Raymond Lewis v. Chance Andes

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

RAYMOND ANTHONY LEWIS, No. 19-99001

Petitioner-Appellant, D.C. No. 1:03-cv-06775- v. LJO-SAB

CHANCE ANDES, Acting Warden, San Quentin State Prison, OPINION

Respondent-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California Lawrence J. O’Neill, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted April 20, 2023 San Francisco, California

Filed March 12, 2024

Before: Mary H. Murguia, Chief Judge, and Morgan Christen and Daniel P. Collins, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Christen SUMMARY *

Habeas Corpus / Death Penalty

The panel affirmed the district court’s denial of a federal habeas corpus petition filed pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 by Raymond Anthony Lewis, who was sentenced to death in 1991 after a California jury convicted him of the first-degree murder of Sandra Simms. Lewis’s certified claims involved only the penalty phase of his trial, where the State introduced evidence of Lewis’s aggravating prior criminal acts, including a confession he made as a…