise a Batson claim on appeal if he did not object to the
prosecutor’s use of peremptory challenges in the district court.” 85 Thus, “a Batson
challenge must be made timely or it will be rejected.” 86
During voir dire, defense counsel failed to object to the State’s striking both of the
two death-qualified African American prospective jurors. 87 As a result, the trial court did

J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B., 511 U.S. 127, 140 (1994).
Miller-El v. Dretke, 545 U.S. 231, 266 (2005); Reed v. Quarterman, 555 F.3d 364, 382 (5th Cir. 2009).
83 See Reed, 555 F.3d at 369.
84 Batson, 476 U.S. at 96–98; see Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 768 (1995).
85 United States v. Flores, 286 F. App’x 206, 210 (5th Cir. 2008) (quoting United States v. Pofahl, 990 F.2d
1456, 1465 (5th Cir. 1993)).
86 Garcia v. Excel Corp., 102 F.3d 758, 759 (5th Cir. 1997).
87 The Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding that Chester waived his Batson claim by failing to make a
contemporaneous objection to the prosecutor’s use of peremptories or to the composition of the jury is an
independent and adequate state law ground for the judgment. See Richardson v. Lemke, 745 F.3d 258, 271–
72 (7th Cir. 2014). Chester argues trial counsel’s failure to object constitutes ineffective assistance and that,
therefore, he has shown cause for the default. R. Doc. 1 at 151. With respect to this claim, the Louisiana
81

82

18

not have the opportunity to consider whether the State’s use of peremptory strikes with
respect to these two venire people was racially motivated. On Chester’s direct appeal of
his conviction, the Louisiana Supreme Court held that these alleged errors were without
merit. 88
A Batson claim presents a mixed question of law and fact, which “focuses on the
reasonableness of the decisions of the state courts—that is, whether those decisions

Supreme Court held: “even assuming arguendo that counsel unreasonably failed to pursue this line of
questioning, Chester fails to show entitlement to relief because he does not point to evidence that any juror
harbored bias or was incapable of serving impartially.” Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 346.
Because evaluating Chester’s claim that his trial counsel’s failure to raise a Batson claim requires
the Court the evaluate the likelihood of success of Chester’s hypothetical objection, “Petitioner has the
burden of showing under Strickland (1) that counsel’s failure to raise such an objection constituted deficient
performance, and (2) a reasonable probability that such an objection would have been successful.” Mitcham
v. Davis, 103 F. Supp. 3d 1091, 1102 (N.D. Ca. 2015); see also 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d); Wrinkles v. Buss, 537
F.3d 804, 813 (7th Cir. 2008).
Courts have found counsel’s failure to object to obvious racial discrimination during jury selection
constitutes deficient performance under Strickland. See, e.g., Eagle v. Linahan, 279 F.3d 926, 938–43 (11th
Cir. 2001) (petitioner’s appellate counsel rendered ineffective assistance in not raising Batson claim on
appeal); Hollis v. Davis, 941 F.2d 1471, 1476–79 (11th Cir. 1991) (petitioner’s counsel’s failure to object to
systemic exclusion of African Americans from jury service constituted ineffective assistance establishing
cause to overcome procedural default); see cf Drain v. Woods, 595 F. App’x 558, 582 (6th Cir. 2014)
(“[D]efense counsel’s failure to object to the manner in which the trial court dealt with the Batson violation
did constitute deficient counsel.”). To determine whether the need for an objection was obvious, courts have
considered whether:
(1) the prosecutor has struck most or all of the members of an identified group from the
venire, or has used a disproportionate amount of his peremptory challenges against that
group; (2) the prospective jurors in question have only their group identification in
common, and in all other respects are as heterogeneous as the community as a whole (e.g.,
“in a case of alleged exclusion on the ground of race it may be significant if the persons
challenged, although black, include both men and women and are of a variety of ages,
occupations, and social or economic conditions”); (3) the prosecutor fails to engage the
prospective jurors in more than desultory voir dire, or fails to ask them any questions at
all; and (4) the defendant is a member of the excluded group, and if in addition, the alleged
victim is a member of the group to which the majority of the remaining jurors belong, these
facts may also be called to the court’s attention.
Mitcham, 103 F. Supp. 3d at 1104. Chester has not offered any evidence in support of his argument that his
trial counsel should have, but did not, object to the exclusion of two Black venire people from the jury, other
than to simply state the State’s striking of these prospective jurors was racially motivated. Moreover,
Chester has not offered any evidence to suggest the Louisiana Supreme Court’s factual determination—that
no juror harbored bias or was incapable of serving impartially—was clearly erroneous. As a result, the Court
finds this Strickland claim lacks merit.
88 In its opposition, the State claims that, contrary to the state court’s opinion, Chester did not raise this
claim on direct appeal, and that, therefore, this claim has been procedurally defaulted. R. Doc. 27 at 104–
05. Because the Louisiana Supreme Court proceeded to the merits of this claim, so too will this Court. See
Drain, 595 F. App’x at 567 (“We choose not to raise the issue [of procedural default] sua sponte, and instead,
we review the Batson claim and related ineffective assistance claim on the merits under AEDPA, as the state
court of appeals did issue a decision regarding the merits of those claims.”).

19

constituted an unreasonable application of Supreme Court precedent.” 89 In addition,
however, a Batson challenge regarding whether the prosecutor intended to discriminate
impermissibly based on race is “a question of historical fact.” 90 “Under AEDPA, primary
or historical facts found by state courts are presumed correct and are rebuttable only by
clear and convincing evidence.” 91
In his petition before this Court, Chester offers no more than the ipse dixit
assertion that the State’s striking of these prospective jurors was racially motivated. The
Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding that Chester waived his Batson claim by failing to
make a contemporaneous objection to the prosecutor’s use of peremptories or to the
composition of the jury is an independent and adequate state law ground for the
judgment. The Louisiana Supreme Court made factual findings that Chester’s trial
counsel failed to raise an objection pursuant to Batson, and that, in any event, the
prosecutor did not act with prejudicial intent. These findings are not clearly erroneous
and are entitled to deference. 92 Accordingly, the Court finds this claim lacks merit.
C. Napue Claim
Chester argues the State violated Napue when the prosecution offered testimony
from Quinice and Kaprice, arguing the prosecution knowingly elicited false testimony
from both witnesses and failed to correct the sisters’ false testimony. 93

Lancaster v. Adams, 324 F.3d 423, 429 (6th Cir. 2003).
Id. at 429.
91 Braxton v. Gansheimer, 561 F.3d 453, 459 (6th Cir. 2009) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also
Snyder v. Louisiana, 552 U.S. 472, 477 (2008) (“On appeal, a trial court’s ruling on the issue of
discriminatory intent must be sustained unless it is clearly erroneous. The trial court has a pivotal role in
evaluating Batson claims.” (internal citations omitted)).
92 As the State points out, Chester does not “identify these two prospective jurors or give support to his
claim that they were death qualified,” and because trial counsel did not make a contemporaneous objection,
“the proper Batson procedure was not complied with . . . . Thus, there was no Batson inquiry nor an offer
of race-neutral reasons.” R. Doc. 27 at 104.
93 R. Doc. 1 at 82.
89

90

20

In Napue, the U.S. Supreme Court explained that if “false testimony used by the
State in securing the conviction of [a] petitioner may have had an effect on the outcome
of the trial,” the petitioner’s conviction must be reversed. 94
It is of no consequence that the falsehood bore upon the witness’ credibility
rather than directly upon defendant’s guilt. A lie is a lie, no matter what its
subject, and, if it is in any way relevant to the case, the district attorney has
the responsibility and duty to correct what he knows to be false and elicit
the truth. That the district attorney’s silence was not the result of guile or a
desire to prejudice matters little, for its impact was the same, preventing, as
it did, a trial that could in any real sense be termed fair. 95
In support of his Napue claim, Chester points to a sworn statement from Sheryl
Nelson, in which Nelson states Quinice changed her testimony only because “prosecutors
told her they would put her in jail and take away her child” if she did not. 96 Chester also
points to the inconsistencies in both Quinice’s and Kaprice’s testimony. Chester argues
these inconsistencies and Nelson’s sworn statement make clear that either Kaprice or
Quinice was lying, and that the State knowingly offered perjured testimony.
With respect to Nelson’s sworn statement, the Louisiana Supreme Court, noting
that a court must view “recantations ‘with the utmost suspicion,’” held that “Nelson’s
statement does not rise even to the level of an actual recantation from Quinice but is
rather merely a third party assertion that she has since claimed she gave false
testimony.” 97 The Louisiana Supreme Court was not persuaded that Quinince or Kaprice
testified falsely and also was not persuaded that the State “knowingly” presented the
allegedly perjured testimony. In his petition before this Court, Chester has not presented
clear and convincing evidence that demonstrates (1) Quinice or Kaprice testified falsely,

Napue, 360 U.S. at 272.
Id. at 269–70.
96 R. Doc. 1-2 at 16–19.
97 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 348.
94
95

21

and (2) that the State knew either one’s testimony was false, but offered it anyway. The
Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding is based on a reasonable
determination of the facts. 98 As a result, the Court will not issue the writ on this basis.
D. Youngblood Claim
Chester complains he was denied the ability to present a complete defense,
including relevant evidence at trial, because (1) the State returned the cab to the King Cab
Company about two days after the murder without first taking photographs of the back
passenger-side seat or allowing the defense to inspect the cab, 99 and (2) the State’s DNA
testing consumed the entire blood sample found on Chester’s cap before the defense could
test it independently. 100
The Due Process Clause requires that the State disclose to a criminal defendant
“evidence that is either material to the guilt of the defendant or relevant to the
punishment to be imposed.” 101 To safeguard that right, the Supreme Court has developed
“‘what might loosely be called the area of constitutionally guaranteed access to
evidence.’” 102 As part of this guarantee, the State has a duty to preserve evidence known
to be favorable to the accused. “Even in the absence of a specific request, the prosecution
has a constitutional duty to turn over exculpatory evidence that would raise a reasonable
doubt about the defendant’s guilt.” 103
A different standard applies to evidence that is only speculatively or potentially
exculpatory, as opposed to clearly exculpatory evidence falling more directly under

See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
Thomas Victory, the general manager of the King Cab Company, testified Adams’ cab was released back
to the cab company the day after the murder occurred R. 1363.
100 R. Doc. 1 at 98.
101 California v. Trombetta, 467 U.S. 479, 485 (1984).
102 Id. (quoting United States v. Valenzuela-Bernal, 458 U.S. 858, 867 (1982)).
103 Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 485.
98
99

22

Brady. “[T]he Due Process Clause requires a different result when we deal with the failure
of the State to preserve evidentiary material of which no more can be said than that it
could have been subjected to tests, the results of which might have exonerated the
defendant.” 104 The State’s duty to preserve this type of evidence is “limited to evidence
that might be expected to play a significant role in the suspect’s defense.” 105
The U.S. Supreme Court held in Youngblood, “that unless a criminal defendant can
show bad faith on the part of the [State], failure to preserve potentially useful evidence
does not constitute a denial of due process of law.” 106 Under these standards, the
exculpatory value of the evidence must have been apparent “before the evidence was
destroyed, and be of such a nature that the defendant would be unable to obtain
comparable evidence by other reasonably available means.” 107 The mere fact that the State
had control over evidence and failed to preserve it is insufficient, by itself, to establish bad
faith, and bad faith will not be found in the State’s negligent failure to preserve potentially
exculpatory evidence. 108
In this case, the Louisiana Supreme Court rejected Chester’s claims under
Youngblood, finding that they were speculative, 109 and therefore holding that “because

Youngblood, 488 U.S. at 57 (emphasis added).
Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 488.
106 Youngblood, 488 U.S. at 58; see Illinois v. Fisher, 540 U.S. 544, 547–48 (2004).
107 Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 489; Youngblood, 488 U.S. at 56, n.“*” (“The presence or absence of bad faith by
the police for purposes of the Due Process Clause must necessarily turn on the police’s knowledge of the
exculpatory value of the evidence at the time it was lost or destroyed.”); Allen v. Collins, 987 F.2d 771, 1993
WL 67167, at *4 (5th Cir. Mar. 4, 1993).
108 See Youngblood, 488 U.S. at 58 (finding the failure to refrigerate clothing or test semen samples was at
worst negligence and not demonstrative of bad faith); Malcum v. Burt, 276 F. Supp. 2d 664, 683 (E.D. Mich.
2003) (citing Lile v. McKune, 45 F. Supp. 2d 1157, 1163 (D. Kan. 1999)); Lions v. Baker, No. 13-CV-321,
2016 WL 7191617, at *6 (D. Nev. Dec. 12, 2016) (“Even negligence in failing to preserve potentially useful
evidence is not sufficient to constitute bad faith and does not violate due process.”).
109 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 349.
104
105

23

[Chester] does not show that the evidence was lost as a result of demonstrable bad faith
by the state,” relief was not warranted as to this claim. 110
In his petition before this Court, Chester contends his “right to a fair trial was
denied because the State did not fulfill its constitutional duty to preserve potentially
exculpatory evidence.” 111 Chester does not allege that the State acted in bad faith, nor does
he offer any evidence to that effect, when it consumed the entire DNA testing sample and
returned the cab to King Cab the day after the murder. 112 Thus, the Court finds this claim
lacks merit. 113
E. Donnelly Claim
Chester complains the State’s arguments during both the guilt and punishment
phases of his trial violated his right to due process as articulated in Donnelly. 114 In
Donnelly, the U.S. Supreme Court held that, in some instances, a prosecutor’s statements
to the jury can be so egregious that they deprive the defendant of due process. 115 The
petitioner in Donnelly was tried in Massachusetts State Court for first degree murder.
During the course of his trial, one of the petitioner’s co-defendants with whom he was
being tried jointly elected to plead guilty to a lesser charge, and the trial judge advised the

Id.
R. Doc. 1 at 98 (emphasis added).
112 In his petition, Chester repeatedly points out that, years after Chester’s trial, the prosecutor in his case,
Ronald Bodenheimer, was convicted of various federal charges resulting, in part, from an FBI probe called
Operation Wrinkled Robe. Although Chester does not argue the crimes of which Bodenheimer was
convicted affected Chester’s trial or that his convictions are evidence of the State’s “bad faith,” Chester does
note that “[i]t is either a striking coincidence, or a disturbing pattern of practice, that prosecutor
Bodenheimer did the very same thing in another capital case during the same time period, where a shooting
occurred in a Metry Cab and the State returned the cab to its owner without taking photographs of the
exterior and before counsel was even appointed to represent the defendant.” R. Doc. 1 at 98 n.27 (citing
Seals v. Vannoy, No. 2:16-cv-09892-SSV-JCW (E.D. La.) (pending)).
113 Chester also argues trial counsel’s failure to object to the State’s destruction of evidence amounts to
ineffective assistance of counsel. Id. at 55. Having found no underlying Youngblood violation, Chester’s
ineffective assistance of counsel claim with respect to this issue necessarily fails.
114 R. Doc. 1 at 90.
115 416 U.S. at 648.
110
111

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jury that the petitioner’s co-defendant had pleaded guilty. The petitioner’s trial then
continued.
In his closing argument, the prosecutor stated he “honestly and sincerely
believe[d] that there is no doubt [the defendant is guilty] in this case, none whatsoever”
and that “They,” meaning the petitioner and his counsel, “said they hope that you find
him not guilty. I quite frankly think that they hope that you find him guilty of something
a little less than first-degree murder.” The petitioner’s counsel objected to the statements
and later sought an instruction that the remark was improper and should be disregarded.
The trial court instructed the jury that the prosecutor’s statements were not evidence and
told the jury to “[c]onsider the case as though no such statement[s] [were] made.” 116
The jury found the petitioner guilty of first degree murder, and his conviction was
affirmed on appeal by the Massachusetts courts. The petitioner then sought habeas
corpus relief in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, which denied the
writ. The First Circuit reversed. 117 The circuit court reasoned that the prosecutor’s
remarks, when combined with the guilty plea of the petitioner’s co-defendant, would
probably have conveyed to the jury a notion that the petitioner had also sought to enter
guilty plea, but had been refused. 118 The circuit court explained that, because the
prosecutor’s statements created this impression, the petitioner was denied due process. 119
The U.S. Supreme Court reversed. 120 The Court cautioned that, although “[t]he
‘consistent and repeated misrepresentation’ of a dramatic exhibit in evidence may
profoundly impress a jury and may have a significant impact on the jury’s deliberations,”

Id. at 641.
DeChristoforo v. Donnelly, 473 F.2d 1236 (1st Cir. 1973), reversed by 416 U.S. at 648.
118 Id. at 1240–41.
119 Id.
120 416 U.S. 637.
116
117

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“[i]solated passages of a prosecutor’s argument, billed in advance to the jury as a matter
of opinion not of evidence, do not reach the same proportions.” 121 The Court reasoned
that, given that the district court and the court of appeals had differing opinions as to
what conclusion the jury might have drawn from the prosecutor’s statements, “it is by no
means clear that the jury did engage in the hypothetical analysis suggested by the majority
of the Court of Appeals, or even probable that it would seize such a comment out of
context and attach this particular meaning to it.” 122 Ultimately, because the trial court
properly instructed the jury to disregard the prosecutor’s statements and it was not clear
what inference the jury might have made as a result of the comments, the Court found the
prosecutor’s comments did not render the petitioner’s “trial so fundamentally unfair as to
deny him due process.” 123
1. Defaulted claims
During the guilt phase of trial, Chester’s trial counsel failed to object to the
statements about which Chester now complains. With respect to these unobjected to
statements, the Louisiana Supreme Court held Chester’s claims of error were procedurally
defaulted:
He argues that [during the guilt phase of trial] the prosecutor misstated the
law of principals and gave incorrect definitions of reasonable doubt, he
expressed his personal opinion regarding defendant’s guilt and the facts of
the case, he bolstered the testimony of Kaprice Pollard and his own position
in the criminal justice system, he misstated the law and evidence in several
instances throughout trial, and he thanked the jury “on behalf of the people
of Jefferson and the family of John Adams” during his closing statement.
Defendant failed to object to these comments of the prosecutor during trial
or closing arguments. Any claim of error based on prosecutorial misconduct
in the guilt phase not objected to was therefore waived. 124
Id. at 646.
Id. at 643.
123 Id. at 645.
124 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XV, XVI (citing LA. CODE CRIM. P. art. 841; State v. Taylor, 93-2201
(La. 2/28/1996), 669 So. 2d 364, 369). For example, Chester complains the State told the jury the blood
121

122

26

When a state court invokes a procedural rule to deny a prisoner’s claims, a federal
habeas court is precluded from reviewing the claims if “the state procedural rule is a
nonfederal ground adequate to support the judgment and the rule is firmly established
and consistently followed.” 125 This doctrine is not without exceptions, however. “A
prisoner may obtain federal review of a defaulted claim by showing cause for the default
and prejudice from a violation of federal law.” 126 Ineffective assistance of counsel may
qualify as cause for the default. 127
Chester contends he can overcome this procedural bar to federal habeas review,
as his trial counsel’s failure to object to these statements constitutes ineffective assistance.
Even assuming defense counsel’s failure to object rendered her performance
constitutionally deficient, however, Chester has not shown he was prejudiced by the
statements. 128 Thus, finding no exception to the general rule that a federal habeas court

evidence “matched” John Adams’ DNA. According to Chester, this mischaracterized and overstated the
DNA evidence. R. Doc. 1 at 84. Chester also points to the prosecutor’s closing statements during the guilt
phase of trial, during which he thanked the jury “on behalf of the people of Jefferson and the family of John
Adams.” Chester also complains that the prosecution repeatedly and improperly defined reasonable doubt
as “not 100 percent,” as “not to a scientific certainty,” and as a doubt that “you can give a reason for,” and
by stating: “I think defense counsel and [I] agree [that] when you’re satisfied that it occurred and you’re a
reasonable person, that’s proof beyond a reasonable doubt.” R. at 1102–05; 1206–07. Finally, Chester
points to the prosecutor’s closing argument in the guilt phase of trial, during which the prosecutor allegedly
misstated the law of principals, R. Doc. 1 at 92, when he explained to the jury:
But even when [Quinice Pollard] was trying to help the guy she was in love with [Teddy
Chester], her old man, even when she was in love with him she said, “He told me they were
robbing the cab driver and Fellow killed him.” That makes him a principal to first degree
murder right there. I’m sure she doesn’t know the law, but that made him a principal right
then and there.
R. at 1634–35. Defense counsel failed to object to any of these statements.
125 Martinez v. Ryan, 566 U.S. 1, 11 (2012) (“Federal habeas courts reviewing the constitutionality of a state
prisoner’s conviction and sentence are guided by rules designed to ensure that state-court judgments are
accorded the finality and respect necessary to preserve the integrity of legal proceedings within our system
of federalism. These rules include the doctrine of procedural default, under which a federal court will not
review the merits of claims, including constitutional claims, that a state court declined to hear because the
prisoner failed to abide by a state procedural rule.”).
126 Id.
127 Id.
128 See Martinez v. Ryan, 566 U.S. 1, 9–10 (2012).

27

is barred from considering claims defaulted in state court applies in this case, the Court
does not consider these claims. 129
2. Statements Made During the Penalty Phase
Chester contends the State “made a number of improper statements on closing
argument of the penalty phase that deprived Mr. Chester’s sentencing determination of
the reliability that the Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendment[s] require[].”130 First,
Chester contends the State mischaracterized Professor Dean Burk Foster’s testimony.
Second, Chester argues the State misstated the law of mitigation. Third, Chester submits
prosecutor Bodenheimer improperly “interjected his own personal beliefs into the case
and resorted to personal experience.” 131 Because Chester argues these statements, when
taken as a whole, deprived him of his right to due process, the Court analyzes them
together.
a. Professor Foster
During the penalty phase, the defense called Professor Foster to discuss conditions
at Angola, the prison where an adult male sentenced to life in prison in Louisiana would
more than likely serve his time. 132 During the State’s cross-examination of Professor
Foster, the State asked Professor Foster about “institutionalization” in the criminological
context. Professor Foster explained that it meant “[an inmate] adapt[s] to the conditions
of an institution to the point that [he] become[s] so affixed to the routine that it’s difficult
for [him] to function outside of prison.” 133 The State then asked Professor Foster to
“describe the conditions at Angola and the conveniences at Angola compared to, let’s say

See Trevino v. Thaler, 569 U.S. 413, 421 (2013).
R. Doc. 1 at 183.
131 R. Doc. 1 at 184.
132 R. 1775–98.
133 R. 1791.
129

130

28

troops in Dessert Storm,” 134 adding “[is there] [a]nybody in Angola living in tents?”
Professor Foster responded that, in fact, some inmates had been housed in tents, but that
“[the inmates] don’t ordinarily live in tents, no.” 135
In his closing argument to the jury, the prosecutor, referring to Professor Foster,
stated Chester’s “own expert talked to you about institutionalization. And that happens
every day at Angola. It’s people who become so happy, so content with their surroundings,
they don’t even want to leave prison.” 136
b. Law of Mitigation
At the penalty phase, defense counsel offered evidence of Chester’s difficult
upbringing and evidence of his learning disabilities, including that Chester is dyslexic.
During closing arguments, the prosecutor stated Chester’s “dyslexia and abuse . . .
[has] got nothing to do with all of this. It’s got nothing. You know what this has got to do
with, two things: does he know right from wrong? And everybody said yes, he knows right
from wrong. And the second is your choice. You make your choices as you live.” 137
c. Interjection of Personal Beliefs
During rebuttal the prosecutor stated,
So we don’t say ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’ in all cases, but in
this one, I say yes. And some people say, ‘Well then, you’ve got a society of
people who are both blind and toothless.’ And I say, ‘If you don’t, you’re
going to have a society where victims are blind and toothless and murders
can see and chew.’ That’s the alternative. Our victims are going to be
slaughtered in the street, but were going to give life to their killers. That, to
me, make no sense whatsoever. 138
Shortly after that, he added:
R. 1791.
Id.
136 R. 1861.
137 R. 1862.
138 R. 1859–60.
134
135

29

And I know, because I have a mother, you know—she’s dead now, but she
used to complain that I didn’t call her every day. . . . But John Adams did. I
hate to say it, but he was a better son than I was, because I couldn’t get to
my mother every day. You know, I just got busy. But, you know, every day
he called his mom. He was a giver. 139
The prosecution also challenged the defense “to answer to [the juror’s]
satisfaction”: “What good it’s going to do society to give him, to award him [with] life in
prison?” 140 On rebuttal, the prosecutor then argued the death penalty is “the only way you
can be 100 percent sure that Chester never kills again,” 141 adding that the death penalty
will only be a deterrent once “the jurors stand up and start enforcing the laws,” 142 by
“cut[ting] off the cancer to save society.” 143
3. Analysis
Chester claims all of the prosecutor’s statements during the penalty phase, taken
as a whole, deprived him of his right to a fair trial, pointing to Berger v. United States.144
In Berger, the U.S. Supreme Court stated “improper suggestions, insinuations and,
especially, assertions of personal knowledge are apt to carry much weight against the
accused when they should properly carry none.” 145
On the direct appeal of his conviction, the Louisiana Supreme Court concluded that
the prosecutor’s statements were improper, but nevertheless held they did not prejudice
Chester. 146 The Louisiana Supreme Court explained:
We do not find these remarks were of such a nature as to require a mistrial
nor did they exceed the scope of proper closing argument. The state is
permitted to argue why the death penalty is appropriate for a defendant and
for the crime. [With respect to the prosecutor’s statements regarding Dr.
R. 1864.
R. 1843.
141 R. 1864.
142 R. 1861.
143 R. 1859.
144 R. Doc. 1 at 182–85 (citing 295 U.S. 78 (1935)).
145 295 U.S. at 88.
146 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XXX, XXIX.
139

140

30

Foster’s testimony,] [we] find that the misstatements were not so
prejudicial, and in any event, the trial judge properly instructed the jury on
the law of mitigation.
The defense claims prosecutorial misconduct when the prosecutor
referred to facts not in evidence when he declared that “Teddy Chester has
escaped responsibility his whole life.” We consider this to be a comment on
defendant’s life style based upon witnesses’ testimony at trial and as such is
not a reiteration of a fact. Defendant further complains that the prosecutor
interjected his own personal beliefs into rebuttal when he stated, “And I
know, because I have a mother, you know—she’s dead now, but she used to
complain that I didn’t call her every day. But John Adams did. I hate to say
it, but he was a better son that I was, because I couldn’t get to my mother
every day.” We find that the remark was within the considerable latitude
allowed prosecutors in closing argument, and, in any event, we do not think
the jury was ever in doubt that the ultimate decision was theirs and that the
prosecutor was only arguing the state’s position. . . . These assignments of
error are without merit. 147
Chester argues the Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding was an “unreasonable
factual determination, as it understates the influence a prosecutor has on a jury—
particularly when he has just persuaded them to find a man guilty—and the potential for
that influence to sway their decision on impermissible grounds.” 148 However, the Court
agrees with the Louisiana Supreme Court that the prosecutor’s statements did not render
Chester’s “trial so fundamentally unfair as to deny him due process.” 149 As a result, this
Court is not persuaded that the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding was: (1) contrary to,
or involved an unreasonable application of clearly established Federal law, as determined
by the U.S. Supreme Court; or (2) based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in
light of the evidence presented in the state court proceeding. 150

Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XXIX, XXX.
R. Doc. 1 at 185.
149 Donnelly, 416 U.S. at 645.
150 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
147

148

31

III.

Atkins Claim

Chester next contends that his death sentence violates Atkins v. Virginia,151
claiming that he is intellectually disabled and the Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding to
the contrary is not entitled to the presumption of correctness. 152
The Court first addresses Chester’s contention that his Atkins claim should be
viewed through the lens of Roper v. Simmons, 153 a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court
held the execution of a person who committed his or her crime as a minor violates the
Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, as Chester’s crime took place only forty-seven days
after his eighteenth birthday. The U.S. Supreme Court’s holding in Roper was clear: “The
Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments forbid imposition of the death penalty on offenders
who were under the age of 18 when their crimes were committed.” 154 Thus, Roper plainly
does not “govern” Chester’s case, and his Atkins claim cannot be viewed through that lens.
In Atkins, the U.S. Supreme Court held that executing an intellectually disabled
person violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. 155
The Court relied heavily on current medical standards, 156 which indicate individuals with
an intelligence quotient (“IQ”) of approximately seventy or below are considered
intellectually disabled. 157 Later, in Hall v. Florida, the U.S. Supreme Court evaluated a
Florida statute that created a bright line rule making anyone whose IQ was above seventy
eligible for execution. 158 In Hall, the Court held that Florida’s bright line rule made the

536 U.S. 304 (2002).
R. Doc. 1 at 103–08, 119.
153 543 U.S. 551 (2005).
154 Id. at 578.
155 536 U.S. at 321.
156 Id. at 308 n.3.
157 Id.
158 134 S. Ct. 1986, 1994–95 (2014).
151

152

32

possibility that an intellectually disabled person would be executed too great, explaining
that IQ scores constitute only a part of what should be considered in determining whether
a person has deficient general intellectual functions. 159
The Supreme Court’s holding in Atkins, issued in June of 2002, applies
retroactively. 160 Chester, having been sentenced to death in 1997, sought to overturn his
death sentence on the basis of his alleged intellectual disability. Pursuant to this assertion,
the Louisiana district court held an extensive post-conviction Atkins hearing on
November 12–15, 2013. 161
On December 10, 2013, the state district court denied Chester’s Atkins claim,
explaining:
Petitioner fails to meet his burden of proving he is mentally retarded by [a]
preponderance of evidence. Petitioner did not submit sufficient evidence to
meet this burden. Moreover, the State presented ample evidence that
Petitioner is not mentally retarded. The court has had the opportunity to
observe Petitioner in court on several occasions, and is impressed with
petitioner’s intellectual abilities to discuss complicated legal issues with an
obvious degree of understanding. Petitioner has also filed numerous
pleadings and has a strong grasp of the law in areas at issue. 162
On review, the Louisiana Supreme Court found Chester’s Atkins claim was
procedurally barred, as Chester “failed to timely seek review of the District Court’s

See id. at 1995 (providing that a person’s IQ score may fluctuate on any given day based on factors such
as health and location of test administration).
160 “[T]he Constitution ‘places a substantive restriction on the State’s power to take the life’ of a mentally
retarded offender.” Atkins, 536 U.S. at 321 (quoting Ford v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 399, 405 (1986)); see
Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302, 330 (1989) (“[I]f we held, as a substantive matter, that the Eighth
Amendment prohibits the execution of mentally retarded persons . . . regardless of the procedures followed,
such a rule would fall under the first exception to the general rule of nonretroactivity and would be
applicable to defendants on collateral review.”); see also Tyler v. Cain, 533 U.S. 656, 668 (2001) (O’Connor,
J., concurring).
161 See Appendix I infra (Volume 24, Petitioner Exhibit 33, on Writ Application to the Louisiana Supreme
Court).
162 Id.
159

33

December 5, 2013, ruling dismissing it.” 163 Chester contends the state court “erroneously
applied an inapplicable and inadequate state procedural bar,” noting that on November
21, 2013, Chester’s post-conviction counsel filed a “Notice of Intent to Seek Writ of
Review.” 164 Even assuming Chester has not procedurally defaulted this claim, however,
the Court concludes Chester has failed to demonstrate the Louisiana district court’s
determination that he is not intellectually disabled was: (1) contrary to, or involved an
unreasonable application of, Atkins; or (2) based on an unreasonable determination of
the facts in light of the evidence presented in the state court proceeding. 165 Thus, the Court
will not grant the writ based on this claim.
IV.

Trial Court’s Alleged Errors

Chester alleges the trial court made several errors that deprived him of his right to
a fair trial. The Court notes at the outset that “federal habeas corpus relief does not lie for
errors of state law,” 166 including whether “evidence was ‘incorrectly admitted . . . pursuant
to [Louisiana] law.’” 167 Thus, a federal habeas court may grant a writ of habeas corpus
only if the petitioner demonstrates the state court’s errors “violated the Constitution,
laws, or treaties of the United States.” 168
Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 351–52.
Doc. 1 at 107; R. Doc. 1-4 at 29.
165 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). Chester also contends trial counsel’s failure to subject Chester to additional
neuropsychological testing constituted ineffective assistance of counsel. Even assuming trial counsel’s
failure to do so rendered her performance constitutionally deficient, Chester was not prejudiced by the
error. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687.
166 Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U.S. 780 (1990); see also Pulley v. Harris, 465 U.S. 37, 41 (1984).
167 Estelle v. McGuire, 502 U.S. 62, 67 (1991); see also Derden v. McNeel, 978 F.2d 1453, 1458 (5th Cir.
1992) (“Errors of state law, including evidentiary errors, are not cognizable in habeas corpus.”); Porter v.
Estelle, 709 F.2d 944, 957 (5th Cir. 1983) (“We have repeatedly admonished that we do not sit as a super
state supreme court on a habeas corpus proceeding to review error under state law.”) (quoting Mendiola v.
Estelle, 635 F.2d 487, 491 (5th Cir. 1981)).
168 McGuire, 502 U.S. at 67. In addition to the claims discussed infra, Chester also alleges the trial court
violated his constitutional rights when the court: (1) admitted only portions of letters Chester sent to
Quinice, R. Doc. 1 at 144; (2) denied defense counsel’s attempt to impeach the Pollard sisters based on their
prior juvenile convictions, id. at 167; (3) restricted testimony during the punishment phase of trial, id. at
173; (4) admitted testimony from Rahn Bailey, id. at 176; (5) failed to admonish prospective jurors before
163

164R.

34

A. Bill of particulars amended the morning of trial
Chester and Ratcliff were indicted by a Jefferson Parish, Louisiana grand jury on
April 25, 1996 for the murder of John Adams. 169 The indictment stated:
The Grand Jurors of the State of Louisiana, duly empaneled and
sworn, in and for the body of the Parish if JEFFERSON, in the name and by
the authority of the said State, upon their Oath, present: That one
TEDDY CHESTER, n/m 11/10/77
ELBERT RATCLIFF, n/m 9/30/70
late of the Parish of JEFFERSON, on or about the 27th day of December in
the year of our Lord, One Thousand Nine Hundred and Ninety-Five (1995)
with force and arms, in the Parish of JEFFERSON aforesaid, and within the
jurisdiction of the Twenty-Fourth Judicial District Court of Louisiana, in
and for the Parish of JEFFERSON aforesaid, then and there being violated
R.S. 14:30 in that they did commit first degree murder of John Adams,
contrary to the form of the Statute of the State of Louisiana, in such case
made and provided, and against the peace and dignity of the State. 170
On May 17, 1996, the defense filed a bill of particulars, 171 asking:
If this prosecution is based on LSA R.S. 14:30(6), specify the controlled
substance involved in the transaction, the schedule under which is it [sic]
classified, whether the victim was distributing or purchasing the controlled

releasing them, id. at 152; (6) required Chester to wear shackles throughout the trial, id. at 164; (7) admitted
Chester’s custodial statements, id. at 121; (8) admitted “prejudicial” photographs of the victim, id. at 170;
(9) admitted evidence of Adams’ personal characteristics, id. at 174; (10) allowed the prosecution to discuss
Ratcliff’s custodial statements, id. at 168; and (11) prevented Chester from demonstrating Kaprice Pollard’s
bias on cross-examination, id. at 166. The Court, after reviewing the pleadings, Louisiana Supreme Court’s
holdings on these claims, and the applicable law, finds these claims do not warrant habeas relief.
169 R. 43.
170 Id.
171 A bill of particulars is “[a] formal, detailed statement of the claims or charges brought by a plaintiff or a
prosecutor, usu[ally] filed in response to the defendant’s request for a more specific complaint.” Bill of
Particulars, BLACK’S LAW DICTIONARY (10th ed. 2014). “The bill of particulars has been abolished in federal
civil actions and replaced by the motion for a more definite statement.” Id. (citing FED. R. CIV. P. 12(e)). In
Louisiana,
A motion for a bill of particulars may be filed of right in accordance with Article 521. The
court, on its own motion or on motion of the defendant, may require the district attorney
to furnish a bill of particulars setting forth more specifically the nature and cause of the
charge against the defendant. Supplemental bills of particulars or a new bill may be ordered
by the court at least seven days before the trial begins. When a bill of particulars is
furnished, it shall be filed of record and a copy of the bill shall be given to the defendant.
LA. CODE CRIM. P. 484.

35

dangerous substance and whether the offender was distributing or
purchasing the controlled dangerous substance. 172
The defense asked a similar question on the same date with respect to the penalty phase
of trial. 173 On September 10, 1996, the prosecution responded to the question, stating with
respect to the guilt phase of trial: “Cocaine; 40:967(c). The offender was attempting to
rob the victim.” 174 With respect to the penalty phase, on January 31, 1997, the prosecution
stated: “The defendant was attempting to acquire cocaine, a violation of R.S.
40:967(c).” 175 According to defense counsel, she interpreted these responses to mean the
State alleged Chester had murdered Adams after Chester tried to rob Adams of cocaine. 176
On the morning of trial, May 6, 1997, the prosecution filed a supplemental bill of
particulars for first degree murder, adding another aggregating factor: “While engaged in
the attempted distribution, exchange, or sale of a controlled dangerous substance listed
in the uniform controlled dangerous substance law, and/or during the course of armed
robbery.” 177 The trial court allowed the amendment, over defense counsel’s objection. 178
Chester claims this amendment violated the Sixth, Eighth and Fourteenth
Amendments to the United States Constitution, as his “right to notice was violated when
the prosecution changed the aggravating circumstance it was alleging on the morning of
trial.” 179 According to Chester, “This case featured a bait and switch of statutory elements

R. 54–55.
R. 72–73.
174 R. 114.
175 R. 137–38.
176 R. Doc. 1 at 163.
177 R. 206.
178 R. 440–45, 563.
179 R. Doc. 1 at 161–63.
172
173

36

where Mr. Chester prepared to defend against a robbery of cocaine, only to find on the
morning of trial that he needed to actually prepare a defense for a drug sale.” 180
In opposition, the State submits this issue is moot, as the jury ultimately rejected
the State’s argument that Chester committed the murder while attempting to sell cocaine.
Rather, the jury found the aggravating circumstance that made Chester “death-eligible”
was that Chester “committed the murder during an attempted armed robbery,” the
aggravating factor the State listed in its original bill of particulars. 181 The State argues that
its initial response to Chester’s request for a bill of particulars—that Chester “was
attempting to rob the victim” 182—in addition to Chester’s prior statements to the police,
in which he admits to attempting to sell Adams “bunk,” but alleges Ratcliff attempted to
rob Adams, provided Chester with sufficient notice that he would need to defend against
the allegation that he committed the murder during the commission of a robbery. 183
The Louisiana Supreme Court agreed with the State and found Chester was not
prejudiced by this amended response because Chester’s counsel was aware of the
accusation that Chester had committed the murder during the commission of a
robbery. 184 In his petition to this Court, Chester does not argue he was prejudiced by the
State’s amendment to the bill of particulars, other than to state that “the prejudice in lack
of notice is readily apparent.” 185
Although amending the bill of information the morning of trial is far from best
practice, the Court’s “distaste for the government’s conduct does not . . . warrant a

Id. at 163.
Chester, 724 So. 2d at 1281.
182 R. 114.
183 R. Doc. 27 at 119.
184 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at II, III.
185 R. Doc. 1 at 163.
180
181

37

reversal,” as “an error in administering the discovery rules is not reversible absent a
showing that the error was prejudicial to the substantial rights of the defendant.” 186 The
Court finds no error in the Louisiana Supreme Court’s conclusion that Chester was not
prejudiced by the State’s amendment to the bill of information the morning of trial, and
as a result, the Court concludes the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding with respect to
this claim was not (1) contrary to, and did not involve an unreasonable application of,
clearly established Federal law, as determined by the U.S. Supreme Court, nor was it (2)
based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in
the state court proceeding. 187
B. Trial Court’s Statements During Voir Dire
Chester next complains he was prejudiced by the trial court’s statements to the jury
during voir dire. Specifically, Chester alleges he was prejudiced when the trial court judge
told the initial nine jurors selected that they would be sequestered and informed them of
the location of their sequestration, adding:
All right. If you want to make a phone call, just let somebody know what’s
going on, that that’s where you’ll be staying. Ask them not to repeat that to
anybody. We don’t, we don’t want the Press or anybody to know where
you’re staying, or the defendant. It’s just better for you just to have some
privacy; okay? 188
Chester contends this statement and an instruction to the prospective jurors that
they not disclose their addresses in open court “were indisputably reversible error,” as the
statements demonstrate Chester did not receive the “full protection of the presumption

United States v. Barrentine, 591 F.2d 1069, 1077 (5th Cir. 1979) (quoting United States v. James, 495
F.2d 434 (5th Cir. 1974)) (affirming the defendants’ conviction, even though the prosecution failed to
disclose a government witness in compliance with the court’s order granting the defendants’ motion for a
bill of particulars identifying any alleged co-conspirators who had not been indicted because “from the
beginning appellants suspected that Bland was the government’s informer”).
187 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
188 R. 1188.
186

38

of innocence.” 189 On direct appeal, the Louisiana Supreme Court found this claim lacked
merit, finding that the trial court’s statements, when viewed “in the context of the entire
colloquy,” made clear that the trial court did not single Chester out in the jury’s presence
or infer that she did not want Chester to know where the jurors were staying because he
was dangerous. Rather “the trial judge explained that the reason for secrecy was for the
jurors’ privacy and to avoid communication with people in general, the press, the jurors’
families as well as [Chester].” 190 The Court agrees with the Louisiana Supreme Court that
this claim lacks merit.
C. Jury Selection
Chester next contends the Louisiana trial court deprived him of his right to be tried
by a fair and impartial jury when it allowed Leslie Dawson to serve on the jury. 191 Citing
to Ross v. Oklahoma, 192 Chester argues Dawson’s presence on the jury violated his Sixth
and Eighth Amendment rights.
“[T]he Constitution presupposes that a jury selected from a fair cross section of the
community is impartial, regardless of the mix of individual viewpoints actually
represented on the jury, so long as the jurors can conscientiously and properly carry out
their sworn duty to apply the law to the facts of the particular case.” 193 In Wainwright v.
Witt, the U.S. Supreme Court held that “the proper standard for determining when a
prospective juror may be excluded for cause because of his or her views on capital
punishment . . . is whether the juror’s views would ‘prevent or substantially impair the

R. Doc. 1 at 139–40.
Chester I, 724 So. 2d at 1283–84.
191 R. Doc. 1 at 160.
192 487 U.S. 81 (1988); see also Morgan v. Illinois, 504 U.S. 719 (1992); Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U.S.
510 (1968).
193 Lockhart v. McCree, 476 U.S. 162, 184 (1986).
189

190

39

performance of his duties as a juror in accordance with his instructions and his oath.’” 194
To serve on a capital jury, a person must be willing to consider all potential sentencing
options, in this case both death and life imprisonment. 195 If the prospective juror’s
opinions would prevent her from considering any sentencing option, then she must be
stricken for cause. 196
During jury selection, both parties questioned the members of the venire about
their positions on the death penalty. Dawson was asked what her position on the death
penalty was, to which she responded:
Well, I believe if someone premeditated, it’s a premeditated situation, that
I don’t feel why should they have even life imprisonment? If they take
somebody else’s life and this was thought about beforehand, if they’re going
to do this act why should they get the opportunity to life[?]” 197
Thereafter, the following exchange took place:
Q: So if the State of Louisiana proves a murder with specific intent, that they
say—as we say—premeditated is not the word in Louisiana—but
premeditated, would you—you’re saying you would never be able to
consider life imprisonment for that?
A: I wouldn’t say never.
Q: Okay. What sort of information would you have to hear, what sort of
evidence would you have to hear to be able to consider life imprisonment?
A: Well, it’s kind of hard to answer that, to pinpoint one specific thing. I
mean I think there’s two sides to every story, so I’d have to know all the facts
before I could do it, of course. But I do believe in it.
Q: Do you subscribe to the theory, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”?
A: Pretty much. . . . Well, I mean there’s always going to be some
circumstances that will, you know, make me say differently, but I do believe
in it.
Q: But you can’t think of any of those circumstances?
A: When you were asking the other gentlemen about the age [whether the
defendant’s youth would be a factor], you know, I don’t feel like that’s a
469 U.S. 412, 424 (1985).
Lockhart, 476 U.S. at 176–77; Uttecht v. Brown, 551 U.S. 1, 8 (2007); see also Gray v. Mississippi, 481
U.S. 648 (1987).
196 Lockhart, 476 U.S. at 176–77.
197 R. 609.
194
195

40

factor. I feel like if you’re performing an adult crime, murder, then you need
to pay the price. . . .
Q: What about the fact that the defendant was raised in an abusive alcoholic
environment, would that make a difference?
A: I don’t know. Because to me that’s like putting the blame on someone
else, “This poor person, because of what they were up against.” I just think
back of years ago, I mean I think everything now is out of whack. I mean
years ago when our parents were coming up and brought up in the
Depression, they didn’t go around killing people like they do today. That’s
just something you didn’t do. And now everything’s acceptable. 198
Defense counsel then moved to strike Dawson for cause, which the Court denied. 199
Chester raised this issue in his direct appeal to the Louisiana Supreme Court. The
court found no error in the trial court’s ruling, noting “Ms. Dawson did not rule out the
consideration of a life sentence.” 200
A trial court’s “predominant function in determining juror bias involves credibility
findings whose basis cannot be easily discerned from an appellate record. These are the
‘factual issues’ that are subject to § 2254(d).” 201 Although Dawson was not able to
articulate the specific mitigating evidence that would sway her in favor of a life sentence
rather than one of death, she at no point indicated she would be incapable of considering
each potential sentencing option, including a life sentence. Thus, the Court finds this
claim lacks merit. 202
R. 609–11.
R. 614–15.
200 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at I.
201 Wainwright v. Witt, 469 U.S. 412, 429 (1985).
202 More troubling to the Court is the trial court’s failure to strike venirewoman Galloway for cause. As
Louisiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Calogero explained in his dissent on the denial of a rehearing in
Chester’s direct appeal,
Although Ms. Galloway initially indicated that she could consider the aggravating and
mitigating circumstances in determining whether a life or death sentence should be
imposed, she made it unequivocally clear that she would vote for the death penalty in the
case of intentional murder. Galloway specifically stated, “If [the defendant] is proven guilty
of murder with specific intent, death penalty.” There was no further effort by the state or
the trial court to rehabilitate this venirewoman. Although during the state’s examination
Ms. Galloway indicated that she could listen to the mitigating factors, and in an appropriate
case return a life or death sentence, her pronouncement that the death penalty was the
198
199

41

D. The state trial court’s jury charges
Chester argues the state trial court’s jury instructions during the guilt phase of trial
violated his constitutional rights. Specifically, Chester contends the state trial court’s
instructions regarding Chester’s right to testify own his own behalf, the burden of proof,
commutation, and aggregating and mitigation factors, as well as the state trial court’s
failure to instruct the jury regarding Chester’s theory of defense, violated Chester’s Sixth
Amendment right to a fair trial.
1. The state trial court’s instruction regarding Chester’s right to
testify on his own behalf
Chester did not testify on his own behalf at trial. Following closing arguments, the
trial court charged the jury as follows with respect to Chester’s decision not to testify:
The defendant is permitted by law to testify in his own behalf. When he does
not avail himself of this privilege, you should not consider this fact, or
permit it to raise a presumption of guilt against him, and you should
consider in determining his guilt or innocence only those facts testified to
and brought out in the trial of this case. 203
Chester argues the trial court should have instructed the jury that Chester has a
Fifth Amendment right not to testify and that the trial court’s instructions impermissibly
drew the jury’s attention to Chester’s decision not to testify. 204 He points to the U.S.
Supreme Court’s holding in Carter v. Kentucky, in which the U.S. Supreme Court held
the trial court erred in refusing to instruct jury that defendant had a right not to testify
and that the jury could draw no adverse inferences from his decision not to testify. 205
appropriate penalty when a person committed murder with specific intent cas[ts] doubt on
her ability to consider life in this case, where a conviction of first degree murder would
necessarily require a finding of specific intent to kill.
Chester I, 724 So. 2d at 1290–91. However, Chester does not raise the issue in his habeas petition before
this Court; therefore, the Court does not consider it.
203 R. 1646.
204 R. Doc. 1 at 154–55.
205 450 U.S. 288 (1981).

42

Ultimately, in Carter, the U.S. Supreme Court held that “the Fifth Amendment requires
that a criminal trial judge . . . give a ‘no-adverse-inference’ jury instruction when
requested by a defendant to do so.” 206
In opposition, the State points to the U.S. Supreme Court’s discussion in Boyde v.
California, wherein the Court explained:
jurors do not sit in solitary isolation booths paring instructions for subtle
shades of meaning in the same way that lawyers might. Differences among
them in interpretation of instructions may be thrashed out in the
deliberative process, with commonsense understanding of the instructions
in the light of all that has taken place at the trial likely to prevail over
technical hairsplitting. 207
The Louisiana Supreme Court found Chester’s claim involved the kind of “technical
hairsplitting” the U.S. Supreme Court cautioned against in Boyde. The Louisiana
Supreme Court explained: “Read in its entirety, [the trial court’s jury instructions]
instructs the jurors that they are not to draw any inference from defendant’s decision not
to testify.” 208 This Court agrees.
Further, the facts in Carter are readily distinguishable from this case. In Carter,
the district court refused entirely to instruct the jury regarding the defendant’s right not
to testify on his own behalf entirely. In this case, the district court properly instructed the
jury that Chester’s decision not to testify should not be considered, and that the jury
should not “permit it to raise a presumption of guilt against him,” 209 in compliance with
Carter. 210 As a result, the Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding is not (1)

Id. at 300.
Boyde v. California, 494 U.S. 370, 380–81 (1990).
208 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XVI, XVII.
209 R. 1646.
210 Carter, 450 U.S. at 303 (“No judge can prevent jurors from speculating about why a defendant stands
mute in the face of a criminal accusation, but a judge can, and must, if requested to do so, use the unique
power of the jury instruction to reduce that speculation to a minimum.”).
206
207

43

contrary to and did not involve an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal
law, as determined by the U.S. Supreme Court, nor was it (2) based on an unreasonable
determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the state court
proceeding. 211
2. The state trial court’s instruction regarding the burden of
proof
Chester next complains the state trial court’s jury instruction regarding the
definition of reasonable doubt “reduce[d] the State’s burden of proof below the standard
set by [the U.S. Supreme Court in] In re Winship.” 212 According to Chester, the court
erroneously placed an obligation on Chester to call witnesses and present a defense by
instructing the jury that:
Witnesses are weighed and not counted. Your function is to determine the
facts, and this is not done by counting noses. The test is not which side
brings the greater quantity of evidence, but rather, which witnesses and
which evidence appeals to your minds as being the most convincing. 213
The Louisiana Supreme Court held that “review of the instruction reveals that it
tracks the language in the Louisiana Judge’s Criminal Bench Book, Vol I, § 303 (1993)
and did not include any terms which would mislead the jury.” 214 The Court finds the
Louisiana Supreme Court’s resolution of this claim was reasonable and not otherwise
contrary to AEDPA or U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
3. The state trial court’s instruction regarding commutation
Next, Chester submits the trial court’s instruction regarding the fact that the
governor of Louisiana has the power to commute life and death sentences violated his

See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
R. Doc. 1 at 155 (citing In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358 (1870)).
213 R. 1644.
214 Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XIX.
211

212

44

Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. 215 With respect to this claim, the Louisiana
Supreme Court found it lacked merit, as “[t]he instruction tracked the language of the
statute” and that the Louisiana Supreme Court had “recently found that the statute is
constitutional.” 216 The Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s resolution of this claim
was reasonable and not otherwise contrary to AEDPA or U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
4. The state trial court’s instruction on aggravating and
mitigation factors
Chester next contends the trial court instructed the jury that it must “weigh” the
aggravating circumstances against the mitigating circumstances in determining the
appropriate sentence in violation of his Fifth, Sixth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendment
rights. 217 The trial court provided the following charge to the jury at the close of the
sentencing phase:
You are required to consider the existence of aggravating and mitigating
circumstances in deciding which sentence should be imposed. Each
individual juror shall weigh the aggravating circumstances found
unanimously to exist and any mitigating circumstances found by the
individual jurors to exist. . . .
Even if you find the existence of an aggravating circumstance, you must also
consider any mitigating circumstances before you decide that a sentence of
death should be imposed. . . .
However, in addition to those specifically provided mitigating
circumstances, you must also consider any other relevant mitigating
circumstances which are defined. You may consider any other relevant
circumstances which you feel should mitigate the severity of the penalty
imposed. 218

R. Doc. 1 at 157.
Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XXXII (citing State v. Loyd, 96-1805 (La. 2/13/97), 689 So. 2d
1321).
217 R. Doc. 1 at 186.
218 R. at 1869.
215

216

45

According to Chester, this is an incorrect statement of Louisiana law, and “at best,
unclear.” 219
The Louisiana Supreme Court found this claim to be without merit because
“Although the court used the word ‘weigh’ in instructing the jurors, the instruction did
not suggest that the jurors balance the number of aggravating circumstances against the
number of mitigating circumstances.” 220 The Louisiana Supreme Court went on to state:
“The record supports a conclusion that the jury understood any weighing as a qualitative
rather than a quantitative process.” 221 This Court agrees with the Louisiana Supreme
Court and finds its resolution of this claim was reasonable and not otherwise contrary to
AEDPA or U.S. Supreme Court precedent. 222
5. The state trial court’s failure to instruct the jury regarding
Chester’s theory of defense
Finally, Chester argues the state trial court’s failure to instruct the jury that a
substance falsely represented as a controlled dangerous substance is not a controlled
dangerous substance under Louisiana law. 223 The Louisiana Supreme Court denied this
claim as moot. The Louisiana Supreme Court explained:
Defense counsel argued that defendant admitted in his second statement
that he had only fake cocaine or bunk on his person; however, the
prosecutor argued that in his first statement, defendant stated he was
attempting to sell crack cocaine and that defendant changed his story from
selling crack to selling “bunk” to avoid implicating himself in criminal
activity. Nonetheless, the trial judge allowed defense counsel to argue the
R. Doc. 1 at 187.
Chester, Unpublished Appx. at XXXI.
221 Id.
222 See State v. Sepulvado, 93-2692, (La. 4/8/96), 672 So. 2d 158, 168, n.7 (instruction that jurors must
weigh the mitigating factors against the aggravating circumstances found was not incorrect when charges
were read as a whole, as the instruction did not tell jurors to balance the number of mitigating factors
against the number of aggravating factors).
223 R. Doc. 1 at 156.
219

220

46

issue in closing argument, thus fully informing the jury of the defense.
Moreover, considering that the jury only found the aggravating
circumstance of attempted armed robbery during the penalty phase it
appears that jurors completely rejected the state’s drug transaction
scenario. Therefore, the trial judge’s failure to read the special charge did
not prejudice defendant. 224
This Court agrees with the Louisiana Supreme Court and finds its resolution of this
claim was reasonable and not otherwise contrary to AEDPA or U.S. Supreme Court
precedent.
V.

Juror Misconduct
A. Improper experimentation

During deliberations following the guilt phase of trial, jurors requested access to
“all physical evidence,” including photographs of the crime scene and a mannequin head
that was used as a prop in the State’s case-in-chief. According to Chester, “In a postconviction interview, foreman John Guillot revealed that jurors attempted to identify the
bullet trajectory for themselves by experimenting in deliberations with the State’s
mannequin prop.” 225 Guillot explained the jurors used the prop to determine whether
Chester was in fact the shooter. 226 Chester argues this violated his Sixth Amendment right
to a fair trial. 227
On review, the Louisiana Supreme Court held that “Because Chester does not
allege that jurors conducted any experiment which effectively gave rise to evidence other
than that presented at trial, he fails to show any basis for examining the jury’s
deliberations as to this issue.” 228 In support of his argument that the Louisiana Supreme

Chester I, Unpublished Appendix, at XVIII.
R. Doc. 1 at 101–02.
226 Id.
227 Id. at 101.
228 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 350–51.
224
225

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Court’s holding with respect to this claim is unreasonable, Chester points to United States
v. Beach, 229 a case from the Fourth Circuit. In Beach, the Fourth Circuit explained:
A jury may not conduct experiments which have the effect of putting them
in possession of evidence not offered at the trial. Jurors conducting such an
experiment are guilty of misconduct warranting a new trial, unless in the
circumstances no prejudice results, as where the verdict has already been
agreed upon and is clearly right. Improper experiments include
experiments with firearms to test the truth of testimony, and ascertainment
by jurors for themselves whether voices can be heard out-of-doors, whether
signatures can be perfectly traced, or whether a worn shoe would make
tracks described at the trial. 230
Even assuming the rationale in Beach applies, which the Louisiana Supreme Court
found it did not, 231 Chester has not pointed to any U.S. Supreme Court holding that such
juror experimentation violates the Sixth Amendment. The Court will not issue the writ on
this basis.
B. Consulting the Bible
Again pointing to the post-Judgment statement from Guillot, Chester contends a
female juror, presumably Iris Gravelee, 232 made her decision to vote in favor of a death
sentence only after consulting her Bible. 233 According to Guillot, Gravelee initially
indicated she would vote for a life sentence before the jury suspended deliberations for
the evening, but when the jury reconvened in the morning, Gravelee had “changed her
vote to death” and had “made her decision with her Bible.” 234

296 F.2d 153, 158 (4th Cir. 1961).
Id.
231 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 351 (“However, a review of Beach reveals that the rule discussed therein is more
nuanced than Chester portrays.”).
232 As the Louisiana Supreme Court explained: “Post-conviction counsel has deduced this is the juror at
issue because those who have recounted her actions and statements have consistently described her as ‘an
older female;’ of the jurors, Gravlee best fit that description.” Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 350 n.7.
233 R. Doc. 1 at 100.
234 R. Doc. 1-2 at 21–27.
229

230

48

Chester contends this “external influence” prejudiced him and deprived him of his
Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial. Chester points to Oliver v. Quarterman, 235 in
support of his assertion. In Oliver, the Fifth Circuit explained that a Bible will serve as a
particularly powerful influence when consulted by jurors during penalty deliberations in
a capital trial “precisely because it may . . . influence[] the jurors simply to answer the
questions in a manner that would ensure a sentence of death instead of conducting a
thorough inquiry into the[] factual areas.” 236
The state district court concluded Chester could not present evidence related to
this claim, applying Louisiana Code of Evidence article 606(B), Louisiana’s juror shield
law. On review, the Louisiana Supreme Court found the district court’s application of the
juror shield law was erroneous, but nevertheless affirmed the outcome as the Louisiana
Supreme Court found the juror’s consultation of the Bible did not have a “substantial and
injurious effect on the verdict.” 237 The Louisiana Supreme Court explained:
Chester fails to make the required showing of a substantial and injurious
effect on the verdict because, although he asserts his post-conviction
interviews with Foreperson Guillot and Juror Lawson contained detailed
descriptions of their observations of Gravlee’s consultation of a Bible after
an overnight recess, which allegedly led Gravelee to decide her penalty
phase vote, Chester has not provided the necessary proof to substantiate his
allegations. Even setting aside whatever practical concerns may arise from
the fact that Gravlee has since passed away, no affidavits from Guillot or
Lawson were attached as exhibits to the instant application. Because

541 F.3d 329, 336 (5th Cir. 2008).
Id. at 340.
237 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 351 (citing LA. CODE EVID. art. 606(B) (“Upon an inquiry into the validity of a
verdict or indictment, a juror may not testify as to any matter or statement occurring during the course of
the jury’s deliberations or to the effect of anything upon his or any other juror’s mind or emotions as
influencing him to assent to or dissent from the verdict or indictment or concerning his mental processes
in connection therewith, except that a juror may testify on the question whether any outside influence was
improperly brought to bear upon any juror, and, in criminal cases only, whether extraneous prejudicial
information was improperly brought to the jury’s attention. Nor may his affidavit or evidence of any
statement by him concerning a matter about which he would be precluded from testifying be received for
these purposes.”)).
235

236

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Chester has not substantiated his assertions, he fails to show any grounds
for remand. 238
Chester contends this holding was an unreasonable factual conclusion, as the
Louisiana Supreme Court simultaneously held that (1) the state district court erred in
barring Chester from presenting evidence with respect to this claim, but that (2) Chester
had failed to present sufficient evidence in support of the claim. 239
Noting the contradictory nature of the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding, on
January 16, 2018, Chester filed a motion for an evidentiary hearing in this Court, arguing
he is entitled to a hearing on, inter alia, his claim that Ms. Gravlee’s consultation of her
Bible and subsequent vote in favor of the death sentence violated his Sixth Amendment
rights. 240 Under AEDPA, requests for an evidentiary hearing are evaluated under the
provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(2). 241 AEDPA allows a federal district court to hold an
evidentiary hearing if two conditions are met: (1) the petition’s factual allegations, if true,
would entitle the petitioner to relief; and (2) for reasons beyond the petitioner’s control,
the factual claims were not previously the subject of a full and fair hearing in the state
court. 242
The second factor, that the state did not afford Chester a full and fair hearing, is
met in this case. Louisiana Code of Criminal Procedure articles 926 and 928 set forth the
pleading requirements for post-conviction petitioners. These articles explain that a
petitioner’s burden in his initial petition is to set forth the factual basis of his claims with

Id.
R. Doc. 1 at 102.
240 R. Doc. 43.
241 See McDonald v. Johnson, 139 F.3d 1056, 1059 (5th Cir. 1998).
242 2254(e)(2); see Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 312–13 (1963); Hall v. Quarterman, 534 F.3d 365, 367–
68 (5th Cir. 2008); Blue v. Thaler, 665 F.3d 647, 656 (5th Cir. 2011) (citing Clark v. Johnson, 202 F.3d 760,
766 (5th Cir. 2000); Moawad v. Anderson, 143 F.3d 942, 947–48 (5th Cir. 1998); Murphy v. Johnson, 205
F.3d 809, 816 (5th Cir. 2000)).
238
239

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reasonable particularity and to plead claims which, if established, would entitle him to
relief. 243 In turn, if issues of fact exist that cannot be resolved on the pleadings alone,
Article 930 requires the Louisiana district court to hold an evidentiary hearing. 244 Thus,
under Louisiana law, there is no requirement that a post-conviction petitioner submit
affidavits in support of his well-pleaded claims, and therefore, Chester’s failure to attach
Guillot’s affidavit to his state court petition does not bar this Court from considering the
claim.
Having found that Chester’s factual claims were not previously the subject of a full
and fair hearing in the state court for reasons beyond Chester’s control, the Court now
considers whether Chester has alleged facts that, if taken as true, would entitle him to

Specifically, Article 926 states:
A. An application for post-conviction relief shall be by written petition addressed to the
district court for the parish in which the petitioner was convicted. A copy of the judgment
of conviction and sentence shall be annexed to the petition, or the petition shall allege that
a copy has been demanded and refused.
B. The petition shall allege:
(1) The name of the person in custody and the place of custody, if known, or if not
known, a statement to that effect;
(2) The name of the custodian, if known, or if not known, a designation or
description of him as far as possible;
(3) A statement of the grounds upon which relief is sought, specifying with
reasonable particularity the factual basis for such relief;
(4) A statement of all prior applications for writs of habeas corpus or for postconviction relief filed by or on behalf of the person in custody in connection with
his present custody; and
(5) All errors known or discoverable by the exercise of due diligence.
C. The application shall be signed by the petitioner and be accompanied by his affidavit
that the allegations contained in the petition are true to the best of his information and
belief.
D. The petitioner shall use the uniform application for post-conviction relief approved by
the Supreme Court of Louisiana. If the petitioner fails to use the uniform application, the
court may provide the petitioner with the uniform application and require its use.
E. Inexcusable failure of the petitioner to comply with the provisions of this Article may be
a basis for dismissal of his application.
LA. CODE OF CRIM. P. 926. Article 928 states: “The application may be dismissed without an answer if the
application fails to allege a claim which, if established, would entitle the petitioner to relief.” LA. CODE OF
CRIM. P. 928.
244 LA. CODE OF CRIM. P. 930(A) (“An evidentiary hearing for the taking of testimony or other evidence shall
be ordered whenever there are questions of fact which cannot properly be resolved pursuant to Articles 928
and 929.”).
243

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relief. In his petition, Chester alleges that while deliberations during the penalty phase of
trial were suspended overnight, a juror consulted her Bible outside of the jury room, and
the next day changed her vote to death as a result.
Under U.S. Supreme Court case law, the Sixth Amendment forbids a jury from
being exposed to external influences during its deliberations. 245 In Oliver, the case to
which Chester points in support of his claim, the petitioner appealed the district court’s
denial of a writ of habeas corpus, arguing the jury violated the Sixth Amendment by
considering passages from the Bible during the sentencing phase of its deliberations. The
Fifth Circuit held that the jury’s consideration of the Bible, which was not in evidence,
violated the Sixth Amendment. The Fifth Circuit nevertheless affirmed the district court’s
denial of the writ, stating that “[a]lthough the jury improperly consulted the Bible,” the
petitioner was not entitled to a writ of habeas corpus, because the petitioner did “not
present[] clear and convincing evidence to rebut [the Louisiana court’s] factual finding”
“that the Bible did not influence the jury’s decision.” 246
The factual underpinnings of Oliver are significantly more troublesome than the
facts Chester alleges, and, even under that scenario, the Fifth Circuit affirmed the denial
of the writ. In Oliver, several jurors brought Bibles into the jury room with them.
Moreover, during deliberations, one juror read several passages aloud to his fellow jurors.
As the Fifth Circuit in Oliver explained:
245 See Parker v. Gladden, 385 U.S. 363, 364-65 (1966) (stating that “the evidence developed against a
defendant shall come from the witness stand in a public courtroom where there is full judicial protection of
the defendant’s right of confrontation, of cross-examination, and of counsel” (internal quotation marks
omitted)); Turner v. Louisiana, 379 U.S. 466, 472 (1965) (“The requirement that a jury’s verdict ‘must be
based upon the evidence developed at the trial’ goes to the fundamental integrity of all that is embraced in
the constitutional concept of trial by jury.”); Remmer v. United States, 347 U.S. 227, 229 (1954) (stating
that “private communication, contact, or tampering” with the jury is presumptively prejudicial); Mattox v.
United States, 146 U.S. 140, 149 (1892) (stating that “in capital cases [ ] the jury should pass upon the case
free from external causes tending to disturb the exercise of deliberated and unbiased judgment”).
246 541 F.3d 329, 331 (5th Cir. 2008).

52

The question before us is not whether a juror must leave his or her moral
values at the door or even whether a juror may consult the Bible for his or
her own personal inspiration during the deliberation process. This case is
also not about whether jurors must forget that, generally, the Bible includes
the concept of an “eye for an eye.” Therefore, we need not address these
issues. Instead, here, several jurors collectively consulted a Bible, in the jury
room, and likely compared the facts of this case to the passage that teaches
that capital punishment is appropriate for a person who strikes another over
the head with an object and causes the person’s death. 247
Chester’s allegation that Ms. Gravlee voted for death only after consulting her Bible
does not establish a Sixth Amendment violation under Oliver. Moreover, although the
U.S. Supreme Court has held the Sixth Amendment forbids a jury from being exposed to
external influences during its deliberations, it is not clearly established that a juror’s
consultation of the Bible outside of the deliberation room constitutes such an external
influence.
On this point, the lack of U.S. Supreme Court precedent addressing the issue,
Justice Thomas’s dissent from the denial of certiorari in Hurst v. Joyner is instructive. 248
In Hurst, the petitioner asserted that his constitutional rights were violated when a juror
asked her father where she could look in the Bible for passages about the death penalty.
The petitioner attached the affidavit of juror Christina Foster, in which she stated she had
“often had lunch with [her] father who worked near the courthouse” during the trial and,
before deliberations, had asked him “where [she] could look in the Bible for help and
guidance in making [her] decision for between life and death.” Her father gave her “the
section in the Bible where [she] could find ‘an eye for an eye.’” Based on this background,
the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina denied the writ. 249 The

Id. at 340 (emphasis added).
Hurst v. Joyner, 757 F.3d 389, 400 (4th Cir. 2014), cert. denied sub nom. Joyner v. Barnes, 135 S. Ct.
2643 (2015).
249 Hurst v. Lassiter, No. 10-725, 2013 WL 1338862 (M.D.N.C. Mar. 31, 2013), rev’d sub. nom. Hurst v.
Joyner, 757 F.3d 389 (4th Cir. 2014).
247

248

53

Fourth Circuit reversed, finding Ms. Foster had inappropriately consulted the Bible in
violation of the Sixth Amendment. 250 The State then filed a petition for certiorari, which
the U.S. Supreme Court denied. 251
Justice Thomas, who was joined by Justice Alito, dissented from the Court’s denial
of certiorari, explaining:
One of the all too common errors that some federal courts make in applying
§ 2254(d) is to look to their own precedents as the source of “clearly
established Federal law” for purposes of § 2254(d)(1), even though that
provision expressly limits that category to Supreme Court precedents.
The Fourth Circuit’s decision in Barnes—upon which it relied in Hurst—
committed the same error. That court reasoned that our decision in
Remmer “created a rebuttable presumption of prejudice applying to
communications or contact between a third party and a juror concerning
the matter pending before the jury.” But Remmer offered no specific
guidance on what constituted “the matter pending before the jury.”
Nevertheless, the Court of Appeals turned to its own precedents to
determine whether the moral and spiritual implications of the death penalty
as a general matter constituted “the matter pending before the jury.” It cited
its earlier decisions in Stockton v. Virginia, 852 F.2d 740 (4th Cir. 1988),
and United States v. Cheek, 94 F.3d 136 (4th Cir. 1996), as setting forth a
“‘minimal standard’” under which “[a]n unauthorized contact between a
third party and a juror concerns the matter pending before the jury when it
is ‘of such a character as to reasonably draw into question the integrity of
the verdict.’” Neither of those decisions is a precedent of this Court. 252
Justice Thomas explained that he would have granted the petition for certiorari to correct
what he perceived as the Fourth Circuit’s error—applying its own case law to overturn a
state court judgment. Instead, the Fourth Circuit could overturn the state court judgment
only based on U.S. Supreme Court precedent, as AEDPA requires. 253
Hurst, 757 F.3d at 398.
Joyner v. Barnes, 135 S. Ct. 2643 (2015).
252 Id. at 2646.
253 Notably, the Fifth Circuit in Oliver, like the Fourth Circuit in Hurst, relied heavily on the U.S. Supreme
Court’s holding in Remmer in concluding a juror’s use of a Bible during deliberations violates a defendant’s
Sixth Amendment rights. Compare Oliver, 541 F.3d at 335–37 (“Stemming from these clearly established
Supreme Court precedents, it is clear that the prohibition of external influences from Remmer, Turner, and
Parker applies to this factual scenario.”) with Joyner, 757 F.3d at 396, 398 (“Accordingly, we hold, as we
did in Barnes, that the state court’s failure to apply the Remmer presumption and to conduct an evidentiary
250
251

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Because granting a writ of habeas corpus based on this claim—specifically, that a
single juror’s consultation of the Bible outside of the jury room violates the Sixth
Amendment—would be an extension of both U.S. Supreme Court and Fifth Circuit
precedent, the Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s disposition of this claim was
not was contrary to or an unreasonable application of the Supreme Court precedents
applicable to juror-influence claims, and this Court will not issue the writ on this basis.
VI.

Sufficiency of the Evidence

Chester next contends the evidence against him was not sufficient to support his
conviction and death sentence. 254 “[A] federal court may not overturn a state court
decision rejecting a sufficiency of the evidence challenge simply because the federal court
disagrees with the state court. The federal court instead may do so only if the state court
decision was ‘objectively unreasonable.’” 255
In this case, at trial, the State presented the testimony of Quinice and Kaprice
Pollard, both of whom testified that Chester confessed that he shot Adams. Further,
although the validity of the testimony and forensic evidence have since come into
question, at trial the State also presented testimony that: (1) Chester had Adams’ blood
on his hat, and (2) the only way Chester could have gotten Adams’ blood on him is if he
were the shooter. In determining whether the evidence presented at trial is sufficient to
sustain a conviction, the Court must draw all inferences in favor of upholding the jury’s
verdict:

hearing in light of this showing was contrary to or an unreasonable application of the Supreme Court
precedents applicable to juror-influence claims.”); see also Oliver, 541 F.3d at 336 (“Although there are no
Fifth Circuit cases directly on point, language from the Eleventh, First, and Sixth Circuits bolsters this
conclusion.”).
254 R. Doc. 1 at 171.
255 Cavazos v. Smith, 565 U.S. 1, 2 (2011) (per curiam).

55

Unless the evidence is of such quality and weight that reasonable and
impartial jurors could not arrive at such a verdict, the findings of the jury
must be upheld. [The Court] may not reweigh the evidence, re-evaluate the
credibility of the witnesses, nor substitute our reasonable factual inferences
for the jury’s reasonable inferences. [The Court] must view the evidence in
the light most favorable to upholding the jury’s verdict and may only reverse
if the evidence points so strongly and overwhelmingly in favor of one party
that the court believes that reasonable men could not arrive at a contrary
conclusion. 256
Based on the evidence offered at trial, the Court concludes the Louisiana Supreme
Court’s determination that the State presented sufficient evidence of Chester’s guilt is not
objectively unreasonable.
VII.

Eighth Amendment Claims

Chester complains that solitary confinement and the death penalty constitute cruel
and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. 257 Without such a
pronunciation from the U.S. Supreme Court, this Court finds Chester’s Eighth
Amendment claims lack merit.
VIII. Cumulative Error Claim
Chester argues his trial was so filled with error as to deprive him of his right to a
fair trial. 258 He contends the Louisiana Supreme Court’s failure to view each of his claims
for cumulative error was contrary to clearly established Federal law, pointing to Derden
v. McNeel, a case in which the Fifth Circuit recognized an independent claim based on
cumulative error. 259 In Derden, the Fifth Circuit explained the cumulative error doctrine
applies only where “(1) the individual errors involved matters of constitutional
dimensions rather than mere violations of state law; (2) the errors were not procedurally
256 Douglas v. DynMcDermott Petroleum Operations Co., 144 F.3d 364, 369 (5th Cir. 1998) (citing Ham
Marine, Inc. v. Dresser Indus., Inc., 72 F.3d 454, 459 (5th Cir. 1995)).
257 R. Doc. 1 at 187, 193–201.
258 Id. at 189.
259 978 F.2d 1453, 1454 (5th Cir. 1992).

56

defaulted for habeas purposes; and (3) the errors ‘so infected the entire trial that the
resulting conviction violates due process.’” 260 Although some U.S. Courts of Appeals have
recognized the cumulative error doctrine, 261 the U.S. Supreme Court has not explicitly
done so. Thus, the Louisiana Supreme Court’s failure to apply the doctrine to Chester’s
case was not contrary to clearly established Federal law, as articulated by the U.S.
Supreme Court, and the Court will not grant Chester a writ of habeas corpus on this basis.
IX.

Chester’s Ineffective Assistance Claims

At trial, the State based its case against Chester on: (1) the theory that the only way
Chester’s cap could have gotten blood on it was if Chester was positioned directly behind
Adams when the gun was fired, not in the rear passenger seat, as Chester stated to police;
(2) the argument that the DNA found on Chester’s cap was Adams’, and (3) testimony
from Quinice and Kaprice Pollard, both of whom testified that Chester confessed to
shooting Adams. In addition, the State rested its theory with respect to the blood spatter
evidence on: (1) the DNA testing done on Chester’s cap, 262 and (2) Sergeant Thornton’s
testimony that blood spatter from a gunshot wound “blows back” in the direction from
which the shot was fired. 263 Chester’s counsel presented a single witness to testify on his
behalf during the guilt phase.

Id. (quoting Cupp v. Naughten, 414 U.S. 141, 147 (1973)).
See, e.g., Brown v. Sirmons, 515 F.3d 1072, 1097 (10th Cir. 2008) (“A cumulative-error analysis
aggregates all errors found to be harmless and analyzes whether their cumulative effect on the outcome of
the trial is such that collectively they can no longer be determined to be harmless.”); Parle v. Runnels, 505
F.3d 922, 927 (9th Cir. 2007) (“Under traditional due process principles, cumulative error warrants habeas
relief only where the errors have ‘so infected the trial with unfairness as to make the resulting conviction a
denial of due process.’” (quoting Donnelly, 416 U.S. at 643)).
262 Chester contends he never “conceded” that the cap found at his home was his. This Court finds, however,
that the Louisiana Supreme Court’s conclusion that the Raiders cap in fact belonged to Chester is entitled
to deference.
263 The Court notes no independent testing of the cab was possible, as the cab was returned to the cab
company the morning after the murder and cleaned shortly thereafter. R. 1364–66. State investigators did
not photograph the back passenger seat of the cab before releasing the cab back to the King Cab Company.
260
261

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In his petition for habeas in state court and before this Court, Chester argues his
trial counsel rendered ineffective assistance of counsel during the guilt and penalty phases
of his trial. In support of this claim, Chester presents several pieces of evidence discovered
by his state habeas counsel:
(1) Evidence that Chester’s blood can be scientifically excluded from the
blood drops found on his cap; 264
(2) Evidence that the blood found on Chester’s cap was likely not Adams’
blood and that the statistical probability the blood sample contained
Adams’ blood is a “scientific nullity”; 265
(3) Evidence that Sergeant Thornton’s “description of the phenomenon
[blood spatter] and his interpretations of the [blood] stains [in Adams’
cab] . . . were inaccurate”; 266 and
(4) Evidence that eight witnesses, including an eyewitness, none of whom
was interviewed by the defense, would have substantiated Chester’s
contention that Ratcliff, not Chester, shot Adams and would have
offered testimony suggesting Quinice testified falsely. 267

R. Doc. 1-1 at 59–73.
Id.
266 Id. at 75–80. Chester also contends “Defense counsel’s failure to object to this improper testimony was
unreasonable and unsupported by any strategic decision.” R. Doc. 1 at 53. The Louisiana Supreme Court
found Sergeant Thornton’s testimony was admissible, and therefore, Chester’s trial counsel’s failure to
object to it could not constitute deficient performance. Although this Court has serious doubts about
whether Sergeant Thornton had the training and experience necessary to offer such a lay opinion, it cannot
say the Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding that he did possess the requisite training and experience to offer
blood spatter testimony is clearly erroneous. As a result, the Court will not grant the writ based on this
ineffective assistance claim. See Clark v. Collins, 19 F.3d 959 (5th Cir. 1994) (“Failure to raise meritless
objections is not ineffective lawyering; it is the very opposite.”).
267 R. Doc. 1-1 at 6–21, 37, 109–110, 125, 131, 138–39, 143–44; R. Doc. 1-2 at 16–19. Chester also contends
this newly discovered evidence supports his claim of actual innocence. R. Doc. 1 at 30. However, no freestanding claim of actual innocence may form the basis for habeas corpus relief. McQuiggin v. Perkins, 133
S. Ct. 1924, 1931 (2013) (citing Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390, 404–05 (1993)). The Supreme Court has
recognized only that a credible showing of actual innocence may act as a gateway to overcome a procedurally
defaulted or untimely filed federal habeas corpus claim and allow for review of the merits. Id. at 1931.
Moreover, to meet the actual innocence requirement, a petitioner must present “new evidence” of his
innocence and “‘show that it is more likely than not that no reasonable juror would have convicted him in
the light of the new evidence.’” Id. at 1935 (quoting Schlup v. Delo, 513 U.S. 298, 327 (1995)). New evidence
may be in the form of any “new reliable evidence—whether it be exculpatory scientific evidence, trustworthy
eyewitness accounts, or critical physical evidence.” Schlup, 513 U.S. at 324; accord Stroman v. Thaler, 405
F. App’x 933, 934–35 (5th Cir. 2010) (citing House v. Bell, 547 U.S. 518, 537 (2006); Schlup, 513 U.S. at
324). Fatal to Chester’s claim of actual innocence, however, the Fifth Circuit has held that evidence is “not
‘new’ [when] it was always within the reach of [petitioner’s] personal knowledge or reasonable
investigation.” Moore v. Quarterman, 534 F.3d 454, 465 (5th Cir. 2008). Thus, because the new evidence
Chester now offers as proof of his actual innocence was available to Chester at the time of trial, but not
discovered due Chester’s trial counsel’s ineffective assistance, Chester’s claim of actual innocence
necessarily fails. See id.
264
265

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Chester submits, among other ineffective assistance claims, 268 that trial counsel’s failure
to (1) present testimony from several witnesses who would have corroborated Chester’s
assertion that he was not the shooter, (2) challenge Sergeant Thornton’s lay blood spatter
testimony, and (3) determine the validity of the State’s DNA testing before stipulating to
its results rendered her performance constitutionally deficient and that those deficiencies
prejudiced Chester. The Court considers each claim in turn.
A. Standard of Review
The clearly established Federal law applicable to Chester’s ineffective assistance
claim is Strickland v. Washington’s familiar two part test. 269 Under Strickland, a
petitioner must demonstrate (1) that his counsel’s performance was deficient and (2) that

Chester also alleges counsel’s performance was ineffective during (1) the hearing on Chester’s motion to
suppress his custodial statements, R. Doc. 1 at 123; (2) opening statements, id. at 96; and (3) crossexamination of the Pollard sisters, id at 132; and that counsel’s failure to (4) object to the State’s evidence
regarding Chester’s “flight,” id. at 135; (5) object to the State’s introduction of victim impact evidence at the
culpability phase, id. at 138; (6) object to inadequate police investigation and procedures, id. at 128; and (7)
to “tak[e] steps” to remedy the prejudicial impact of portions of Chester’s letters to Quinice being admitted
into evidence rendered her performance constitutionally deficient, id. at 147. The Louisiana Supreme Court
found none of these claims warranted relief, as it concluded Chester’s trial counsel’s performance was
adequate. This Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s findings on these claims was neither contrary to
nor an unreasonable application of Federal law.
Finally, Chester argues his trial counsel’s performance was deficient because she failed to offer
“sufficient” evidence of Chester’s alleged neurological impairments during the penalty phase of trial. Id. at
109–15. Chester failed to present this claim to the Louisiana Supreme Court on direct or collateral review.
Before this Court, Chester argues he can overcome this procedural bar to relief, as he contends his postconviction counsel’s failure to raise this claim on direct or collateral review in state court constitutes
ineffective assistance, citing Trevino v. Thaler. Id. at 116, 118 (citing 569 U.S. 413 (2013)).
The Court finds this claim lacks merit, and as a result, Chester’s post-conviction counsel was not
ineffective for failing to raise it. At trial, Chester’s trial counsel presented evidence of his neurological
impairments during the mitigation phase. For example, trial counsel offered the testimony of Sarah Deland,
M.D. and Beth Denton. R. at 1730–54. Ms. Denton was qualified as an expert in social work and psychosocial history, and Dr. Deland was qualified as an expert in forensic psychiatry. Their testimony presented
an overview of Chester’s mental health. This Court’s review of trial counsel’s strategic choices must be highly
deferential, and it must be particularly wary of “arguments that essentially come down to a matter of
degrees. Did counsel investigate enough? Did counsel present enough mitigating evidence? Those questions
are even less susceptible to judicial second-guessing.” Dowthitt v. Johnson, 230 F.3d 733, 743 (5th Cir.
2000) (quoting Kitchens v. Johnson, 190 F.3d 698, 703 (5th Cir. 1999)). Because, essentially, Chester’s
complaint is that trial counsel was deficient during the penalty phase of trial for failing to present additional
evidence of Chester’s alleged neurological impairment, the Court finds Chester has failed to meet
Strickland’s two-part test with respect to this claim. See Boyd v. Estelle, 661 F.2d 388, 390 (5th Cir. 1981)
(“Complaints of uncalled witnesses are not favored in federal habeas review.”).
269 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984).
268

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his counsel’s deficient performance prejudiced the outcome of his trial. 270 The petitioner
must satisfy both prongs to succeed. 271
To establish a deficient performance, the petitioner must show that his counsel’s
representation “fell below an objective standard of reasonableness.” 272 The Court applies
a highly deferential standard to the examination of counsel’s performance, making every
effort to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight and to evaluate the conduct from
counsel’s perspective at the time of trial. 273
The second, or prejudice, prong of Strickland requires a petitioner to show that
“there is a reasonable probability that, but for trial counsel’s unprofessional errors, the
result of the proceeding would have been different. A reasonable probability is a
probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome.” 274
Because ineffective assistance of counsel claims present mixed questions of law
and fact, this Court must defer to the state court’s decision rejecting such claims, unless
that decision was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly
established Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States.” 275
Moreover, the United States Supreme Court has explained that, under the AEDPA, federal
habeas corpus review of an ineffective assistance of counsel claim is “doubly” deferential:
The pivotal question is whether the state court’s application of the
Strickland standard was unreasonable. This is different from asking
whether defense counsel’s performance fell below Strickland’s standard.
Were that the inquiry, the analysis would be no different than if, for
example, this Court were adjudicating a Strickland claim on direct review
Id.
Id. at 687.
272 Jones v. Jones, 163 F.3d 285, 301 (5th Cir. 1998) (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 688).
273 See id. (quoting Pitts v. Anderson, 122 F.3d 275, 279 (5th Cir. 1997)); see also Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506
U.S. 364, 371 (1993) (on ineffective assistance claim, courts judge counsel’s conduct on the facts of the
particular case, viewed as of the time of counsel’s conduct).
274 Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694.
275 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1); Moore v. Cockrell, 313 F.3d 880, 881 (5th Cir. 2002).
270
271

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of a criminal conviction in a United States district court. Under AEDPA,
though, it is a necessary premise that the two questions are different. For
purposes of § 2254(d)(1), an unreasonable application of federal law is
different from an incorrect application of federal law. A state court must be
granted a deference and latitude that are not in operation when the case
involves review under the Strickland standard itself.
A state court’s determination that a claim lacks merit precludes federal
habeas relief so long as fairminded jurists could disagree on the correctness
of the state court’s decision. And as this Court has explained, “[E]valuating
whether a rule application was unreasonable requires considering the rule’s
specificity. The more general the rule, the more leeway courts have in
reaching outcomes in case-by-case determinations.” “[I]t is not an
unreasonable application of clearly established Federal law for a state court
to decline to apply a specific legal rule that has not been squarely established
by this Court.” 276
The Supreme Court then explained:
Surmounting Strickland’s high bar is never an easy task. An ineffective
assistance claim can function as a way to escape rules of waiver and
forfeiture and raise issues not presented at trial, and so the Strickland
standard must be applied with scrupulous care, lest intrusive post-trial
inquiry threaten the integrity of the very adversary process the right to
counsel is meant to serve. Even under de novo review, the standard for
judging counsel’s representation is a most deferential one. Unlike a later
reviewing court, the attorney observed the relevant proceedings, knew of
materials outside the record, and interacted with the client, with opposing
counsel, and with the judge. It is all too tempting to second-guess counsel’s
assistance after conviction or adverse sentence. The question is whether an
attorney’s representation amounted to incompetence under prevailing
professional norms, not whether it deviated from best practices or most
common custom.
Establishing that a state court’s application of Strickland was unreasonable
under § 2254(d) is all the more difficult. The standards created by
Strickland and § 2254(d) are both highly deferential, and when the two
apply in tandem, review is doubly so. The Strickland standard is a general
one, so the range of reasonable applications is substantial. Federal habeas
courts must guard against the danger of equating unreasonableness under
Strickland with unreasonableness under § 2254(d). When § 2254(d)
applies, the question is not whether counsel’s actions were reasonable. The
276

Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 101 (2011) (citations omitted).

61

question is whether there is any reasonable argument that counsel satisfied
Strickland’s deferential standard. 277
Therefore, on a habeas review of an ineffective assistance claim, “federal courts are to
afford both the state court and the defense attorney the benefit of the doubt.” 278
B. The Louisiana Supreme Court’s Ruling
In the instant case, with respect to Chester’s claims that his trial counsel’s failure
to interview several witnesses who would have testified favorably for the defense and her
failure to challenge Sergeant Thornton’s lay blood spatter testimony rendered trial
counsel’s performance constitutionally deficient, the Louisiana Supreme Court found that
Strickland’s first prong was met. 279 The court, however, found that Chester had failed to
show he was prejudiced by these failures. The court’s analysis reads:
Next, [Chester] asserts counsel’s investigation was deficient because she
failed to present witnesses whose accounts would have contradicted the
state’s case and failed to present evidence that would have undermined the
state’s blood spatter theory and demonstrated Ratcliff was the shooter.
Even if this Court agreed with Chester on some independent review of the
omitted evidence, counsel’s strategy is unsound only if she failed to
adequately investigate the evidence bearing on culpability—taking into
account both admissibility and relevance. Thus, counsel was obligated to
conduct a thorough investigation or to make a reasonable decision that a
particular avenue of investigation was unnecessary under the
circumstances. Although Chester has shown that counsel failed to interview
the omitted witnesses, and it is not apparent that counsel’s actions were the
product of a reasonable and sound strategy, because we are not convinced
that any of the omitted evidence would have affected the verdict, we cannot
find this claim warrants relief. 280
The Louisiana Supreme Court found that Chester’s ineffective assistance claim
based on trial counsel’s failure to hire an independent expert to evaluate the State’s blood

Id. at 105 (citations omitted).
Woods v. Etherton, 136 S. Ct. 1149, 1151 (2016) (quotation marks omitted).
279 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 347.
280 Id. 346–47.
277

278

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evidence did not warrant relief, as Chester failed to show his counsel’s failure to challenge
the State’s evidence prejudiced him at trial. The Louisiana Supreme Court’s analysis of
this claim reads:
Chester next claims he was prejudiced by counsel’s stipulation that the DNA
sample from his baseball cap contained a combination of his and the
victim’s DNA, and by counsel’s failure to expose the inaccuracy of the state’s
DNA results with an opposing expert opinion. According to his postconviction expert, who has reviewed the state’s DNA data and results (the
state’s testing consumed the only sample), contrary to the evidence
presented, Chester can be excluded as a contributor to the sample tested,
and the statistical likelihood that the victim was a contributor is so low as to
render the results presented at trial “a nullity.”
The District Court correctly dismissed this claim, however, given that
Chester does not show he was prejudiced by the alleged missteps. That he
can be excluded from a sample collected from his own cap does not
exculpate him. Notably, he does not dispute his ownership of the cap.
Moreover, his assertion that there is low a statistical probability that the
victim was the other contributor is too imprecise to warrant relief in a case
in which Chester admitted he was inside the taxi during the shooting. 281
In sum, the Louisiana Supreme Court held that, although trial counsel’s
performance “fell below an objective standard of reasonableness” 282 by failing to (1)
interview an eyewitness; (2) independently verify the State’s DNA testing results; and (3)
offer expert blood spatter testimony substantiating Chester’s assertion that he was in the
back passenger seat and, therefore, not the shooter, Chester was not prejudiced by these
failures.
Two Louisiana Supreme Court Justices dissented from the majority’s holding,
concluding instead that Chester was entitled to an evidentiary hearing on at least some
portions of his ineffective assistance of counsel claim. Justice John L. Weimer, with whom
Justice Jefferson D. Hughes III joined, wrote:

281
282

Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 347.
Jones, 163 F.3d at 301 (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 688).

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In my view, two of relator’s claims of ineffective assistance of counsel
require a remand for an evidentiary hearing: (1) that trial counsel’s
investigation was deficient because of a failure to interview and/or present
several witnesses whose testimony would have bolstered a purely
argumentative defense; and relatedly, (2) that counsel erred by not
presenting any evidence to undermine the state’s amateur blood spatter
expert, whose opinion testimony put relator in the “shooter’s seat” in the
murder of a taxi driver. . . .
The prosecution’s reliance on the detective to establish so many predicates
for placing the defendant in the shooter’s seat in the taxi seems to lack
scientific validity and seems somewhat amateurish, given the gravity of the
question of who was the actual shooter. Thus, without interviewing the
potential witnesses who would establish Ratcliff as the shooter, trial counsel
instead compounded the significance of her own failure to procure
“knowledgeable” expert testimony under her duty as described in Hinton,
134 S. Ct. at 1088. . . . Recalling that counsel ultimately presented no
witnesses at trial to support the defense’s theory that defendant was not the
shooter, it is reasonable to infer that had even several of the eight potential
witnesses testified in support of that theory, such could have dissuaded the
jury from the imposition of the death penalty.
In conclusion, I find that there are serious questions in this death penalty
case as to whether trial counsel’s performance was inadequate and
prejudiced relator to the extent that trial was rendered unfair and the
verdict suspect. 283
With due deference to the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holdings, this Court analyzes
each of Chester’s ineffective assistance of counsel claims in turn, first determining
whether counsel’s performance was deficient, then determining whether “there is a
reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the
proceeding would have been different.” 284 Finally, as this Court must defer to the
Louisiana Supreme Court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law, the Court considers
whether the Louisiana Supreme Court’s decision to deny Chester habeas relief based on

283
284

Id. at 355–356.
Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694.

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these claims was reasonable, requiring the Court to determine whether there is any
reasonable argument that Chester’s counsel satisfied Strickland’s deferential standard. 285
C. Whether trial counsel’s performance was constitutionally
deficient
Chester raises ten issues of error in his ineffective assistance claim, many of which
were summarily rejected by the Louisiana Supreme Court. At the outset, the Court notes
that, although the Louisiana Supreme Court either gave only a brief justification for its
denial of each of Chester’s ineffective assistance of counsel claims or offered no analysis
at all, the Louisiana Supreme Court’s refusal to issue Chester a writ of review based on his
ineffective assistance of counsel claims is nevertheless entitled to deference, as “[s]ection
2254(d) applies even where there has been a summary denial.” 286 Thus, because “[i]n this
circuit, a federal habeas court reviews ‘only a state court’s “decision,” and not the written
opinion explaining that decision,’” 287 Chester can satisfy the “unreasonable application”
prong of § 2254(d) “only by showing that ‘there was no reasonable basis’ for the
[Louisiana] Supreme Court’s decision.” 288
1. Failure to Interview Exculpatory Witnesses
In his petition for post-conviction relief, Chester included statements from several
witnesses whose potential testimony would have substantiated Chester’s contention that,
although he was present when Ratcliff shot Adams, he was not the man who pulled the
trigger:

Richter, 562 U.S. at 105.
Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S. 170, 187 (2011) (citing Richter, 562 U.S. at 101).
287 Anderson v. Johnson, 338 F.3d 382, 390 (5th Cir. 2003) (quoting Neal v. Puckett, 286 F.3d 230, 246
(5th Cir. 2002) (en banc)).
288 Cullen, 563 U.S. at 188. “Under § 2254(d), a habeas court must determine what arguments or theories
supported or, as here, could have supported, the state court’s decision; and then it must ask whether it is
possible fairminded jurists could disagree that those arguments or theories are inconsistent with the
holding in a prior decision of [the U.S. Supreme] Court.” Richter, 562 U.S. at 102. “[E]ven a strong case for
relief does not mean the state court’s contrary conclusion was unreasonable.” Id.
285

286

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a. Anthony Curtis
At the time of the shooting, Anthony Curtis and a friend were driving down
Calhoun Street when they saw Adams’ cab stopped on the side of the street. Curtis and
his passenger then “heard something that sounded like a gunshot,” and slowed down.
Suddenly,
[Curtis] saw [Ratcliff] and [Chester] jump out of the cab. [Chester] ran off,
but [Ratcliff] didn’t run away. [Ratcliff] stayed there. I saw that [Ratcliff]
had a gun in his hand when he jumped out of the cab. Then I saw him tuck
the gun in his waistband. After [Ratcliff] tucked in his gun, he stop[p]ed
there [and] was talking to people in the area. We had got out the car about
the same time. Right around that time, my friend said to me, “[Ratcliff] just
killed that cab driver.” 289
b. Ora Chairs
Ora Chairs, who in 1996 lived near Calhoun Street where Adams was murdered,
“learned the cabbie got shot when Ratcliff was running up Filmore, passing [her] home,
toward Airline.” In the sworn statement she gave Chester’s habeas counsel, she explained:
[Ratcliff] came right over to me, by the porch and I saw blood all over the
front of his shirt. I said “man, what happened?” He said to me “the cab
driver just got shot.” . . . I said “what you doing with blood on your shirt?”
And he said “a white man got killed.” He pulled off his shirt, but kept it in
his hand, and ran off. He just held the shirt—he wanted me to give him a
clean shirt, but I said no. He was in a rage—he ran off. 290
c. Michelle Robinson
Michelle Robinson was at home the night of Adams’ murder. She said that
“[a]round 5:30 or 6 in the morning,” she heard a knock at her door. It was Chester. “[H]e
was so shaken and scared. He was hysterical. He told [Robinson] ‘Fella just shot this cab
driver.’” Chester told Robinson that after Ratcliff shot Adams, “Fella put the gun in [his]

289
290

R. Doc. 1-1 at 6–12.
Id. 14–21.

66

mouth and said ‘if you tell, I’m gonna kill you.’” According to Robinson, “[a] few nights
after [the murder] happened, Teddy stayed by [her] house. He stayed inside the entire
time. He was worried about Fella, because Fella threatened Teddy that if Teddy went to
the police, Fella could kill Teddy’s mom. . . . Fella was a bully and he had Teddy so scared.
Fella had bullied Teddy in the past, before [the murder] happened.” 291
d. Larry Franklin
Detective Sacks interviewed residents at 713 Calhoun Street, the house where the
call for Adams’ cab came from the night he was killed. Delores Vinnett, the homeowner,
denied calling for a cab, but told Detective Sacks that her grandson, Larry Franklin, had
also been home at the time. Franklin told Detective Sacks that he knew Ratcliff well and
that Ratcliff had “been to [Franklin’s] house many times.” 292
e. Angela Horton
Police began investigating Ratcliff after interviewing Angela Horton, who told
them Ratcliff might have been involved with the murder. After showing Horton a line up,
Horton “immediately recognized Ratcliff’s picture.” Based on Horton’s tip, the police
compared the prints found on Adams’ business cards to Ratcliff’s, finding a match.
Horton told police she got her information from Herman Clay. 293
f. Herman Clay
Clay had been incarcerated with Ratcliff at Hunt Correctional Center. “When [he]
was locked up with Ratcliff . . . [he] saw people telling him that what he’d done was

Id. at 37.
Id. at 125, 138.
293 Id. at 131.
291

292

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wrong—[Ratcliff had] sent an innocent man to be executed. Ratcliff never tried to defend
himself and just put his head down.” 294
g. Calvin White
Calvin White was also incarcerated with Ratcliff in 1996 in the Jefferson Parish
Prison. They were dorm mates. According to White’s affidavit, Ratcliff told White:
[He] shot a cab driver on Calhoun Street and then blamed it on Teddy. He
said that Teddy walked up to the cab driver to try and sell him some drugs.
Then, Elbert came up separately and got into the back seat. Elbert was trying
to rob the cab driver. Teddy wasn’t working with Elbert and didn’t know
what he was going to do. Teddy didn’t have a gun.
After Elbert shot the cab driver, he said that Teddy ran away and hid behind
a tree. Elbert said that Teddy was a scared little bitch for hiding behind the
tree. He said that he walked up to Teddy and told him that he would kill him
if he told anyone what happened.
Elbert said that when the police talked to him, he flipped the script and told
them that Teddy was the one who shot the cab driver and he was just
walking by. He bragged to me about this a lot. His [sic] said “fuck Teddy.”
He was just trying to get off the charges. He knew that Teddy was too
incompetent to stand up for himself. 295
h. Donna LaRocca
Shortly after the murder took place, local cab driver Donna LaRocca recalls picking
up two men in Kenner. “[D]uring the ride . . . the [two] . . . males were very polite and
wanted to know if the police had any information about Adams’ murder. [She] stated that
she told the [men] she did not know what evidence the police had, but a reward was going
to be offered for [Adams’] killer. The two subjects responded by stating that they hoped
the killer got caught because it made it hard for them to get a cab.” LaRocca called the
police once she saw pictures of Ratcliff and Chester on the news. After being interviewed

294
295

Id. at 143–44.
Id. at 109–110.

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by police, an officer “showed LaRocca a photographic lineup of Ratcliff and a
photographic lineup of Chester. LaRocca was able to identify Ratcliff in the lineup, but
not Chester. LaRocca stated that she was positive that Ratcliff was one of the people that
she picked up at 525 Richard Street. LaRocca also stated that Ratcliff was a frequent
customer of King Cab,” the company for which both LaRocca and the victim, John Adams,
drove. 296
i. Sheryl Nelson
Finally, Sheryl Nelson states that, following trial, Quinice Pollard admitted to lying
on the stand. Quinice, nicknamed “Buck,” told Nelson:
She only [perjured herself] because the prosecutors told her that they would
put her in jail and take away her child. They [the prosecutors] made Buck
change her story. She lied on the stand because she was so afraid that her
daughter would be taken away. I was very surprised that Teddy was found
guilty, because Buck always told me that he was innocent. 297
Chester’s trial counsel did not interview any of these witness. The Court must
determine whether Chester’s trial counsel’s failure to interview these witnesses rendered
her performance constitutionally deficient.
Although it is reasonable to conclude trial counsel either knew or should have
known of these witnesses—with the exception of White and Nelson, whose statements are
made based on knowledge obtained after Chester’s trial—this Court must “make every
effort to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight and to evaluate the conduct from
counsel’s perspective at the time of trial.” 298 Trial counsel had direct knowledge of Curtis,

Id. at 138–39.
R. Doc. 1-2 at 16–19.
298 See Jones v. Jones, 163 F.3d 285, 300–01 (5th Cir. 1998) (quoting Pitts, 122 F.3d at 279); see also
Lockhart v. Fretwell, 506 U.S. 364, 371 (1993) (explaining that with an ineffective assistance claim, courts
judge counsel’s conduct on the facts of the particular case, viewed as of the time of counsel’s conduct)
(quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690)).
296
297

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Clay, Franklin, Horton, and LaRocca. In her notes from an interview with Chester that
took place on “4/17,” trial counsel writes “Anthony Curtis says he saw co-[defendant].” 299
In another set of notes, Chester’s trial counsel writes Herman Clay’s name on a list of
people who had “what [she] need[ed].” 300 Finally, Jefferson Parish’s supplemental report
on the murder points to Franklin, Horton, and LaRocca as witnesses. 301
Trial counsel did not, however, have direct knowledge of Chairs or Robinson.
Although it is reasonably likely trial counsel could have, through reasonable investigation,
discovered Chairs and it is also reasonable to presume Chester informed his counsel of
his interaction with Robinson, nothing in the record before this Court or the state courts
suggests Chester’s trial counsel had any actual knowledge of either witness. As a result,
the Court does not consider them.
In sum, looking at the potential witnesses Chester now offers, the Court concludes
that, at the very least, Curtis, Franklin, Horton, Clay, and LaRocca were potential
witnesses of whom counsel was definitely aware before trial and whose testimony would
have been admissible.
In addition to showing trial counsel could have reasonably known about these
witnesses and that their testimony would be admissible at trial, “[t]o prevail on an
ineffective assistance claim based upon uncalled witnesses, an applicant must name the
witness, demonstrate that the witness would have testified, set out the content of the
witness’s proposed testimony, and show that the testimony would have been
favorable.” 302 “An applicant ‘who alleges a failure to investigate on the part of his counsel

R. Doc. 1-1 at 107.
R. Doc. 1-1 at 141.
301 Id. at 112–39.
302 Gregory v. Thaler, 601 F.3d 347, 352 (5th Cir. 2010).
299

300

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must allege with specificity what the investigation would have revealed and how it would
have altered the outcome of the trial.’”303 In his habeas petition, Chester offers Franklin,
Horton, and LaRocca as potential witnesses, but does not demonstrate that any of these
three witness would have testified at trial, nor does he establish what their sworn
testimony would have been. Moreover, although Chester offers a sworn statement from
Clay, it is not clear to the Court that his testimony would be admissible, as much of Clay’s
statement either constitutes inadmissible hearsay, or references observations Clay made
of Ratcliff that took place after Chester’s trial. 304 Thus, the Court evaluates only whether
trial counsel’s failure to interview Curtis, whose sworn statement Chester has provided to
the Court, constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel. 305
The Louisiana Supreme Court concluded, “counsel was obligated to conduct a
thorough investigation or to make a reasonable decision that a particular avenue of
investigation was unnecessary under the circumstances,” 306 and trial counsel’s failure to
interview any of these witnesses was “not a product of a reasonable and sound
strategy.” 307 This Court agrees.
Trial counsel’s failure to interview Curtis rendered her performance deficient.
“Strickland simply ‘does not require . . . defer[ence] to decisions that are uninformed by
Id.
Although Clay is who told Horton he believed Ratcliff was involved in the murder, Chester does not offer
a statement from Clay explaining why he believed that, nor does Chester explain when Clay and Ratcliff
were incarcerated together. It is possible Clay was incarcerated with Ratcliff before trial, but that point is
not clear from his sworn statement. R. Doc. 1-1 at 143–44. It is more likely that his conversations with
Ratcliff regarding Chester’s innocence took place after trial. See id. at 143 (“People from the neighborhood
all knew that Ratcliff set Teddy Chester up and got him on death row, even though Teddy is innocent.”).
Moreover, with respect to the remaining testimony in his sworn statement, much of this testimony appears
to be inadmissible hearsay. See id. at 143 (“I heard Quinice Pollard testified against Teddy at trial. She lied
because she heard that Teddy was messing around with another woman.”).
305 Chester offered Curtis’ testimony in the form of a sworn declaration, in which Curtis states “I would have
been available to testify to [the] information [offered in his declaration], because it is the truth.” R. Doc. 11 at 6.
306 Chester II, 208 So. 2d at 346.
307 Id.
303

304

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an adequate investigation into the controlling facts and law.’” 308 Even assuming trial
counsel believed Curtis would not be a credible witness, such a justification is not
reasonable if made before even interviewing the witness.
[A] failure to interview witnesses is [not] excusable as “a strategic decision”
[even] if the witnesses would not have been credible. Acknowledging that a
lack of credibility might support a strategic decision not to call a witness to
testify at trial, . . . a witness’s character flaws cannot support a failure to
investigate. Without so much as contacting a witness, much less speaking
with him, counsel is “ill-equipped to assess his credibility or persuasiveness
as a witness.” 309
Trial counsel’s failure to investigate is particularly egregious in Curtis’ case, given
that he was an eyewitness who could have potentially pointed to at least one additional
eyewitness. “[I]nformation relevant to [the] defense might have been obtained through
better pretrial investigation of the eyewitnesses, and a reasonable lawyer would have
made some effort to investigate the eyewitnesses’ testimony.” 310
Thus, “mak[ing] every effort to eliminate the distorting effects of hindsight and to
evaluate the conduct from counsel’s perspective at the time of trial,” 311 and “taking into
account both admissibility and relevance,” 312 the Court finds trial counsel’s failure to
interview Curtis, an eyewitness who claims he saw Ratcliff with a gun immediately
following the shooting, plainly “amounted to incompetence under prevailing professional
norms.” 313

Anderson, 338 F.3d at 392.
Id.
310 Bryant v. Scott, 28 F.3d 1411, 1418 (5th Cir. 1994); see also Anderson, 338 F.3d at 391 (“[C]ounsel’s
failure to interview eyewitnesses to a charged crime constitutes ‘constitutionally deficient representation.’”)
311 See Jones, 163 F.3d at 301 (quoting Pitts, 122 F.3d at 279); see also Lockhart, 506 U.S. at 371 (quoting
Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690)).
312 Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 346 (citing Strickland, 466 U.S. 690–91).
313 Richter, 562 U.S. at 101; see also Koon v. Cain, 277 F. App’x 381, 389 (5th Cir. 2008) (“[T]here is a critical
distinction between, on the one hand, failing even to attempt to interview the lone eyewitness to a crime,
whose testimony is critical to the defensive theory presented, and, on the other hand, strategically deciding
not to call that person to testify based on the results of such an interview.”).
308
309

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2. Failing to present expert blood spatter testimony
The Louisiana Supreme Court found trial counsel’s failure “to present evidence
that would have undermined the state’s blood spatter theory and demonstrated Ratcliff
was the shooter” 314 rendered her performance at trial constitutionally deficient. This
Court agrees.
At trial, the State offered the lay testimony of Sergeant Thornton, who described
the concept of blood spatter to the jurors. He explained:
Spatter is usually—in cases when you have blood product, it could be blood
product, it could be blood, it could be tissue, skin, that occurs in a particular
direction away from a wound when someone is injured in either a gunshot
wound, say, or maybe a knife wound, or even blunt trauma, being hit with a
bat of some sort, you will have an effect of product, in this case, spatter,
which could be dots or liquid markings that would end up on an object away
from the injured person. 315
The following exchange then took place:
Q:
Can you inform the members of the jury, please, what is meant by the
term “blow back”?
A:
The term “blow back” is a definition that is commonly used in, in
areas of forensics and the law enforcement community. The definition
basically consists of, in the case of a gunshot wound or when a gun has been
discharged in the direction of a person and that person has been hit by a
projectile, a bullet, and sustains a wound, usually when, when the projectile
strikes the person and the wound is created, a certain amount of blow back
will occur. And what that generally is, it could be, again, like I say, a similar
consensus with spatter. It could be blood; it could be, from my
understanding tissue; it could be hair; it could be bone fragments. And the
blow back is these particular matters that will go away from the wound in
the direction from where the, in this case, the shot came from.
And in that instance would be, in the case of this matter, blow back
would have occurred towards the back of the vehicle. In this case, the back
seat behind the driver’s seat, where the victim was sitting. 316

Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 347.
R. 1487.
316 R. 1489–90.
314
315

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Sergeant Thornton’s testimony went unchallenged and at no point did Chester’s trial
counsel attempt to discredit Sergeant Thornton’s blood spatter analysis or present
evidence to the contrary.
Based on Sergeant Thornton’s testimony, the State contended that, because blood
spatter from a gunshot “blows back” to where the shooter is, if Chester were in the back
passenger seat of Adams’ cab, as he claimed, he could not have gotten blood on him.
At trial, the theory of Chester’s defense was that, although Chester was in the cab
when Adams was shot, he was not the shooter. The State’s theory, based on Sergeant
Thornton’s testimony regarding blood splatter, was that, because Chester’s cap had blood
on it, he must have been the shooter. Other than the Pollard sisters’ testimony, the fact
that Adams’ blood was found on Chester’s hat was the only evidence the State presented
that Chester pulled the trigger. At trial, the prosecutor repeatedly used Sergeant
Thornton’s testimony as evidence that Chester was lying:
Blow back, what Sergeant Thornton told you about. And that is—where’s
that head? Blow back is that when the trajectory, the bullet goes in one way,
matter is going to blow back in the same direction.
Remember the testimony from him? Well, I want you to envision Mr.
Chester, I mean Mr. Adams, in the cab. Look at that projectory [sic].
Somebody was behind him and to his left, by the left back door, and popped
him in the back of his head, put a bullet in his brain and ended his life.
And if your blow back from that, if you imagine him in the cab and you do
the blow back on the shooter, that shooter’s going to be, what, to the left and
in the back of that cab.
Now, by Mr. Chester—a man who’s lied to the police, lied to his brother, lied
to his girlfriend, lied to everybody—now, but if you’re going to believe his
story, how did the blood, if he was over here and the blow back goes the
same way as the trajectory, how did it get on him? . . . . That’s evidence.
That’s not testimony. That’s not memory. That is fact. . . .

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[Y]ou have each one of them screaming, “It wasn’t me. I didn’t do it. I was a
witness. He did it.” That’s what you have. And the evidence, especially the
blow back, points to [Chester]. 317
In his state and federal habeas petitions, Chester presented the testimony of Dr.
Stuart H. James, a crime scene and bloodstain analyst, who has been qualified as an
expert in these fields throughout the United States. 318 Dr. James states that Sergeant
Thornton’s “description of the phenomenon and his interpretations of the stains in the
instant case were inaccurate” and that his review of the evidence “strongly suggests” the
State did not interpret it correctly. 319
Dr. James found Sergeant Thornton’s testimony regarding blowback bloodstain
patterns unreliable in two respects. First, Sergeant Thornton failed to point out that
blowback is often found on the “shooter’s hands, sleeves and front of the exterior clothing
worn at the time,” but that “[t]here was no evidence of blowback bloodstain patterns on
any of [Chester’s] clothing,” 320 including Chester’s cap. According to Dr. James, the blood
on the cap was “a transfer from another object that had blood on it, and not an impact
pattern’” 321 and “[g]iven the manner in which Mr. Adams’ head slumped between the
front seats, there would be ample opportunity for one sitting on either side of the rear seat
to receive blood transfer on their person.” 322
Second, Dr. James found that,
[Sergeant Thornton] misinterpreted the bloodstains on the lower rear left
passenger door and doorframe. The geometry of the stains indicates that
the airborne droplets struck those surfaces at a very low angle and did not
originate from the entrance wound of John Adams. Subsequent to his
gunshot injury the final position of his head was back between the front
R. 1638–40 (emphasis added).
R. Doc. 1-1 at 75.
319 Id. at 79.
320 Id.
321 Id. at 80.
322 Id.
317

318

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seats, which allowed for a large amount of blood to accumulate on the rear
floor of the cab as a result of dripping due to gravity. Due to their
directionality, the stains on the lower left rear door originated from a source
well below the head of the decedent. Some of the stains may be the result of
satellite spatter produced by blood dripping into blood and others from
projection produced by someone exiting the rear of the cab on that side. The
same is true for the bloodstain patterns on the Guess bag. Thus, these
bloodstain patterns have the characteristics of castoff patterns; that is, the
pattern is created by blood that is flung from—0r cast from—something that
has blood on it. Although neither the cab nor any of its contents was
preserved for evidence, the photographs fail to demonstrate any evidence of
blowback bloodstain patterns from the entrance wound of the decedent
within the confines of the cab. 323
Dr. James also points out that much of the physical evidence in this case had been
compromised. For example, “a gun was collected after being . . . found lying in the grass
below a window. Once the gun was photographed, it was apparently picked up with bare
hands contaminating the gun for DNA testing.” 324 Crime scene investigators also did not
test the door handles on the cab for DNA, and “neither the cab nor its contents were
preserved for evidence.” 325 Additionally, the tested DNA found on Chester’s cap was
located on the inside of the cap, where one’s head goes. Ultimately, Dr. James concludes
that,
The fact that Teddy Chester had blood transfer on his cap in no way proves
that he was the shooter. There was no impact spatter on his clothing even
though the crime scene was the enclosed area of the vehicle. Though [it]
appeared that there were reddish-brown transfer stains on his blue jeans,
the crime laboratory did not find blood on this item. Based upon the forensic
evidence available, the evidence does not support Teddy Chester as the
shooter in this case. 326
In Harrington v. Richter, the Court held that trial counsel was not ineffective for
failing to consult a DNA expert, given the “number of hypothetical experts—specialists in

Id. at 79.
Id. at 77.
325 R. Doc. 1-1 at 79.
326 Id. at 80 (emphasis added).
323

324

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psychiatry, psychology, ballistics, fingerprints, tire treads, physiology, or numerous other
disciplines and subdisciplines—whose insight might possibly have been useful.” 327 In that
case, Richter and his co-defendant were charged with the murder of Patrick Klein and the
attempted murder of Joshua Johnson. At trial, the prosecution theorized Klein was shot
and killed while lying on a living room couch. The defense asserted that Klein and
Johnson had been shot in self-defense and that Klein was shot in a bedroom doorway, but
had been moved to the couch.
Following the incident, there were several pools of blood throughout the crime
scene, which lead to “many factual differences between prosecution and defense versions
of the events on the night of the shootings.” 328 One pool of blood located in the bedroom
doorway was not tested to determine whose blood at was; a blood pool adjacent to that
blood pool, however, was determined to consist of only Johnson’s blood. Following his
conviction, Richter asserted his trial counsel’s failure to test the blood found in the
doorway warranted relief under Strickland. According to Richter, had the blood pool been
tested, it would have substantiated his contention that Klein was shot in the doorway.
After exhausting his available remedies in state court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the Ninth Circuit, sitting en banc, held Richter was entitled to relief, given that his trial
counsel failed to consult a DNA expert to determine whose blood was in the bedroom
doorway.
The U.S. Supreme Court reversed, finding that “[i]t [wa]s only because forensic
evidence . . . emerged concerning the source of the blood pool that the issue could with
any plausibility be said to stand apart.” 329 Notably,
Richter, 562 U.S. at 107.
Id.
329 Id. at 107.
327

328

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Blood evidence does not appear to have been part of the prosecution’s
planned case prior to trial, and investigators had not analyzed the few blood
samples taken from the crime scene. But the opening statement from the
defense led the prosecution to alter its approach. Richter’s attorney outlined
the theory that Branscombe had fired on Johnson in self-defense and that
Klein had been killed not on the living room couch but in the crossfire in the
bedroom doorway. Defense counsel stressed deficiencies in the
investigation, including the absence of forensic support for the
prosecution’s version of events. 330
The Court further explained:
From the perspective of Richter’s defense counsel when he was preparing
Richter’s defense, there were any number of hypothetical experts [who he
could have consulted]. . . . In [habeas counsel’s] view Klein’s location was
“the single most critical issue in the case” given the differing theories of the
prosecution and the defense, and the source of the blood in the doorway was
therefore of central concern. But it was far from a necessary conclusion that
this was evident at the time of the trial. 331
In Richter, the U.S. Supreme Court concluded that trial counsel’s performance was
not deficient because she could not have reasonably anticipated the need to present at
trial expert testimony regarding the composition of the blood pool in question. In this
case, however, before trial began, it was clear that whether Chester was on the rear
passenger side or driver’s side was crucial to the State’s case. Before trial, defense counsel
knew that, although Chester admitted to being at the scene of the crime, he maintained
that he was not the shooter and that he was on the back passenger side of the cab when
Adams was shot. Trail counsel knew that the only blood found on Chester was a small
speck on his cap. Moreover, the cap having been destroyed, the only physical evidence
available to both the prosecution and defense were pictures of the blood spatter in the
back driver’s side seat. The need for a blood spatter expert’s opinion as to whether
someone with only a speck of blood on them could have been the shooter and whether

330
331

Id. at 94.
Id. at 107.

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someone seated in the back passenger side of the car could have been the shooter was
clear.
Even “reconstruct[ing] the circumstances of counsel’s challenged conduct,” 332 trial
counsel’s decision not to present expert blood spatter testimony cannot be justified as a
valid strategic choice. Given the fact that the only physical evidence the State had to place
Chester in the back driver’s side of the car was blood spatter evidence, any reasonable trial
counsel would have had at least some understanding of the potential importance of such
evidence. As Justice Weiner wrote in his dissent: “The prosecution’s reliance on the
detective to establish so many predicates for placing the defendant in the shooter’s seat
in the taxi seems to lack scientific validity and seems somewhat amateurish, given the
gravity of the question of who was the actual shooter.” 333
The mere fact that counsel might have known that blood spatter evidence could be
helpful, yet decided not to present such evidence, does not establish that it was a reasoned,
tactical decision. “In assessing the reasonableness of an attorney’s investigation . . . a court
must consider not only the quantum of evidence already known to counsel, but also
whether the known evidence would lead a reasonable attorney to investigate further.” 334
“Strickland does not establish that a cursory investigation automatically justifies a tactical
decision with respect to . . . strategy.” 335
In this case, there is no evidence that counsel did any investigation into the matter
before determining an expert’s blood spatter analysis would not have been helpful. The
blood spatter evidence in this case was a central issue. The result of trial counsel’s failure

Id.
Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 355–56.
334 Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 527 (2003).
335 Id.
332
333

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to offer the testimony of a blood spatter expert was for the jury to be told that, without
question, Chester could not have been seated in the back passenger-side of the cab, as
Chester alleged, when Adams was shot. Thus, “the only reasonable and available defense
strategy [in this case] require[d] consultation with experts or introduction of expert
evidence.” 336 The Court agrees with the Louisiana Supreme Court’s determination that
trial counsel’s failure to consult a blood spatter expert rendered her performance
constitutionally deficient.
3. Failing to obtain the opinion of an independent DNA expert
Chester next complains that trial counsel’s failure to obtain an independent
opinion of the State’s DNA testing before “blindly stipulating” to its results constitutes
ineffective assistance. With respect to trial counsel’s failure to consult an independent
DNA expert, the Louisiana Supreme Court did not explicitly find counsel’s performance
was constitutionally deficient, instead resting its holding on an analysis of Strickland’s
second prong. 337 Thus, the Court assumes the Louisiana Supreme Court found
Strickland’s first prong was met with respect to this claim. To the extent the Louisiana
Supreme Court’s opinion can be read as finding counsel’s failure to consult an
independent DNA expert did not make her performance deficient, the Court finds such a
holding is an unreasonable application of Strickland. 338

336 Richter, 562 U.S. at 106 (“[C]riminal cases will arise where the only reasonable and available defense
strategy requires consultation with experts or introduction of expert evidence, whether pretrial, at trial, or
both. . . . It can be assumed that in some cases counsel would be deemed ineffective for failing to consult or
rely on experts.”); see also Hinton v. Alabama, 134 S. Ct. 1081, 1088 (2014); Soffar v. Dretke, 368 F.3d 441,
477 (5th Cir. 2004) (“Soffar’s defense counsel chose to do nothing about the ballistics evidence. Had they
investigated the evidence and consulted a ballistics expert, they would have been able to make a strategic
decision as to whether such information would have helped Soffar’s defense. As was made evident during
the state habeas proceedings, Soffar’s defense counsel would not have had to look far to find a ballistics
expert who could have provided testimony to aid his defense.”).
337 See Chester II, 208 So. 3d at 347 (“Chester does not show he was prejudiced by the alleged missteps.”).
338 See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690–691 (“[S]trategic choices made after thorough investigation of law and
facts relevant to plausible options are virtually unchallengeable; and strategic choices made after less than

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The Fifth Circuit has repeatedly cautioned against finding trial counsel’s
performance constitutionally deficient based on his or her failure to call a witness.
Claims that counsel failed to call witnesses are not favored on federal habeas
review because the presentation of witnesses is generally a matter of trial
strategy and speculation about what witnesses would have said on the stand
is too uncertain. For this reason, we require petitioners making claims of
ineffective assistance based on counsel’s failure to call a witness to
demonstrate prejudice by naming the witness, demonstrating that the
witness was available to testify and would have done so, setting out the
content of the witness’s proposed testimony, and showing that the
testimony would have been favorable to a particular defense. This
requirement applies to both uncalled lay and expert witnesses. 339
Chester has met this initial hurdle with respect to this claim, offering the detailed expert
report of Dr. Randell T. Libby, the contents of which are favorable to Chester’s case. Dr.
Libby also states that, had he been retained by Chester’s trial counsel, he would have been
available to testify. 340
Dr. Libby holds a doctoral degree in the area of molecular genetics, with extensive
training and experience in the areas of genotyping procedures and methodologies
employed for the purposes of human identification. According to Dr. Libby, although it is
possible Adams’ blood contributed to the mixture tested by the State, the State’s
conclusions about the statistical probability Adams’ blood contributed to the mixture was
overstated and misleading. Dr. Libby explained “that the possible number of genotypic
contributors to the biological materials [(the tested DNA sample)] is the product of the

complete investigation are reasonable precisely to the extent that reasonable professional judgments
support the limitations on investigation. In other words, counsel has a duty to make reasonable
investigations or to make a reasonable decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary.”);
Hinton, 134 S. Ct. 1088; Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 406 (2000).
339 Woodfox v. Cain, 609 F.3d 774, 808 (5th Cir. 2010) (citations, quotation marks, and brackets omitted);
Day v. Quarterman, 566 F.3d 527, 538 (5th Cir. 2009).
340 R. Doc. 1-1 at 59–73; see Woodfox, 609 F.3d at 808. In addition to Dr. Libby’s testimony, Chester’s blood
spatter expert also noted the incorrectness of the State’s DNA evidence, recommending an independent
DNA expert be consulted. R. Doc. 1-1 at 77 (noting several issues with the State’s DNA testing, and stating
“it appears that there is no complete DNA profile matching Teddy Chester at the D1880 test. Therefore, I
recommend this case be reviewed by a DNA expert”).

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total possible individual combinations at each of the . . . loci, and therefore . . . 145,800
possible genetic types.” 341 The results of Dr. Libby’s analysis “revealed a low power of
identity and consequently a low power of discrimination ranging from a frequency
estimate of 1 in 140 individuals to 1 [in] 375 individuals.” 342
Regarding whether Chester could be a contributor to the DNA tested by the state,
Dr. Libby notes that, with respect to the blood found on the inside of the cap, “Teddy
Chester may be excluded as a contributor to the mixture” because “[Chester’s] D1S80-34
allele was NOT observed in the mixture.” 343 With respect to the sample found on the bill
of the cap, Dr. Libby concludes that “[i]n consideration of all the potential contributors
[to the tested DNA], combined with the weak alleles at four of the ten markers on the
baseball cap bill, render the conclusions drawn by GenTest to be unreliable.” 344
Hinton requires that the selection of an expert witness be a “‘strategic choic[e]’
that, when made ‘after thorough investigation of [the] law and facts,” is “virtually
unchallengable.” 345 However, this rationale does not apply when, as here, trial counsel
makes no investigation and, based on that lack of investigation, does not hire any expert
at all, let alone a minimally qualified one.
In this case, trial counsel did not investigate the possibility of hiring an
independent expert to refute the State’s assertion that the DNA belonged to both Adams
and Chester, rendering her performance constitutionally deficient. To the extent the
Louisiana Supreme Court’s opinion can be read as finding trial counsel’s failure to
independently verify the validity of the State’s DNA results did not constitute ineffective

R. Doc. 1-1 at 68.
Id. at 69.
343 Id. at 63, 68.
344 Id. at 70.
345 Hinton, 134 S. Ct. at 1089 (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690).
341

342

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assistance, the Court considers whether “‘there was no reasonable basis’ for the
[Louisiana] Supreme Court’s decision.” 346
It is possible the Louisiana Supreme Court determined trial counsel made a
reasonable, strategic decision based on the information given to her by the State—that the
blood on Chester’s cap belonged to both Chester and Adams. Based on this information,
trial counsel could have believed that challenging the State’s medical evidence would have
been futile, and that, therefore, the most effective defense would be to stipulate to the
physical evidence, instead of having the State offer its DNA expert as a witness, thereby
placing a greater emphasis on the fact that Chester had the victim’s DNA on him.
In considering this argument, this Court judges the reasonableness of defense
counsel’s purported “strategic decision” “in terms of the adequacy of the investigations
supporting it.” 347 This Court finds Defense counsel’s supposed decision not to investigate
the State’s DNA findings before stipulating to their validity is unreasonable; defense
counsel made this decision without having investigated whether the State’s expert was
correct and lacked sufficient information to reasonably determine that such an
investigation was not necessary. 348
“[M]indful that ‘the range of reasonable professional judgments is wide,’
courts recognize that ‘[i]neffectiveness is generally clear in the context of a
complete failure to investigate because counsel can hardly be said to have
made a strategic choice against pursuing a certain line of investigation when
346 Cullen, 563 U.S. at 188. “Under § 2254(d), a habeas court must determine what arguments or theories
supported or, as here, could have supported, the state court’s decision; and then it must ask whether it is
possible fairminded jurists could disagree that those arguments or theories are inconsistent with the
holding in a prior decision of [the U.S. Supreme] Court.” Richter, 562 U.S. at 102. “[E]ven a strong case for
relief does not mean the state court’s contrary conclusion was unreasonable.” Id.
347 Wiggins, 539 U.S. at 521.
348 It is apparent that trial counsel was aware of the importance of the State’s DNA evidence, given that the
Louisiana trial court held a hearing on its admissibility on March 5, 1997, approximately two months before
trial. R. 335. At the hearing, the State’s DNA expert testified that “1 in 339 Caucasians” have the two markers
observed in the profile that were consistent with Mr. Adams’ DNA, R. 386, adding “I am comfortable giving
those numbers, even though they are very modest. But I would rather be more conservative in my estimates,
which I usually am, than trying to give a number that is difficult to defend,” id.

83

[she] has not yet obtained the facts on which such a decision could be
made.’” 349
This is not a case in which counsel made a reasonable decision to cease further
investigation as a result of having “uncovered . . . evidence . . . to suggest that” challenging
the State’s DNA evidence “would have been counterproductive, or that further
investigation would have been fruitless.” 350 Nor is this a case of “diligent counsel . . .
draw[ing] a line when they have good reason to think further investigation would be a
waste.” 351 Rather, trial counsel in this case never discovered any evidence to suggest one
way or another whether a challenge to the State’s DNA evidence would be wasteful. 352 As
the U.S. Supreme Court has cautioned:
Prosecution experts, of course, can sometimes make mistakes. Indeed, we
have recognized the threat to fair criminal trials posed by the potential for
incompetent or fraudulent prosecution forensics experts, noting that
“[s]erious deficiencies have been found in the forensic evidence used in
criminal trials. . . . One study of cases in which exonerating evidence
resulted in the overturning of criminal convictions concluded that invalid
forensic testimony contributed to the convictions in 60% of the cases.” This
threat is minimized when the defense retains a competent expert to counter
the testimony of the prosecution’s expert witnesses; it is maximized when
the defense instead fails to understand the resources available to it by
law. 353
In this case, trial counsel settled on a defense strategy without consulting a single
expert and cut off further investigation of other strategies without first conducting any

Anderson, 338 F.3d at 391.
Wiggins, 539 U.S. at 525.
351 Rompilla v. Beard, 125 S. Ct. 2456, 2463 (2005).
352 See Wiggins, 539 U.S. at 527 (“[The Maryland Court of Appeals] did not conduct an assessment of
whether the decision to cease all investigation upon obtaining the PSI and the DSS records actually
demonstrated reasonable professional judgment. The state court merely assumed that the investigation was
adequate. In light of what the PSI and the DSS records actually revealed, however, counsel chose to abandon
their investigation at an unreasonable juncture, making a fully informed decision with respect to sentencing
strategy impossible.”).
353 Hinton, 134 S. Ct. at 1090 (citing Melendez–Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305, 319 (2009) (citing
Bramdon L. Garrett & Peter J. Neufeld, Invalid Forensic Science Testimony and Wrongful Convictions, 95
Va. L. Rev. 1, 14 (2009))).
349

350

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investigation whatsoever into the possibility of challenging the prosecution’s DNA
evidence. Because counsel never investigated an alternative approach, counsel did not
have any reasoned basis to conclude that a challenge to the State’s DNA evidence would
be fruitless.
In Richter, the U.S. Supreme Court also considered the possibility that defense
counsel’s decision not to have the blood tested was itself strategic.
[C]oncentrating on the blood pool carried its own serious risks. If
serological analysis or other forensic evidence demonstrated that the blood
came from Johnson alone, Richter’s story would be exposed as an invention.
An attorney need not pursue an investigation that would be fruitless, much
less one that might be harmful to the defense. Here Richter’s attorney had
reason to question the truth of his client’s account, given, for instance,
Richter’s initial denial of involvement and the subsequent production of
Johnson’s missing pistol. It would have been altogether reasonable to
conclude that this concern justified the course Richter’s counsel pursued. 354
Unlike the situation in Richter, investigating whether the State’s DNA results were
valid by consulting an independent expert did not “carr[y] its own serious risk” in this
case. The State’s testing concluded Chester and Adams’ blood “could not be excluded”
from the tested sample. An independent evaluation of the State’s DNA testing would have
either confirmed this fact, or, as habeas counsel has discovered, shown that, in fact,
Chester can be scientifically excluded as a contributor to the sample and the possibility
that Adams’ blood contributed to the sample is a “scientific nullity.” Thus, the
investigation would not have been “fruitless” or potentially harmful to the defense—it had
only the potential to assist in Chester’s defense.
Defense counsel may not fail to conduct an investigation and then rely on her
resulting ignorance to excuse her failure to explore a strategy that would likely have

354

Richter, 562 U.S. at 108.

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yielded exculpatory evidence. 355 For counsel to forgo even an investigation of the
possibility of challenging the State’s DNA evidence, evidence the State heavily relied upon
to show Chester was the shooter, was not an objectively reasonable performance. 356 There
was nothing strategic about a decision to concede the physical evidence, with no educated
basis for doing so.
4. Conclusion
In sum, with deference to the Louisiana Supreme Court’s holdings on Strickland’s
first prong, this Court finds trial counsel’s failure to (1) interview Curtis, an eyewitnesses
who would have testified favorably to Chester’s defense; (2) present evidence that would
have undermined the state’s blood spatter theory; and (3) hire an independent DNA
analyst prior to stipulating to the State’s DNA evidence, independently constitute “errors
so serious that counsel was not functioning as the ‘counsel’ guaranteed the defendant by
the Sixth Amendment.” 357 Accordingly, with respect to these three errors, the Court must
examine whether the Louisiana Supreme Court’s determination that Chester was not
prejudiced by these errors was either contrary to or an unreasonable application of
Strickland’s second prong. 358
D. Whether there is a reasonable probability trial counsel’s
efficient performance effected the jury’s guilty verdict

Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690–91 (“[S]trategic choices made after less than complete investigation are
reasonable precisely to the extent that reasonable professional judgments support the limitations on
investigations. In other words, counsel has a duty to make reasonable investigations or to make a reasonable
decision that makes particular investigations unnecessary.”).
356 See Soffar, 368 F.3d at 476 (“We also agree with Soffar that his defense counsel were deficient in not
seeking out a ballistics expert when there were such readily apparent discrepancies between the ballistics
evidence and the State’s theory of the case. The State’s theory relied heavily on ballistics evidence to show
a correlation between the statement attributed to Soffar and the crime scene. Yet Soffar’s defense counsel
never even consulted with a ballistics expert.”).
357 Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687.
358 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d). The Court notes that the same three claims of ineffective assistance it finds have
merit are the same three claims on which the Louisiana Supreme Court found Chester had met Strickland’s
first prong.
355

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Under Strickland’s second prong, Chester must establish “prejudice.” In other
words, Chester must demonstrate a “reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s
unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different.” 359 A
“reasonable probability” is “a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the
outcome.” 360 In determining whether prejudice has resulted from counsel’s errors, a court
“must consider the totality of the evidence before the jury . . . a verdict or conclusion only
weakly supported by the record is more likely to have been affected by errors than one
with overwhelming record support.” 361 Deference to a state court’s conclusion that any
deficiency did not result in prejudice requires this Court to ask whether such a
determination by the state court “would be unreasonable.” 362
1. Failure to interview Curtis
At trial, the State’s case rested primarily on (1) the State’s unchallenged DNA
evidence; (2) unchallenged lay testimony that blood spatter “blows back” in the direction
from which it came; and (3) the Pollard sisters’ inconsistent testimony that Chester
confessed to killing Adams the night of Adams’ murder. No eyewitnesses testified at trial,
and the only witness who testified for the defense during the guilt phase of trial was
Chester’s brother, Darren Chester. Darren testified he was home on the night of Adams’
murder, and, contrary to Quinice’s testimony, that Quinice and her baby were both at the
apartment with him when Chester came home that night. 363

Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694.
Id.
361 Id. at 696.
362 Premo v. Moore, 131 S. Ct. 733, 744 (2011); see also Harrington, 131 S. Ct. at 792 (holding that “[i]t
would not have been unreasonable” for the state court to conclude that the petitioner’s evidence of prejudice
did not make it “reasonably likely” that the result would have been different).
363 R. 1594–96.
359

360

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There is a reasonable probability that “but for” trial counsel’s failure to interview
or present the testimony of Curtis, the result of the proceeding would have been different.
Curtis is the only person on the record before this Court, and before the Louisiana
Supreme Court, who actually witnessed the shooting. 364 Certainly, his testimony would
have been a powerful rebuttal to the State’s assertion that Chester was the shooter. Thus,
looking at trial counsel’s failure to interview Curtis, Chester has established the requisite
cause and prejudice required to establish ineffective assistance of trial counsel.
This is not the end of this Court’s analysis, however; this constitutional deficiency
must be viewed through AEDPA’s highly deferential lens. Following the Fifth Circuit’s
instructions in Neal, this Court looks only to the “ultimate legal conclusion that the state
court reached and not [to] whether the state court considered and discussed every angle
of the evidence.” 365 The Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s legal conclusion that
it was not reasonably likely Curtis’s eyewitness testimony would have impacted the jurors’
decision on Chester’s guilt is an unreasonable application of Strickland.
At trial, the State had relatively little evidence demonstrating Chester’s guilt and
did not offer any eyewitness testimony. The State rested its case on two drops of blood
found on Chester’s hat, lay testimony that blood from a gunshot wound “blows back”
towards the shooter, and two witnesses who testified Chester confessed to shooting
Adams, one of whom was impeached by a prior statement in which she stated Chester told
her Ratcliff shot the cab driver, and the other’s testimony was contradicted by the
testimony of the Defense’s only witness. In defense, Chester offered no evidence to

364
365

With, of course, the exception of Chester, Ratcliff, and Adams.
Neal, 286 F.3d at 246.

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corroborate his version of the shooting—that, although he was in the cab, Ratcliff shot
Adams.
Curtis’ testimony that Ratcliff exited the cab, tucked a gun in his waistband, and
left the scene only after rummaging through Adams’ cab, when added to the evidence
presented to the jury—that Ratcliff’s plastic bag was found hanging from the rear driver’s
side door and that Ratcliff’s fingerprints were on the business cards found in Adams’ cab—
undermines confidence in the outcome. The Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding to the
contrary is unreasonable. This is not a case in which the evidence of Chester’s guilt is so
extensive as to render harmless defense counsel’s errors. To the contrary, the State
predominately relied on blood spatter, DNA evidence, and the Pollard sisters’ testimony
that directly conflict with Curtis’ account of the murder. This conflicting evidence is
particularly important, given that Curtis was the sole witness to the crime. 366
The Court concludes trial counsel’s failure to interview and present Curtis’s
eyewitness testimony rendered her performance constitutionally deficient and that this
failure prejudiced Chester at trial. The Louisiana Supreme Court’s conclusion to the
contrary was an unreasonable application of Strickland.
2. Blood spatter expert
At trial, the State argued Chester had to have been the shooter if he had any “blow
back” on him. The State’s position is supported only by assuming the jury would have
indulged every possible inference in favor of the prosecution’s evidence as to whether
Chester could have been in the back passenger seat, as he claimed, when Adams was shot.
If the issue in this case were whether there is sufficient evidence on the record to support
366 The Court notes that in his affidavit, Curtis states that he was with another person when he witnessed
the crime. Had Chester’s trial counsel interviewed Curtis, it is reasonable to conclude defense counsel would
have had not one, but two eye-witnesses to corroborate Chester’s version of events.

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Chester’s conviction, the Court would resolve all such inferences in the State’s favor. The
standard for determining prejudice on a Strickland claim, however, is whether there is a
reasonable probability that the outcome would have been different if the jury had heard
Dr. James’ expert blood spatter testimony. Post-trial, Dr. James has presented blood
spatter evidence, that the jury did not hear, supporting Chester’s claim that he was seated
in the back passenger side of the car and, more importantly, that the blood spatter
evidence suggested Chester was not the shooter.
As Dr. James’ testimony demonstrates, expert blood spatter analysis would have
provided physical evidence supporting Chester’s claim that he was not the shooter. In the
absence of this evidence, Chester’s defense theory lacked any evidence in its support, and
the State made much of its blood spatter evidence at trial, asking the jury “[I]f you’re going
to believe [Chester’s] story, how did the blood, if he was over here and the blow back goes
the same way as the trajectory, how did it get on him?” 367
Chester’s only evidence, physical or otherwise, was his brother’s testimony that
Chester did not mention the murder to his brother and that Quinice was at the brother’s
house that night, not at Kaprice’s house, as Quinice had testified. Darren’s testimony was
easily discredited when he admitted he was not sure whether the night Quinice was at his
house was actually the night Adams was killed. Sergeant Thornton’s testimony was the
evidence the State used to demonstrate Chester was in the back driver’s side seat and,
therefore, the shooter. Without any evidence contradicting Sergeant Thornton’s
assertion, the jury was left to conclude the State’s theory was correct. Thus, the Court

367

R. 1638.

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finds that, had trial counsel presented Dr. James’ expert testimony, there is a reasonable
probability the jury’s verdict would have been different. 368
The Louisiana Supreme Court’s holding that Chester was not prejudiced is an
unreasonable application of Strickland. The only evidence the State presented that placed
Chester in the “shooter’s seat” was the blood spatter evidence detailed in Sergeant
Thornton’s lay testimony. It is unreasonable to conclude that defense testimony from a
blood spatter expert refuting the State’s lay witness’s interpretation of the blood evidence
likely would not affect the jury’s verdict.
3. DNA expert
Defense counsel did nothing to independently verify the accuracy of the State’s
DNA testing, but nevertheless elected to stipulate that the blood sample was “a
combination of [Chester’s] DNA and the victim’s DNA.” 369 At trial, witnesses for the State
and the prosecutor himself repeatedly overstated the DNA test’s conclusions. For
example, Detective Sacks testified that the results of the DNA testing revealed that “in
fact, . . . it was the victim’s blood” on Chester’s cap, 370 and during opening statements,
the State told the jury that the blood found on Chester’s cap “was tested by DNA experts,
and . . . the blood on the cap that was found was the blood of John Adams, the victim.” 371
Had defense counsel offered evidence that, in fact, Chester’s DNA could be excluded from
the sample and that, although it was possible, it was highly unlikely Adams’ blood

368 See Draughon v. Dretke, 427 F.3d 286, 295-97 (5th Cir. 2005) (counsel ineffective for failing to retain a
ballistics expert where expert could have shown state’s evidence was incorrect); Soffar v. Dretke, 368 F.3d
441, as amended by 391 F.3d 703 (5th Cir. 2004) (counsel ineffective for failing to consult ballistics expert
and living witness who could have countered false confession); Rivas v. Fischer, 780 F.3d 529 (2d Cir. 2015)
(counsel ineffective for failing to adequately investigate and present evidence challenging the testimony of
the medical examiner concerning the time of death); Thomas v. Clements, 789 F.3d 760 (7th Cir. 2015)
(counsel ineffective for failing to consult with a pathologist or other medical expert).
369 R. 1297.
370 R. 1547.
371 R. 1306.

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contributed to the sample, in this Court’s estimation it is reasonably likely that this
evidence would have swayed the jury in Chester’s favor.
Before this Court can find Chester was prejudiced by counsel’s failure, however,
the Court must consider every reasonable basis for the Louisiana Supreme Court’s finding
Chester was not prejudiced. 372 In its opinion, the Louisiana Supreme Court found Chester
was not prejudiced because: (1) Chester admitted to being in the cab when Adams was
shot, and, (2) although it is unlikely Adams’ blood contributed to the tested sample,
Adams could not be excluded as a donor. Taking the State’s contention that the blood
spatter from the gunshot wound could not have “blown back” on the passenger side of the
vehicle as true, the State’s assertion that the blood on Chester’s cap was, without question,
“the blood of John Adams, the victim,” 373 places Chester irrefutably in the shooter’s seat.
That, in reality, there was only a small chance the blood found on Chester’s cap might
belong to Adams draws the State’s placement of Chester in the shooter’s seat into
question.
The State based its case on the fact that, although there was no blood found in the
back passenger side of the cab, Chester had Adams’ blood on his person. If, in fact, Chester
did not have the victim’s blood on him, the State’s theory of the case would have been
squarely discredited and the evidence would have corroborated Chester’s version of
events; namely, that he was seated in the passenger side, and therefore, could not have
been the shooter. As a result, the Court finds no reasonable basis on which the Louisiana
Supreme Court could have rested its conclusion that the addition of Dr. Libby’s testimony
likely would not have affected the jury’s verdict.

372
373

See Anderson, 338 F.3d at 390.
R. 1306.

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4. Cumulative Effect of Trial Counsel’s Errors
Chester argues the Louisiana Supreme Court’s failure to consider the combined
prejudicial effect of each of trial counsel’s deficiencies constitutes an unreasonable
application of clearly established Federal law. In support of this argument, he submits
that “Strickland repeatedly describes a single ineffective assistance of counsel claim as
consisting of multiple errors or omissions that result in prejudice to the accused” 374 and
points out that the U.S. Supreme Court’s discussion of trial counsel’s errors in Williams
v. Taylor 375 and Wiggins v. Smith 376 demonstrates that this Court must evaluate
Strickland’s second prong with respect to the cumulative effect of each finding of
ineffective assistance.
Chester’s contention finds support in Fifth Circuit precedent. In White v. Thaler, 377
the Fifth Circuit considered “[t]he combined prejudicial effect” of counsel’s errors in its
evaluation of Strickland’s prejudice prong. 378 Similarly, in Richards v. Quarterman,379
the Fifth Circuit considered “each aspect of [counsel’s] performance the district court
found deficient” before determining whether the petitioner “was cumulatively prejudiced
thereby.” 380 In Moore v. Johnson, 381 the Fifth Circuit framed Strickland’s second prong

See, e.g., Strickland, 466 U.S. at 693 (“Even if a defendant shows that particular errors of counsel were
unreasonable . . . the defendant must show that they actually had an adverse effect on the defense.”)
(emphasis added); id. at 694 (holding that a petitioner must show “a reasonable probability that, but for
counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different”) (emphasis added).
375 529 U.S. at 395–96 (treating multiple unprofessional errors as a single claim of “trial counsel[’s] [failure
to] fulfill their obligation to conduct a thorough investigation of the defendant’s background”).
376 539 U.S. at 534 (noting that for counsel’s inadequate performance to constitute a Sixth Amendment
violation, petitioner must show that counsel’s “failures” prejudiced his defense (emphasis added)).
377 610 F.3d 890 (5th Cir. 2010).
378 Id. at 912.
379 566 F.3d 553 (5th Cir. 2009).
380 Id. at 564.
381 194 F.3d 586 (5th Cir. 1999)
374

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as requiring a court to determine “whether the cumulative errors of counsel rendered the
jury’s findings, either as to guilt or punishment, unreliable.” 382
That a court should evaluate the cumulative effect of trial counsel’s errors appears
to be clearly established in the Fifth Circuit. Thus, had Chester been convicted in Federal
court, this Court would agree that Strickland’s second prong must be evaluated
cumulatively. In the case of a habeas petitioner seeking relief from a state court
conviction, however, and with due respect to the Fifth Circuit, this Court must consider
whether the rule in question is clearly established by the U.S. Supreme Court, not a U.S.
Court of Appeals.
Although the U.S. Supreme Court’s use of the plural “errors” in the prejudice
context suggests Strickland’s prejudice prong should be evaluated cumulatively, this
Court cannot say such a requirement is clearly established by U.S. Supreme Court
precedent. 383 Accordingly, the Court finds the Louisiana Supreme Court’s failure to
evaluate the cumulative effect of counsel’s errors was not contrary to or an unreasonable
application of clearly established Federal law in the AEDPA context. 384
5. Conclusion

Id. at 619; see also id. at 621 (finding that counsel’s errors “taken together,” “including counsel’s
performance during the guilt phase, prejudiced the outcome of the punishment phase of Moore’s trial”).
Other circuits have made similar statements. See, e.g., United States v. Dado, 759 F.3d 550, 563 (6th Cir.
2014) (“[E]xamining an [ineffective assistance of counsel] claim requires the court to consider ‘the
combined effect of all acts of counsel found to be constitutionally deficient, in light of the totality of the
evidence in the case.’”) (quoting Lundgren v. Mitchell, 440 F.3d 754, 770 (6th Cir. 2006)); Goodman v.
Bertrand, 467 F.3d 1022, 1030 (7th Cir. 2006) (“Rather than evaluating each error in isolation, . . . the
pattern of counsel’s deficiencies must be considered in their totality.”).
383 See Lopez v. Smith, 135 S. Ct. 1, 1 (2014) (“We have emphasized, time and again, that the Antiterrorism
and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 110 Stat. 1214, prohibits the federal courts of appeals
from relying on their own precedent to conclude that a particular constitutional principle is ‘clearly
established.’”); see also Ruth A. Moyer, To Err is Human; to Cumulate, Judicious: The Need for U.S.
Supreme Court Guidance on Whether Federal Habeas Courts Reviewing State Convictions May
Cumulatively Assess Strickland Errors, 61 DRAKE L. REV. 447 (2013).
384 See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d).
382

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The Court holds that the Louisiana Supreme Court unreasonably applied
Strickland and its progeny when it concluded Chester was not prejudiced by his trial
counsel’s ineffective assistance with respect to her failure to interview Curtis, to challenge
the State’s blood spatter evidence, and to independently verify the validity of the State’s
DNA testing. With respect to those three claims, the Court concludes “there was no
reasonable basis” for the Louisiana Supreme Court’s decision to the contrary.
Accordingly;
CONCLUSION
IT IS ORDERED that Teddy Chester’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus be and
hereby is GRANTED. 385
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that within 120 days of this Order, the State of
Louisiana either retry Teddy Chester or set him free.
New Orleans, Louisiana on this 11th day of June, 2018.
_________________________________
SUSIE MORGAN
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT JUDGE

R. Doc. 1. Having granted the writ, the Court DENIES Petitioner’s motion for an evidentiary hearing as
MOOT.
385

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