Charley Luther Pike v. Fred R. Dickson, Warden, California State Prison, San Quentin, California

The appellant Charley Luther Pike, convicted of first degree murder in a California Superior Court and sentenced to death, filed in the court below his petition for writ of habeas corpus alleging that his sentence of death was the result of proceedings in the State court which had denied him due process of law. No question is raised as to the appellant having exhausted his State remedies in the light of the decision in Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391 , 83 S.Ct. 822 , 9 L.Ed.2d 837 .

The petitioner filed his petition in the court below in propria persona and he was granted leave to proceed in forma pauperis. The petition, although couched in good English, is an inexpertly drawn legal document. Petitioner stated that he was not versed in the law and that his education did not go beyond the seventh grade.

In view of these circumstances it is appropriate that the petition be read in the manner suggested by Chief Judge Sobeloff in United States v. Glass, 4 Cir., 317 F.2d 200, 202 , as follows: “Where the layman’s papers clearly show what he is driving at, it is usually in the interest of justice and may in the long run save time to temper the reading of the papers with a measure of…