Steven M. Castillo v. Jerry S. Stainer

983 F.2d 145 Steven M. CASTILLO, Petitioner-Appellant, v. Jerry S. STAINER, Respondent-Appellee. No. 91-16146. United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit. Argued and Submitted Nov. 2, 1992. Decided Dec. 22, 1992. Lauren Weil, Asst. Federal Public Defender, Sacramento, CA, for petitioner-appellant. Michael J. Weinberger, Deputy Atty. Gen., Sacramento, CA, for respondent-appellee. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California. Before BOOCHEVER, NOONAN and O'SCANNLAIN, Circuit Judges. NOONAN, Circuit Judge: 1 Steven M. Castillo seeks habeas corpus, having been convicted of murder in California. The district court denied his petition. We affirm. FACTS 2 Castillo was convicted of aiding and abetting the murder of Eric Reimer by Ramon Arreaga on March 16, 1987. The state presented evidence that Arreaga entered the Bob-Les bar and shot Reimer four times in the head. He then left the bar, got into his car, and drove off. The evidence against Castillo was that shortly before the shooting he was seen talking to Arreaga in the Bob-Les parking lot. After the shooting Castillo was in the parking lot with a rifle in his hands and fired shots at two…

Steven M. Castillo seeks habeas corpus, having been convicted of murder in California. The district court-denied his petition. We affirm.

FACTS

Castillo was convicted of aiding and abetting the murder of Eric Reimer by Ramon Arreaga on March 16, 1987. The state presented evidence that Arreaga entered the Bob-Les bar and shot Reimer four times in the head. He then left the bar, got into his car, and drove off. The evidence against Castillo was that shortly before the shooting he was seen talking to Arreaga in the Bob-Les parking lot. After the shooting Castillo was in the parking lot with a rifle in his hands and fired shots at two persons who came into the parking lot following Reimer’s murder. Castillo accompanied Arreaga in his getaway and, when the car got stuck and was abandoned, continued to accompany Arreaga. When police told them to freeze, both Arreaga and Castillo ran.

They were later apprehended together and when put in the police car, Castillo told Arreaga, “We did it man, we did it; it’s okay.” Castillo also telephoned Jona Hamlin, an off-duty bartender at the Bob-Les club, before his arrest and asked for someone named Johnny. She told him that Johnny was not there…

concurring:

I concur in the opinion, but would not address the issue of whether the shackling in this case violated the Constitution. The state trial judge was not arbitrary, capricious, or discriminatory in his ruling. Castillo was charged with first-degree murder and was housed in a disciplinary “separation area” for having assaulted other inmates. Under these circumstances, I believe there is a substantial question whether the type of shackling that was ordered, which was not visible to the jury and would not likely cause pain or a major interference to communication with counsel, reached the level of a constitutional violation of due process. None of the cases from this circuit directly addresses this issue, nor has it been specifically decided by the Supreme Court. Because I believe we should not rule on such an important constitutional issue unless necessary to resolve the appeal, I would rest the decision on the harmless error analysis. See Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352 , 361 n. 10, 103 S.Ct. 1855 , 1860 n. 10, 75 L.Ed.2d 903 (1983) *150 (constitutional questions should not be decided in advance of the necessity of doing so).