Watson v. Hall

Filing 12

MEMORANDUM OPINION. Signed by Senior Judge Neal B. Biggers on 8/13/18. (cr)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF MISSISSIPPI
OXFORD DIVISION
VERNORA WATSON

PETITIONER

v.

No. 3:17CV144-NBB-DAS

MDOC, ET AL.

RESPONDENTS
MEMORANDUM OPINION

This matter comes before the court on the pro se petition of Vernora Watson for a writ of
habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The State has moved to dismiss the petition for failure to
state a claim upon which relief could be granted. Ms. Watson has responded to the motion, and the
matter is ripe for resolution. For the reasons set forth below, the State’s motion to dismiss will be
granted and the instant petition will be dismissed for failure to state a claim upon which relief could
be granted.
Habeas Corpus Relief Under 28 U.S.C. § 2254
The writ of habeas corpus, a challenge to the legal authority under which a person may
be detained, is ancient. Duker, The English Origins of the Writ of Habeas Corpus: A Peculiar
Path to Fame, 53 N.Y.U.L.Rev. 983 (1978); Glass, Historical Aspects of Habeas Corpus, 9 St.
John's L.Rev. 55 (1934). It is “perhaps the most important writ known to the constitutional law
of England,” Secretary of State for Home Affairs v. O’Brien, A.C. 603, 609 (1923), and it is
equally significant in the United States. Article I, § 9, of the Constitution ensures that the right
of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, except when, in the case of rebellion or
invasion, public safety may require it. Habeas Corpus, 20 Fed. Prac. & Proc. Deskbook § 56.
Its use by the federal courts was authorized in Section14 of the Judiciary Act of 1789.

Habeas

corpus principles developed over time in both English and American common law have since
been codified:
The statutory provisions on habeas corpus appear as sections 2241 to 2255 of the
1948 Judicial Code. The recodification of that year set out important procedural
limitations and additional procedural changes were added in 1966. The scope of the
writ, insofar as the statutory language is concerned, remained essentially the same,
however, until 1996, when Congress enacted the Antiterrorism and Effective Death
Penalty Act, placing severe restrictions on the issuance of the writ for state prisoners
and setting out special, new habeas corpus procedures for capital cases. The changes
made by the 1996 legislation are the end product of decades of debate about habeas
corpus.
Id. Under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, a federal court may issue the writ when a person is held in violation of
the federal Constitution or laws, permitting a federal court to order the discharge of any person held
by a state in violation of the supreme law of the land. Frank v. Mangum, 237 U.S. 309, 311, 35 S. Ct.
582, 588, 59 L. Ed. 969 (1915).
Facts and Procedural Posture
Vernora Watson is in the custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections and is
currently housed at the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility in Pearl, Mississippi. Ms.
Watson was convicted of murder in the Circuit Court of Panola County and sentenced on August
17, 2000, to serve a term of life in the custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections
(MDOC). See Exhibit A.1 On May 14, 2001, the Mississippi Court of Appeals affirmed Ms.
Watson’s conviction and sentence. Watson v. State, 816 So. 1029 (Miss. Ct. App. 2002) (Cause
No. 2000-KA-01936). In the instant petition, however, Ms. Watson has not challenged her
conviction and sentence for murder; rather, she challenges the State’s determination that she is

1

The exhibits referenced in the instant memorandum opinion may be found in the State’s
motion to dismiss.
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not eligible for parole.2
Ms. Watson attached to her petition a grievance filed with the Administrative Remedy
Program (ARP) at the Mississippi Department of Corrections in August 2015 and the First Step
Response to that grievance. ECF Doc. 1at 16-18. The First Step Response, dated August 11, 2015,
informed Ms. Watson that she was not eligible for parole because homicide was a crime of violence.
ECF Doc. 1, p. 18. The First Step response also added that Ms. Watson could “petition the court for
parole consideration after serving ten years of your sentence.” Id.3 MDOC officials informed the
respondent that Ms. Watson did not complete the grievance process by seeking review through the
second step. As such, she did not receive a certificate of completion to appeal the MDOC’s decision
on the grievance to the circuit court. See Exhibit F (Affidavit of LeTresia Stewart). Further, in
August 2016, Ms. Watson filed a second grievance with ARP which MDOC officials returned to her,
stating “that she had a previously accepted ARP (CMCF-15-1466) concerning the same issue.” Id.

Ms. Watson also attached to her petition a copy of a letter dated October 20, 2015,
acknowledging Watson’s request to the trial court for consideration of parole under House Bill 585.
2

Ms. Watson’s federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus does not challenge her
conviction and sentence on the merits, but her parole eligibility. She has filed several state court
cases challenging the validity of her conviction and sentence. As Ms. Watson’s present petition
challenges only her parole eligibility, not the merits of her conviction, the court will not consider
her state postconviction actions or the direct appeal of her conviction.
3

Despite this additional language in the response to Ms. Watson’s grievance, under state law,
her crime, homicide, renders her ineligible for parole consideration by the trial court, as the trial court
noted in its order attached to the instant petition. ECF Doc. 1, pp. 20-22. In addition, the
Administrative Remedy Program provided an amended First Step response to Ms. Watson, removing
the inaccurate language and stating that Watson was not eligible for parole because homicide is a
crime of violence. A copy of that Amended grievance response may be found in Exhibit E; see also
Exhibit F (Affidavit of LeTresia Stewart).
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ECF Doc. 1at 19. In addition, Watson attached an Order of the Panola County Circuit Court filed
March 23, 2017, denying her petition for parole based on the trial court’s determination that Watson’s
crime, murder, is a violent crime which is ineligible for parole under current state law. ECF Doc. 1,
pp. 20-22. The trial judge concluded that, “[w]hen Watson might be released from custody is now an
executive decision to be made by the proper MDOC or any other officials, and not a judicial decision
to be made by this court.” ECF Doc. 1, p. 22.
Grounds for Relief
In the instant petition, Ms. Watson raises the following grounds for relief:
Ground One:

Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3 language is contradictory in nature of
its agenda.

Ground Two:

That Panola County Circuit Court Judge Jimmy McClure has
ordered that release is now an MDOC decision.

Ground Three:

14th USCA violation of Equal Protection Clause - Ex Post Facto
restrictions.

Doc. 1. The court has construed Ms. Watson’s petition to seek parole eligibility on her murder
conviction and sentence.
Grounds One and Two: Parole Eligibility
Ms. Watson argues in her response to the State’s motion to dismiss that her challenge to parole
eligibility is, indeed, a part of her sentence – and thus a proper ground for relief in the instant habeas
corpus petition. As discussed below, however, that is not the case.
The instant federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus must be dismissed for failure to state a
valid claim for relief. Ms. Watson’s request for parole eligibility does not state a claim of
constitutional magnitude and thus falls outside the realm of federal habeas corpus relief under 28
U.S.C. § 2254.
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To maintain a petition for writ of habeas corpus, a petitioner must allege that she has been
“deprived of some right secured to [her] by the Constitution or the laws of the United States.” Irving
v. Thigpen, 732 F.2d 1215, 1216 (5th Cir. 1984); Trussell v. Estelle, 699 F.2d 256, 259 (5th Cir. 1983);
Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137 (1979). In the event that the petitioner has not alleged a deprivation
of such a right, she has failed to state a claim for habeas corpus relief, and her claims must be
dismissed. Irving, supra at 1216. Further, “[a] petition for federal habeas corpus relief based on any
argument that state courts are incorrectly applying their own law [] is not a basis for relief.” Wansley
v. Mississippi Dept. of Corrections, et al., 769 F.3d 309, 312 (5th Cir. 2014) (citations omitted).
Ms. Watson has challenged only her parole eligibility; as such, she has not set forth the
deprivation of an interest protected by federal law. See Wansley, supra. Therefore, Ms. Watson’s
federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus seeking parole eligibility fails to state a claim for relief.
Whether Ms. Watson is eligible for or entitled to parole is a matter of Mississippi law. The
parole statute on the date of her conviction read, in relevant part:
47–7–3. (1) Every prisoner who has been convicted of any offense against the State of
Mississippi, and is confined in the execution of a judgment of such conviction in the
Mississippi State Penitentiary for a definite term or terms of one (1) year or over, or
for the term of his or her natural life, whose record of conduct shows that such
prisoner has observed the rules of the penitentiary, and who has served not less than
one-fourth (¼) of the total of such term or terms for which such prisoner was
sentenced, or, if sentenced to serve a term or terms of thirty (30) years or more, or, if
sentenced for the term of the natural life of such prisoner, has served not less than ten
(10) years of such life sentence, may be released on parole as hereinafter provided,
except that:
…
(g) No person shall be eligible for parole who is convicted or whose suspended
sentence is revoked after June 30, 1995.
Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3(g) (1995 Miss. Laws Ch. 596 (S.B. 2175)) (emphasis added). That statute
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became effective on June 30, 1995. Thus, at the time of her conviction, August 17, 2000, Ms. Watson
was ineligible for parole.
The parole statutes in Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3(1), as amended, currently provide, in relevant
part:
(1) Every prisoner who has been convicted of any offense against the State of
Mississippi, and is confined in the execution of a judgment of such conviction in the
Mississippi Department of Corrections for a definite term or terms of one (1) year or
over, or for the term of his or her natural life, whose record of conduct shows that such
prisoner has observed the rules of the department, and who has served not less than
one-fourth ( ¼ ) of the total of such term or terms for which such prisoner was
sentenced, or, if sentenced to serve a term or terms of thirty (30) years or more, or, if
sentenced for the term of the natural life of such prisoner, has served not less than ten
(10) years of such life sentence, may be released on parole as hereinafter provided,
except that:
…
(f) No person shall be eligible for parole who is convicted or whose suspended
sentence is revoked after June 30, 1995, except that an offender convicted of only
nonviolent crimes after June 30, 1995 may be eligible for parole if the offender meets
the requirements in subsection (1) and this paragraph . . . . For purposes of this
paragraph, “nonviolent crime” means a felony other than homicide [and other
crimes inapplicable to the instant case].
…
(g)(i) No person who, on or after July 1, 2014, is convicted of a crime of violence
pursuant to Section 97-3-2, a sex crime or an offense that specifically prohibits parole
release, shall be eligible for parole.
(Emphasis added).4 Miss. Code Ann. § 97-3-2(b) defines murder as a crime of violence. Thus, under
the current parole statute, Ms. Watson remains ineligible for parole. Nothing has changed.
As discussed above, Ms. Watson was convicted for murder, a crime of violence, in Panola
4

Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3(1)(g) has been added to govern parole eligibility for crimes committed
after July 1, 2014. However, even that subsection states that an inmate who has committed a crime of
violence under § 97-3-2 (such as murder) is ineligible for parole. See Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3(1)(g)(i).
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County Circuit Court and sentenced to life in prison. Thus, even under the legislative amendments as
codified in the current version of the parole statute in Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-3(1), she Watson is
ineligible for parole under state law.
Mississippi’s parole statutes, Miss. Code Ann. § 47-7-1, et seq., (1972), as amended, confer
absolute discretion regarding parole on the Parole Board; therefore, a prisoner has no constitutionally
protected liberty interest in parole. See Scales v. Mississippi State Parole Board, 831 F.2d 565 (5th Cir.
1987) (“In Mississippi, the absolute discretion conferred on the Parole Board affords a prisoner no
constitutionally recognized liberty interest” in parole.); Irving v. Thigpen, supra, (“...the Mississippi
[parole] statute does not create any constitutionally protected liberty interest in parole to which
procedural due process considerations attach.”); see also Smith v. Mississippi Parole Board, 478 F.
App’x 97, 2017 WL 1645457 (5th Cir. May 10, 2012) (unpub.) (“The Mississippi statutes do not
create a liberty interest and federal due process rights are not implicated by the denial of parole and
the procedures by which parole is denied.”).
Further, in Hopson v. Mississippi State Parole Board, 976 So.2d 973, 975 (Miss. Ct. App.
2008), the Mississippi Court of Appeals held that “‘[b]y statute, the Parole Board is given ‘absolute
discretion’ to determine who is entitled to parole within the boundaries of the factors set forth in
[section] 47-7-3.” Therefore, parole in Mississippi is not a right, but a privilege, which may be
granted to a prisoner by the parole board under state law guidelines.
Additionally, the Mississippi Supreme Court held in Mitchell v. State, 561 So.2d 1037, 1039
(Miss. 1990), that “[t]he granting of parole or denial of parole . . . is the exclusive responsibility of the
state parole board, which is independent of the circuit court's sentencing authority.” See also Johnson
v. Miller, 919 So.2d 273, 277 (Miss. Ct. App. 2005) (“In Mississippi, prisoners have ‘no
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constitutionally recognized liberty interest in parole.’”) (citations omitted). In Davis v. State, 429
So.2d 262 (Miss. 1983) the Mississippi Supreme Court explained:
A prisoner has no automatic entitlement to parole. It may be granted or withheld by the
state – to be sure, not arbitrarily – as a matter of grace. That the state holds out the
possibility of parole provides no more than a mere hope that the benefit will be obtained.
Greenholtz v. Inmates of the Nebraska Penal and Correctional Complex, 442 U.S. 1, 11,
99 S.Ct. 2100, 2105, 60 L.Ed.2d 668, 677 (1979).
See also Davis v. Johnson, 205 F. Supp. 2d 616, 619 (N.D. Miss. June 20, 2002) (where the District
Court found that even a prisoner who may be eligible – and even approved – for parole “holds the
smallest liberty interest, ‘no more substantial than the inmate’s hope ... a hope which is not protected
by due process.’”) (citing Greenholtz, supra). Both state and federal courts have repeatedly held that
the Mississippi parole statutes do not confer a liberty interest regarding state inmates’ eligibility for
parole.
For these reasons, neither Ms. Watson nor any prisoner within the Mississippi Department of
Corrections has a constitutionally recognized liberty interest in parole due to the discretionary nature
of Mississippi’s parole system. Absent the assertion of a federally protected constitutional right, Ms.
Watson’s request for parole eligibility fails to state a habeas corpus claim upon which relief can be
granted.
Ground Three: Equal Protection and Ex Post Facto Claims
Ms. Watson also argues that criminal defendants who are convicted at different times can face
different punishments, including eligibility for parole. Though she couches this claim mostly in terms
of equal protection, it could also be an ex post facto claim. The court will discuss both.
Equal Protection
Put simply, the equal protection clause directs states to treat all similarly situated persons
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alike. City of Cleburne, Tex. v. Cleburne Living Center, 473 U.S. 432, 439, 105 S.Ct. 3249, 3254, 87
L.Ed.2d 313 (1985). A state government can violate the Equal Protection Clause only by intentional
discrimination. Lavernia v. Lynaugh, 845 F.2d 493, 496 (5th Cir. 1988). “Discriminatory purpose . . .
implies more than intent as violation or as awareness of consequences[.] . . . It implies that the
decisionmaker singled out a particular group for disparate treatment and selected his course of action
at least in part for the purpose of causing its adverse effect on an identifiable group[.]” Id. (internal
quotations, citations, and footnote omitted) (emphasis in original). A violation of the equal protection
clause can occur only when the government action in question classifies or distinguishes between two
or more relevant persons or groups. Brennan v. Stewart, 834 F.2d 1248, 1257 (5th Cir. 1988). The
plaintiff’s equal protection claim in this case must therefore fail, as she has failed to identify “two or
more relevant persons or groups” which the government has classified and treated differently – and to
her detriment. Vera v. Tue, 73 F.3d 604, 609-10 (5th Cir. 1996). Nearly every time a state passes a
law, some people benefit, some are harmed, and other are unaffected. Ms. Watson has not even
alleged that state elected officials passed the most recent parole statute for the purpose causing harm
to a specific group. For these reasons, the plaintiff’s Equal Protection claim will be dismissed for
failure to state a constitutional question.
Ex Post Facto Laws
Though not entirely clear, it appears that Ms. Watson also claims that the new parole statutes
have caused her sentence to be more severe than those in effect at the time of her conviction. If true,
these facts could give rise to a claim that the new statute violated the constitutional prohibition against
ex post facto laws. The Constitution prohibits the imposition of retroactively-applied criminal
statutes:
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The Framers of the U.S. Constitution adopted the Ex Post Facto Clause to protect
future Americans against oppressive, retroactively imposed, legislative enactments.
The enduring prominence of the Clause stems as much from its location in Article I, a
position otherwise reserved for structural issues of broad democratic governance, as
from its emphatic prohibition: “No state shall … pass any … ex post facto law.”
Wayne A. Logan, The Ex Post Facto Clause and the Jurisprudence of Punishment, 35 Am. Crim. L.
Rev. 1261, 1275 (1998) (internal citations and footnotes omitted). The Court defined an ex post facto
law to be one “which imposes a punishment for an act which was not punishable at the time it was
committed; or imposes additional punishment to that then prescribed ....” Cummings v. Missouri, 71
U.S. (4 Wall.) 277, 325-26 (1867). In the present case, murder in Mississippi was punishable by
imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole when Ms. Watson was convicted, and the
punishment is the same now. Thus, Ms. Watson was not eligible for parole at the time she was
convicted, and she is not eligible for parole now; as such, the new statute has not worked to her
detriment. Thus, to the extent that she raises a ex post facto claim, that claim must also be
dismissed.
Conclusion
For the reasons set forth above, the instant petition for a writ of habeas corpus will be
dismissed for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. A final judgment consistent
with this memorandum opinion will issue today.
SO ORDERED, this, the 13th day of August, 2018.
/s/ Neal Biggers
NEAL B. BIGGERS
SENIOR U. S. DISTRICT JUDGE

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