Castegnaro v. State of Vermont

Filing 9

OPINION AND ORDER Adopting 8 Magistrate Judge's Report and Recommendation, granting 7 Respondent's MOTION to Dismiss, denying 1 Petitioner's PETITION for Writ of Habeas Corpus. Signed by Chief Judge Christina Reiss on 7/18/2016. (pac) Filed date corrected on 7/19/2016 (jlh).

U.S. DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF VERMONT
FILED
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE
DISTRICT OF VERMONT
JOSEPH P. CASTEGNARO,
Petitioner,

v.
STATE OF VERMONT,
Respondent.

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CLERK

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LAW
Case No. 2:15-cv-270

OPINION AND ORDER ADOPTING MAGISTRATE JUDGE'S
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
(Docs. 7 & 8)
This matter came before the court for a review of the Magistrate Judge's June 7,
2016 Report and Recommendation ("R & R") (Doc. 8). On December 30, 2015,
Petitioner Joseph P. Castegnaro filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28
U.S.C. § 2254 (Doc. 1). Petitioner contends that "[t]he evidence was insufficient to
establish that [he] was guilty ofviolating an abuse prevention order." (Doc. 1 at 5.) In
response to the petition, the State of Vermont (the "State") filed a motion to dismiss
(Doc. 7), which Petitioner did not oppose. In his R & R, the Magistrate Judge
recommends granting the State's motion to dismiss. No party has filed an objection to
the R & R, and the deadline for doing so has passed.
On May 13, 2013, Petitioner, who was represented by counsel at the time, was
convicted of two counts of violating an abuse prevention order, second or subsequent
offense, in violation of 13 V.S.A. § 1030(a), (b). Petitioner was sentenced to two
concurrent terms of eight to nine years of imprisonment, which he is currently serving in
the custody ofthe Vermont Department of Corrections.
In its entry order on Petitioner's direct appeal, the Vermont Supreme Court
summarized the State's evidence against Petitioner as follows:

In July 2012, [Petitioner] was served with an abuse prevention order. The
order required [Petitioner] to remain 100 feet away from the victim and her
residence; it also prohibited [Petitioner] from contacting the victim "in any
way," including "indirectly ... through a third party or in any other
manner." [Petitioner] was subsequently charged with violating the order by
being within 100 feet of the victim's residence on or about September 1,
2012, and for having third-party contact with the victim on or about
September 9, 2012. At trial, two witnesses testified[] ... that [Petitioner]
was near the victim's residence on September 1, 2012. Another witness
testified that, on September 9, 20 12, [Petitioner] asked her to tell the victim
to call him.

State v. Castegnaro, 2014 WL 3714918, at *1 (Vt. July Term, 2014).
With respect to Petitioner's argument that the State failed to introduce sufficient
evidence of when the alleged acts occurred, the Vermont Supreme Court noted, and
Petitioner acknowledged, that "the actual date that the alleged acts occurred is not an
element of the crimes." !d. The court recounted that:
[a] police officer testified that the victim contacted police on September 1,
20 12 and that he spoke that day to the victim and a neighbor who observed
the offense. The victim's neighbor testified that she saw [Petitioner] in the
victim's driveway on September 1, within approximately 15 feet of
victim's home. She testified that she was aware of the abuse prevention
order at that time. Another neighbor testified that he saw [Petitioner]
outside the victim's home that day, knocking on the victim's door. He
reconstructed the date of this incident several days later when he mentioned
it to the victim. He recalled that he had seen [Petitioner] knocking on the
victim's door the same day he got his food stamps-namely, September 1.
[A]nother of the victim's neighbors testified that on September 9, 2012, she
ran into [Petitioner] on her way to church. [Petitioner] asked her to tell the
victim that he wanted the victim to call him because he was lonely. The
neighbor later relayed this information to the victim.

!d. at *2. Based on this testimony, the court concluded that the State had presented
sufficient evidence as to the timing of the alleged acts.
A district judge must make a de novo determination of those portions of a
magistrate judge's report and recommendation to which an objection is made. Fed. R.
Civ. P. 72(b); 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Cullen v. United States, 194 F.3d 401, 405 (2d Cir.
1999). The district judge may "accept, reject, or modify, in whole or in part, the findings
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or recommendations made by the magistrate judge." 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); accord

Cullen, 194 F.3d at 405. A district judge, however, is not required to review the factual
or legal conclusions of the magistrate judge as to those portions of a report and
recommendation to which no objections are addressed. Thomas v. Arn, 474 U.S. 140,
150 (1985).
In his ten page R & R, the Magistrate Judge carefully reviewed the factual record
and motion before the court and determined the State's motion to dismiss should be
granted. The Magistrate Judge observed that Petitioner made no effort to explain the
factual basis for his petition and therefore failed to satisfy the exacting legal standard
employed by federal courts when a petitioner challenges the sufficiency of the evidence
supporting his conviction. See Coleman v. Johnson, 132 S. Ct. 2060, 2062 (2012) (per
curiam) (recognizing petitioners "face a high bar in federal habeas proceedings" because
"[a] reviewing court may set aside the jury's verdict on the ground of insufficient
evidence only if no rational trier of fact could have agreed with the jury" and "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."')
(internal quotation marks omitted). The court agrees with the Magistrate Judge's
recommendations and finds them well-reasoned. The court therefore adopts the R & R in
its entirety.

CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the court hereby ADOPTS the Magistrate Judge's
R & R (Doc. 8) as the court's Opinion and Order. The State's motion to dismiss (Doc. 7)
is GRANTED.
).,

SO ORDERED.

Dated at Burlington, in the District of Vermont, this_!_!_ day of July, 2016.

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