Juan Ortega v. Fernando Gonzalez

MEMORANDUM

Ortega argues that the state court decision was contrary to or unreasonably applied the United States Supreme Court’s decisions in Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284 , 93 S.Ct. 1038 , 35 L.Ed.2d 297 (1973), and Pennsylvania v. Ritchie, 480 U.S. 39 , 107 S.Ct. 989 , 94 L.Ed.2d 40 (1987). The Ritchie argument is insubstantial, because the holding in that case addressed whether the compulsory process clause was violated by failure to disclose confidential records of the agency that provided services to the victim. No such disclosure issue was raised in this case.

The Chambers argument raises a serious question, but we cannot say that the state court’s decision was contrary to or an unreasonable application of the holding in that case. In Chambers , another man had repeatedly admitted, in writing under oath, as well as orally, that he had committed the murder with which Chambers was charged. At Chambers’s trial, the other man repudiated his sworn confession. Chambers was not permitted, under state evidentiary rules, to cross-examine the man about his repudiation of his sworn confession. Nor was he allowed to call witnesses, whose testimony the Court deemed both…