In re Caldwell

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Caldwell pleaded guilty to murder and an unrelated aggravated robbery in two separate cases in the same court on the same day. He initially filed an unsuccessful 28 U.S.C. 2254 habeas petition challenging his murder conviction. He then challenged both convictions in a second section 2254 petition. The district court transferred Caldwell’s petition to the Sixth Circuit, which held that the petition is second or successive only to the extent it re-attacks his murder conviction. To the extent it challenges his aggravated-robbery conviction for the first time, the court returned it to the district court for consideration as an initial petition. The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act limits “second or successive” applications for habeas relief but Caldwell had no obligation to challenge both convictions in his initial habeas petition. A petition qualifies as second or successive only if it challenges a previously challenged judgment. The court declined to authorize Caldwell’s second petition, challenging his murder conviction; Caldwell did not identify a new rule of constitutional law supporting any of his claims nor did he identify any factual predicates for these claims that could not have been discovered previously and that would establish his actual innocence. View "In re Caldwell" on Justia Law