Hurles v. Ryan, No. 16-99007 (9th Cir. 2019)
Annotate this CaseThe Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment dismissing a petition for habeas relief. After the district court conducted a through evidentiary hearing on the issue of judicial bias and concluded that no bias occurred, the panel reviewed the record, the briefs, and considered the arguments of counsel and could not say that the district court committed clear error in its factual determinations. The panel also held that Ngyuen v. Curry, 736 F.3d 1287 (9th Cir. 2013), was not controlling and the prudential law of the case doctrine did not bind the panel. Rather, the panel held that, under Davila v. Davis, 137 S. Ct. 2058 (2017), petitioner's ineffective assistance of counsel claim was not viable.
Court Description: Habeas Corpus. The panel affirmed the district court’s judgment, on remand for an evidentiary hearing, dismissing a habeas corpus petition. The panel could not say that the district court committed clear error in its determinations, after conducting an evidentiary hearing on remand, that there was no actual judicial bias. The panel held that the petitioner’s claim of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel is not viable in light of Davila v. Davis, 137 S. Ct. 2058 (2017), which held that the holding in Martinez v. Ryan, 566 U.S. 1 (2012) – that a successful claim of post-conviction ineffective assistance of counsel can excuse a procedurally defaulted claim of ineffective assistance of trial counsel – does not extend to procedurally defaulted claims of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. The panel wrote that because Davila is clearly irreconcilable with this court’s prior precedent, Nguyen v. Curry, 736 F.3d 1287 (9th Cir. 2013), Nguyen does not control the panel’s decision, and a prior panel’s pre-Davila decision applying Nguyen to this case does not bind this panel. HURLES V. RYAN 3
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