Raymond I. Cooks v. A.C. Newland, Warden

State prisoner Cooks appeals from the district court’s judgment denying his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. He argues that the California Court of Appeal unreasonably applied Faretta v. California, 422 U.S. 806 , 95 S.Ct. 2525 , 45 L.Ed.2d 562 (1975), and Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 , 83 S.Ct. 792 , 9 L.Ed.2d 799 (1963), when it affirmed his robbery convictions. Cooks contends that the state trial court should not have consolidated two separate criminal cases in which he was a defendant, representing himself in one case and represented by counsel in the other. He asserts that this improperly forced him to choose between invoking his constitutional right to self-representation, as recognized in Faretta , or his Gideon right to counsel on both charges. The district court had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 , and we have jurisdiction over this timely appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2253 . We affirm.

I.

Cooks robbed James Fleming and Ignacio Suarez separately. The two robberies were conducted within 15 days under similar circumstances: both involved the use of a gun, both occurred in daylight, and both victims had just with drawn cash from the same bank…