Donald Beardslee v. Jill Brown, Warden, of the California State Prison at San Quentin

Donald Beardslee seeks federal habeas relief pursuant to Sanders v. Woodford, 373 F.3d 1054 (9th Cir.2004), a decision recently issued by this Court. Beardslee was convicted by a jury in San Mateo County, California, of two counts of first degree murder with special circumstances and sentenced to death. The California Supreme Court affirmed his conviction and sentence. People v. Beardslee, 53 Cal.3d 68 , 279 Cal.Rptr. 276 , 806 P.2d 1311 (1991) (“Beardslee I ”). Beardslee filed a habeas corpus petition in federal district court. The district court rejected each of his claims and dismissed the petition. We affirmed the district court’s denial of habe-as relief, see Beardslee v. Woodford, 358 F.3d 560 (9th Cir.2004), and the Supreme Court denied Beardslee’s petition for a writ of certiorari, see Beardslee v. Brown, - U.S. -, 125 S.Ct. 281 , 160 L.Ed.2d 68 (2004).

After denial of certiorari, but before the mandate was issued, Beardslee requested the issuance of an expanded certificate of appealability, arguing that he is entitled to relief under our decision in Sanders , a decision that was issued during the pen-dency of his petition for a writ of certiora-ri. In Sanders , we…