Wood v. McCollum

FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
August 16, 2016
PUBLISH Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
TENTH CIRCUIT
MICHAEL W. WOOD,
Petitioner - Appellant,
No. 16-6067
v. (W.D. Okla.)
(D.C. No. 5:13-CV-00628-M)
TRACY MCCOLLUM, Warden,
Respondent - Appellee.
ORDER
Before HARTZ, MURPHY, and PHILLIPS, Circuit Judges.
MURPHY, Circuit Judge.
Petitioner Michael W. Wood is an Oklahoma state prisoner. In 2010, Wood
pleaded guilty to first degree murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment
without the possibility of parole. After his conviction, Wood sought a writ of
certiorari from the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (“OCCA”), arguing he
should be permitted to withdraw his plea and proceed to trial. The OCCA denied
certiorari on November 29, 2012, rejecting all five of Wood’s arguments.
Although Wood did not seek post-conviction relief in Oklahoma state court, he
filed a federal application for writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254.
Wood’s § 2254 application was referred to a federal magistrate judge who
prepared a Report and Recommendation (“R&R”). The R&R identified seven
grounds for relief in Wood’s habeas application, noting these claims were largely
duplicative of the ones Wood previously raised on direct appeal to the OCCA.
Wood’s claim the OCCA violated his due process and equal protection rights
(“Ground Six”), however, was unexhausted because Wood had not sought relief in
state court. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1)(A) (requiring a petitioner in state custody
to first “exhaust[] the remedies available in the courts of the State” before filing a
federal habeas application).
Respondent asked the district court to deny the unexhausted claim on the
merits. Wood asked the court to either dismiss Ground Six without prejudice or
to “retain jurisdiction” while he exhausted the claim in state court. The R&R
recommended (1) denying Wood’s request to stay the proceedings and hold the
§ 2254 application in abeyance while he exhausted his claim and (2) granting
Wood’s request to dismiss the claim without prejudice. The R&R recommended
denying the remainder of Wood’s claims on the merits. The district court entered
an order adopting the R&R, denying the habeas application with prejudice on the
merits with the exception of Ground Six which was dismissed without prejudice
for failure to exhaust available state remedies.
Wood does not contest that Ground Six is currently unexhausted, rendering
his § 2254 petition a “mixed petition” containing both exhausted and unexhausted
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claims. A district court confronted with a mixed petition may either “(1) dismiss
the entire petition without prejudice in order to permit exhaustion of state
remedies, or (2) deny the entire petition on the merits.” Moore v. Schoeman, 288
F.3d 1231, 1235 (10th Cir. 2002). The court may also permit the petitioner to
delete the unexhausted claim from his petition and proceed only on the exhausted
claims, Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509, 510 (1982), or, if the equities favor such an
approach, it may stay the federal habeas petition and hold it in abeyance while the
petitioner returns to state court to exhaust the previously unexhausted claims,
Rhines v. Weber, 544 U.S. 269, 279 (2005).
In this matter, the district court disposed of Wood’s § 2254 petition by
denying all claims but one on the merits and dismissing the remaining claim
without prejudice. This approach to a mixed petition is specifically foreclosed by
our precedent. Moore, 288 F.3d at 1232. A district court may not dispose of a
mixed petition in a hybrid fashion by adjudicating the exhausted claims on the
merits and dismissing the unexhausted claim(s) without prejudice. Id. at 1235–36
(reversing a hybrid dismissal).
On July 7, 2016, we issued an order to show cause why this court should
not summarily reverse the district court’s hybrid dismissal of Wood’s § 2254
petition, and remand the matter for a disposition consistent with our precedent.
On July 14, 2016, Respondent filed its response to our order to show cause,
acknowledging the district court’s hybrid dismissal should be reversed and this
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matter should be remanded under the reasoning in Moore. Wood filed his
response on July 25, 2016, asserting he has no objection to applying the “ruling
and/or reasoning” in Moore to his mixed petition. 1
Based on the foregoing, we reverse the district court’s hybrid dismissal of
Wood’s § 2254 petition, and remand to the district court with instructions to
vacate its judgment and dispose of Wood’s petition in a manner consistent with
Moore.
1
Wood’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis is granted.
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