Hall v. Mays, No. 10-5658 (6th Cir. 2021)
Annotate this Case
In 1994, Hall murdered his estranged wife by attacking her in her home, dragging her to the backyard swimming pool while at least one of her children looked on, and drowning her. A Tennessee state court jury convicted Hall of premeditated first-degree murder and sentenced him to death, finding that the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel, and involved torture or serious physical abuse beyond that necessary to cause death. State courts affirmed the conviction and sentence. Hall unsuccessfully pursued state post-conviction relief, then sought federal habeas relief.
The district court denied Hall any relief. The Sixth Circuit affirmed, rejecting a “Brady” claim concerning prison records about the mental illness of a fellow inmate (Dutton) who testified against Hall. Dutton’s prison records were records of the Tennessee Department of Corrections, which was not acting under the prosecutor’s control, so the prosecutor did not know about them, actually or constructively. Brady does not impose an unlimited duty to pursue such an inquiry. Given the initial determination of competence, the opinions of mental health professionals that evaluated Hall throughout his state court proceedings, and no question of mental incompetence being raised during that time, counsel’s performance was not unreasonable in failing to establish that Hall was incompetent to stand trial. The court also rejected an ineffective assistance claim concerning evidence of Hall’s family and social history
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.