Daire v. Lattimore, No. 12-55667 (9th Cir. 2015)
Annotate this CasePetitioner was a California state prisoner who was serving a forty-year “three strikes” sentence for first-degree burglary. Petitioner filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), arguing that her attorney provided ineffective assistance by failing to present evidence of mental illness in Petitioner's Romero motion asking the sentencing court to disregard two of her strikes. The district court denied the petition. The Ninth Circuit affirmed, holding (1) even assuming that the applicability of Strickland v. Washington to noncapital sentencing is clearly established such that federal courts can afford relief from a state court’s flawed application of Strickland in that context, Petitioner could not prevail under the review standard imposed by the AEDPA; and (2) the state court’s findings that trial counsel’s performance did not fall below an objective standard of reasonableness and that submission of Petitioner’s medical evidence would not have resulted in a successful Romero motion and a concomitantly reduced sentence were not unreasonable applications of the Strickland standard.
Court Description: Habeas Corpus. The panel affirmed the district court’s denial of a 28 U.S.C. § 2254 habeas corpus petition brought by California state prisoner Sophia Daire, who is serving a 40-year “three strikes” sentence for first-degree burglary. Daire argued that she was deprived of effective assistance because her attorney failed to present evidence of mental illness in her Romero motion asking the sentencing court to disregard two of her strikes. The panel held that even assuming, arguendo, that the applicability of Strickland v. Washington to noncapital sentencing is clearly established such that federal courts can afford relief from a state court’s flawed application of Strickland in that context, Daire cannot prevail under the review standard imposed by AEDPA. The panel held that the state court’s findings – that trial counsel’s performance did not fall below an objective standard of reasonableness and that submission of Daire’s medical evidence would not have changed the outcome of her Romero hearing – were not unreasonable applications of federal law. DAIRE V. LATTIMORE 3
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.