Carter v. Bigelow, No. 12-4203 (10th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CasePetitioner-Appellant Douglas Carter, a Utah inmate, appealed the district court’s denial of his petition for writ of habeas corpus challenging his conviction and death sentence. Carter was convicted of the murder of Eva Olesen in Provo, Utah in 1985 and subsequently sentenced to death. Carter raised seven claims of error: (1) ineffective assistance of guilt-phase counsel; (2) ineffective assistance of appellate counsel; (3) ineffective assistance of sentencing counsel at his 1992 resentencing; (4) denial of due process and right to remain silent based on two of the prosecutor’s comments at closing argument; (5) denial of Confrontation Clause rights at resentencing; (6) denial of Fifth Amendment rights based on the admission of an involuntary confession; and (7) cumulative error. After review, the Tenth Circuit concluded that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to allow Carter to supplement his habeas petition with claims based on newly discovered evidence of prosecutorial misconduct and suppression of evidence. Because the district court did not address whether a stay of these claims to permit exhaustion was appropriate, the Court remanded to allow this determination in the first instance. As to his remaining claims (with the exception of his claim of cumulative error), the Court affirmed the district court’s denial of habeas relief: "[w]e conclude that these claims can be resolved even given the possibility of future evidentiary development of his prosecutorial-misconduct and suppression-of-evidence claims. Further delay and subsequent re-briefing of the other claims is not justified given the protracted time period[(]now over thirteen years[)] Mr. Carter’s federal habeas petition has been pending." The Court vacated as to Carter’s claim of cumulative error, and remanded to the district court based on the possibility that Carter’s supplemental claims could alter the cumulative error analysis.
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