Cleveland Jackson v. Marc Houk, No. 08-3677 (6th Cir. 2012)
Annotate this CaseJackson was convicted by an Ohio jury of two murders committed in 2002. The court sentenced him to two separate death sentences. The Supreme Court of Ohio on direct appeal vacated the death sentence for one of the murders based on the trial judge’s errors in limiting the voir dire, but it affirmed the other death sentence. The federal district court denied a habeas corpus petition. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, noting the “difficulty” of Jackson’s claim that the trial court violated his right to due process of law when, after denying his counsel the right to question the jury concerning pretrial publicity, it denied his motion for a change of venue premised on the extraordinary pretrial publicity present in Lima, Ohio, the small community in which he was tried. There was no clearly established law governing the issue of what questions defense counsel is entitled to ask in order to examine jurors concerning non-racial bias against defendants accused of murdering a child. The court also rejected ineffective assistance claims.
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