Harper v. Lumpkin, No. 20-70022 (5th Cir. 2021)
Annotate this CaseThe Fifth Circuit denied petitioner, who is convicted of murder and sentenced to death, a certificate of appealability (COA) on all of his claims. The court concluded that petitioner did not sufficiently plead his Confrontation Clause claim and neither of his alternative arguments have any merit. The court also concluded that the state court's conclusion that petitioner's counsel was not ineffective for failing to use a peremptory strike against certain jurors was supported by the evidence and its legal conclusion that petitioner did not satisfy Strickland v. Washington's first prong was therefore not unreasonable; petitioner's Batson claims are either procedurally defaulted or the district court's rejection of petitioner's Batson claim is not debatable; petitioner's claim that counsel was ineffective by making an incomplete Batson claim also failed; even assuming counsel was ineffective for failing to object to the introduction of certain testimony, the error was not prejudicial; and no reasonable jurist could find that the habeas court's decision regarding counsel's ineffectiveness (for not arguing that petitioner's mental illness rendered his confession involuntary) was unreasonable.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on April 5, 2023.
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