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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES  MAPLES v. THOMAS, COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES MAPLES v. THOMAS, COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
No. 10–63. Argued October 4, 2011—January 18, 2012
Petitioner Cory R. Maples was found guilty of murder and sentenced todeath in Alabama state court. In 2001, Maples sought postconvictionrelief in state court under Alabama Rule 32. Maples alleged, amongother things, that his underpaid and inexperienced trial attorneys failed to afford him the effective assistance guaranteed by the SixthAmendment. His petition was written by two pro bono attorneys,Jaasai Munanka and Clara Ingen-Housz, both associated with theNew York offices of the Sullivan & Cromwell law firm. As requiredby Alabama law, the two attorneys engaged an Alabama lawyer, John Butler, to move their admission pro hac vice. Butler made clear, however, that he would undertake no substantive involvement in the case. In 2002, while Maples' state postconviction petition was pending,Munanka and Ingen-Housz left Sullivan & Cromwell. Their new employment disabled them from representing Maples. They did not inform Maples of their departure and consequent inability to serve as his counsel. In disregard of Alabama law, neither sought the trial court's leave to withdraw. No other Sullivan & Cromwell attorneyentered an appearance, moved to substitute counsel, or otherwise notified the court of a change in Maples' representation. Thus, Munanka, Ingen-Housz, and Butler remained Maples' listed, and only, attorneys of record.The trial court denied Maples' petition in May 2003. Notices of the order were posted to Munanka and Ingen-Housz at Sullivan &Cromwell's address. When those postings were returned, unopened, the trial court clerk attempted no further mailing. Butler also received a copy of the order, but did not act on it. With no attorney of
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record in fact acting on Maples' behalf, the 42-day period Maples had to file a notice of appeal ran out.
About a month later, an Alabama Assistant Attorney General senta letter directly to Maples. The letter informed Maples of the misseddeadline and notified him that he had four weeks remaining to file afederal habeas petition. Maples immediately contacted his mother,who called Sullivan & Cromwell. Three Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys, through Butler, moved the trial court to reissue its order,thereby restarting the 42-day appeal period. The court denied the motion. The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals then denied a writof mandamus that would have granted Maples leave to file an out-oftime appeal, and the State Supreme Court affirmed.
Thereafter, Maples sought federal habeas relief. Both the District Court and the Eleventh Circuit denied his request, pointing to the procedural default in state court, i.e., Maples' failure timely to appealthe state trial court's order denying his Rule 32 petition for postconviction relief.
Held: Maples has shown the requisite “cause” to excuse his procedural default. Pp. 11–22.
(a)
As a rule, a federal court may not entertain a state prisoner's habeas claims “when (1) ‘a state court [has] declined to address[those] claims because the prisoner had failed to meet a state procedural requirement,' and (2) ‘the state judgment rests on independent and adequate state procedural grounds.' ” Walker v. Martin, 562
U.
S. ___, ___. The bar to federal review may be lifted, however, if “the prisoner can demonstrate cause for the [procedural] default [instate court] and actual prejudice as a result of the alleged violation offederal law.” Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U. S. 722, 750.
Cause for a procedural default exists where “something external to the petitioner, something that cannot fairly be attributed to him[,]. . . ‘impeded [his] efforts to comply with the State's procedural rule.' ” Id., at 753. A prisoner's postconviction attorney's negligence does not qualify as “cause,” ibid., because the attorney is the prisoner's agent, and under “well-settled” agency law, the principal bears the risk of his agent's negligent conduct, id., at 753–754. Thus, a petitioner isbound by his attorney's failure to meet a filing deadline and cannot rely on that failure to establish cause. Ibid.
A markedly different situation arises, however, when an attorneyabandons his client without notice, and thereby occasions the default.In such cases, the principal-agent relationship is severed and the attorney's acts or omissions “cannot fairly be attributed to [the client].” Id., at 753. Nor can the client be faulted for failing to act on his own behalf when he lacks reason to believe his attorneys of record, in fact,are not representing him.
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Holland v. Florida, 560 U. S. ___, is instructive. There, the Court found that the one-year deadline for filing a federal habeas petitioncan be tolled for equitable reasons, and that an attorney's unprofessional conduct may sometimes be an “extraordinary circumstance” justifying equitable tolling. Id., at ___, ___–___. The Court recognized that an attorney's negligence does not provide a basis for tolling a statutory time limit. Id., at ___. Holland's claim that he was abandoned by his attorney, however, if true, “would suffice to establish extraordinary circumstances beyond his control,” id., at ___ (opinion of ALITO, J.). Pp. 11–15.
(b)
From the time of his initial Rule 32 petition until well aftertime ran out for appealing the trial court's denial of that petition,Maples' sole attorneys of record were Munanka, Ingen-Housz, and Butler. Unknown to Maples, none of those lawyers was in fact serving as his attorney during the 42-day appeal period. Pp. 15–21.
(1)
The State contends that Sullivan & Cromwell representedMaples throughout his state postconviction proceedings, and that, as a result, Maples cannot establish abandonment by counsel during the 42-day period. But it is undisputed that Munanka and Ingen-Housz severed their agency relationship with Maples long before the default occurred. Furthermore, because the attorneys did not seek the trialcourt's permission to withdraw, they allowed court records to conveythat they remained the attorneys of record. As such, the attorneys,not Maples, would be the addressees of court orders Alabama law requires the clerk to furnish.
The State asserts that, after Munanka's and Ingen-Housz's departure, other Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys came forward to serve asMaples' counsel. At the time of the default, however, those attorneys had not been admitted to practice in Alabama, had not entered their appearances on Maples' behalf, and had done nothing to inform theAlabama court that they wished to substitute for Munanka and Ingen-Housz. Thus, they lacked the legal authority to act on Maples'behalf before his time to appeal expired. Pp. 15–19.
(2)
Maples' only other attorney of record, local counsel Butler, did not even begin to represent Maples. Butler told Munanka and Ingen-Housz that he would serve as local counsel only for the purpose of enabling them to appear pro hac vice and would play no substantiverole in the case. Other factors confirm that Butler was not Maples' “agent in any meaningful sense of that word.” Holland, 560 U. S., at ___ (opinion of ALITO, J.). Upon receiving a copy of the trial court's order, Butler did not contact Sullivan & Cromwell to ensure that firm lawyers were taking appropriate action. Nor did the State treat Butler as Maples' actual representative. Notably, the Alabama AssistantAttorney General wrote directly and only to Maples, notwithstanding
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an ethical obligation to refrain from communicating directly with anopposing party known to be represented by counsel. Pp. 19–20.
(3)
Not only was Maples left without any functioning attorney of record; the very listing of Munanka, Ingen-Housz, and Butler as his representatives meant that he had no right personally to receive notice. He in fact received none within the 42 days allowed for commencing an appeal. Given no reason to suspect that he lacked counsel able and willing to represent him, Maples surely was blocked fromcomplying with the State's procedural rule. Pp. 20–21.
(c)
“The cause and prejudice requirement shows due regard for States' finality and comity interests while ensuring that ‘fundamental fairness [remains] the central concern of the writ of habeas corpus.' ” Dretke v. Haley, 541 U. S. 386, 393. In the unusual circumstances of this case, agency law principles and fundamental fairness point to the same conclusion: there was indeed cause to excuse Maples' procedural default. Through no fault of his own, he lacked the assistance of any authorized attorney during the 42-day appeal period. And he had no reason to suspect that, in reality, he had been reduced to pro se status. Pp. 21–22.
(d)
The question of prejudice, which neither the District Court northe Eleventh Circuit reached, remains open for decision on remand.
P. 22. 586 F. 3d 879, reversed and remanded.
GINSBURG, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS,
C. J., and KENNEDY, BREYER, ALITO, SOTOMAYOR, and KAGAN, JJ., joined. ALITO, J., filed a concurring opinion. SCALIA, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which THOMAS, J., joined.
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NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in thepreliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested tonotify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in orderthat corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 10–63
CORY R. MAPLES, PETITIONER v. KIM T. THOMAS,
COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
[January 18, 2012]
JUSTICE GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court.
Cory R. Maples is an Alabama capital prisoner sentenced to death in 1997 for the murder of two individuals. At trial, he was represented by two appointed lawyers,minimally paid and with scant experience in capital cases. Maples sought postconviction relief in state court, allegingineffective assistance of counsel and several other trial infirmities. His petition, filed in August 2001, was writtenby two New York attorneys serving pro bono, both associated with the same New York-based large law firm. An Alabama attorney, designated as local counsel, moved the admission of the out-of-state counsel pro hac vice. As understood by New York counsel, local counsel would facilitate their appearance, but would undertake no substantive involvement in the case.
In the summer of 2002, while Maples' postconvictionpetition remained pending in the Alabama trial court, his New York attorneys left the law firm; their new employment disabled them from continuing to represent Maples.They did not inform Maples of their departure and conse2
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quent inability to serve as his counsel. Nor did they seekthe Alabama trial court's leave to withdraw. Neither theynor anyone else moved for the substitution of counsel able to handle Maples' case.
In May 2003, the Alabama trial court denied Maples' petition. Notices of the court's order were posted to the New York attorneys at the address of the law firm withwhich they had been associated. Those postings were returned, unopened, to the trial court clerk, who attempted no further mailing. With no attorney of record in factacting on Maples' behalf, the time to appeal ran out.
Thereafter, Maples petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus in federal court. The District Court and, in turn, the Eleventh Circuit, rejected his petition, pointing to the procedural default in state court, i.e., Maples' failure timely to appeal the Alabama trial court's order denyinghim postconviction relief. Maples, it is uncontested, wasblameless for the default.
The sole question this Court has taken up for review iswhether, on the extraordinary facts of Maples' case, thereis “cause” to excuse the default. Maples maintains thatthere is, for the lawyers he believed to be vigilantly representing him had abandoned the case without leave of court, without informing Maples they could no longerrepresent him, and without securing any recorded substitution of counsel. We agree. Abandoned by counsel, Maples was left unrepresented at a critical time for his state postconviction petition, and he lacked a clue of any need to protect himself pro se. In these circumstances, no justsystem would lay the default at Maples' death-cell door.Satisfied that the requisite cause has been shown, we reverse the Eleventh Circuit's judgment.
I A Alabama sets low eligibility requirements for lawyers
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appointed to represent indigent capital defendants at trial.American Bar Association, Evaluating Fairness and Accuracy in State Death Penalty Systems: The Alabama DeathPenalty Assessment Report 117–120 (June 2006) (hereinafter ABA Report); Brief for Alabama Appellate Court Justices et al. as Amici Curiae 7–8 (hereinafter Justices Brief). Appointed counsel need only be a member of theAlabama bar and have “five years' prior experience in theactive practice of criminal law.” Ala. Code §13A–5–54(2006). Experience with capital cases is not required.Justices Brief 7–8. Nor does the State provide, or requireappointed counsel to gain, any capital-case-specific professional education or training. ABA Report 129–131; Justices Brief 14–16.
Appointed counsel in death penalty cases are also undercompensated. ABA Report 124–129; Justices Brief 12–
14. Until 1999, the State paid appointed capital defense attorneys just “$40.00 per hour for time expended in courtand $20.00 per hour for time reasonably expended out of court in the preparation of [the defendant's] case.” Ala. Code §15–12–21(d) (1995). Although death penalty litigation is plainly time intensive,1 the State capped at $1,000 fees recoverable by capital defense attorneys for out-ofcourt work. Ibid.2 Even today, court-appointed attorneysreceive only $70 per hour. 2011 Ala. Acts no. 2011–678, pp. 1072–1073, §6. ——————
1One study of federal capital trials from 1990 to 1997 found that defense attorneys spent an average of 1,480 out-of-court hours prepar- ing a defendant's case. Subcommittee on Federal Death Penalty Cases,Committee on Defender Services, Judicial Conference of the United States, Federal Death Penalty Cases: Recommendations Concerning the Cost and Quality of Defense Representation 14 (May 1998).
2In 1999, the State removed the cap on fees for out-of-court work incapital cases. Ala. Code §15–12–21(d) (2010 Cum. Supp.). Perhaps notcoincidentally, 70% of the inmates on Alabama's death row in 2006, including Maples, had been convicted when the $1,000 cap was ineffect. ABA Report 126.
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Nearly alone among the States, Alabama does not guarantee representation to indigent capital defendants in postconviction proceedings. ABA Report 111–112, 158– 160; Justices Brief 33. The State has elected, instead, “to rely on the efforts of typically well-funded [out-of-state]volunteers.” Brief in Opposition in Barbour v. Allen, O. T. 2006, No. 06–10605, p. 23. Thus, as of 2006, 86% of the attorneys representing Alabama's death row inmates instate collateral review proceedings “either worked for theEqual Justice Initiative (headed by NYU Law professor Bryan Stevenson), out-of-state public interest groups likethe Innocence Project, or an out-of-state mega-firm.” Brief in Opposition 16, n. 4. On occasion, some prisoners sentenced to death receive no postconviction representation at all. See ABA Report 112 (“[A]s of April 2006, approximately fifteen of Alabama's death row inmates in the final rounds of state appeals had no lawyer to represent them.”).
B This system was in place when, in 1997, Alabamacharged Maples with two counts of capital murder; thevictims, Stacy Alan Terry and Barry Dewayne RobinsonII, were Maples' friends who, on the night of the murders, had been out on the town with him. Maples pleaded not guilty, and his case proceeded to trial, where he was represented by two court-appointed Alabama attorneys. Onlyone of them had earlier served in a capital case. See Tr. 3081. Neither counsel had previously tried the penaltyphase of a capital case. Compensation for each lawyer wascapped at $1,000 for time spent out-of-court preparing Maples' case, and at $40 per hour for in-court services.See Ala. Code §15–12–21 (1995). Finding Maples guilty on both counts, the jury recommended that he be sentenced to death. The vote was 10 to 2, the minimum number Alabama requires for a death
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recommendation. See Ala. Code §13A–5–46(f) (1994)(“The decision of the jury to recommend a sentence of death must be based on a vote of at least 10 jurors.”).Accepting the jury's recommendation, the trial court sentenced Maples to death. On direct appeal, the AlabamaCourt of Criminal Appeals and the Alabama Supreme Court affirmed the convictions and sentence. Ex parte Maples, 758 So. 2d 81 (Ala. 1999); Maples v. State, 758 So. 2d 1 (Ala. Crim. App. 1999). We denied certiorari. Maples v. Alabama, 531 U. S. 830 (2000).
Two out-of-state volunteers represented Maples inpostconviction proceedings: Jaasi Munanka and Clara Ingen-Housz, both associates at the New York offices ofthe Sullivan & Cromwell law firm. At the time, Alabama required out-of-state attorneys to associate local counselwhen seeking admission to practice pro hac vice before an Alabama court, regardless of the nature of the proceeding.Rule Governing Admission to the Ala. State Bar VII (2000)(hereinafter Rule VII).3 The Alabama Rule further prescribed that the local attorney's name “appear on all notices, orders, pleadings, and other documents filed in thecause,” and that local counsel “accept joint and severalresponsibility with the foreign attorney to the client, toopposing parties and counsel, and to the court or administrative agency in all matters [relating to the case].”Rule VII(C).
Munanka and Ingen-Housz associated Huntsville, Alabama attorney John Butler as local counsel. Notwithstanding his obligations under Alabama law, Butlerinformed Munanka and Ingen-Housz, “at the outset,” that he would serve as local counsel only for the purpose of ——————
3In 2006, Alabama revised Rule VII. See Rule Governing Admission to the Ala. State Bar VII (2009). Under the new rule, the State allows out-of-state counsel to represent pro bono indigent criminal defendants in postconviction proceedings without involvement of local counsel. Ibid.
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allowing the two New York attorneys to appear pro hac vice on behalf of Maples. App. to Pet. for Cert. 255a.Given his lack of “resources, available time [and] experience,” Butler told the Sullivan & Cromwell lawyers, he could not “deal with substantive issues in the case.” Ibid. The Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys accepted Butler'sconditions. Id., at 257a. This arrangement between outof-state and local attorneys, it appears, was hardly atypical. See Justices Brief 36 (“The fact is that local counsel for out-of-state attorneys in post-conviction litigation mostoften do nothing other than provide the mechanism forforeign attorneys to be admitted.”).
With the aid of his pro bono counsel, Maples filed apetition for postconviction relief under Alabama Rule of Criminal Procedure 32.4 Among other claims, Maplesasserted that his court-appointed attorneys provided constitutionally ineffective assistance during both guilt and penalty phases of his capital trial. App. 29–126. He alleged, in this regard, that his inexperienced and underfunded attorneys failed to develop and raise an obvious intoxication defense, did not object to several egregious instances of prosecutorial misconduct, and woefully underprepared for the penalty phase of his trial. The State responded by moving for summary dismissal of Maples' petition. On December 27, 2001, the trial court denied the State's motion.
Some seven months later, in the summer of 2002, both Munanka and Ingen-Housz left Sullivan & Cromwell. App. to Pet. for Cert. 258a. Munanka gained a clerkship with a federal judge; Ingen-Housz accepted a position withthe European Commission in Belgium. Ibid. Neither attorney told Maples of their departure from Sullivan &Cromwell or of their resulting inability to continue to
—————— 4Originally filed in August 2001, the petition was resubmitted, with only minor alterations, in December 2001. See App. 22–24, 28–142.
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represent him. In disregard of Alabama law, see Ala. Rule Crim. Proc. 6.2, Comment, neither attorney sought the trial court's leave to withdraw, App. to Pet. for Cert. 223a.Compounding Munanka's and Ingen-Housz's inaction, noother Sullivan & Cromwell lawyer entered an appearance on Maples' behalf, moved to substitute counsel, or otherwise notified the court of any change in Maples' representation. Ibid.
Another nine months passed. During this time period,no Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys assigned to Maples'case sought admission to the Alabama bar, entered appearances on Maples' behalf, or otherwise advised the Alabama court that Munanka and Ingen-Housz were nolonger Maples' attorneys. Thus, Munanka and Ingen-Housz (along with Butler) remained Maples' listed, andonly, “attorneys of record.” Id., at 223a.
There things stood when, in May 2003, the trial court,without holding a hearing, entered an order denying Maples' Rule 32 petition. App. 146–225.5 The clerk of the Alabama trial court mailed copies of the order to Maples' three attorneys of record. He sent Munanka's and IngenHousz's copies to Sullivan & Cromwell's New York address, which the pair had provided upon entering their appearances.
When those copies arrived at Sullivan & Cromwell, Munanka and Ingen-Housz had long since departed. The notices, however, were not forwarded to another Sullivan & Cromwell attorney. Instead, a mailroom employee sent the unopened envelopes back to the court. “Returned to Sender—Attempted, Unknown” was stamped on the envelope addressed to Munanka. App. to Reply to Brief in
—————— 5One of Maples' attorneys observed, without contradiction, that the trial court's order was a “word for word copy of the proposed Order that the State had submitted [with] its [December 2001] Motion to Dismiss.” Id., at 300.
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Opposition 8a. A similar stamp appeared on the envelopeaddressed to Ingen-Housz, along with the handwrittennotation “Return to Sender—Left Firm.” Id., at 7a.
Upon receiving back the unopened envelopes he had mailed to Munanka and Ingen-Housz, the Alabama court clerk took no further action. In particular, the clerk didnot contact Munanka or Ingen-Housz at the personal telephone numbers or home addresses they had providedin their pro hac vice applications. See Ingen-Housz Verified Application for Admission to Practice Under Rule VII,
p. 1; and Munanka Verified Application for Admission toPractice Under Rule VII, p. 1, in Maples v. State, No. CC– 95–842.60 (C. C. Morgan Cty., Ala.). Nor did the clerk alert Sullivan & Cromwell or Butler. Butler received his copy of the order, but did not act on it. App. to Pet. forCert. 256a. He assumed that Munanka and Ingen-Housz, who had been “CC'd” on the order, would take care of filing an appeal. Ibid.
Meanwhile, the clock ticked on Maples' appeal. Under Alabama's Rules of Appellate Procedure, Maples had 42days to file a notice of appeal from the trial court's May 22,2003 order denying Maples' petition for postconvictionrelief. Rule 4(a)(1) (2000). No appeal notice was filed, and the time allowed for filing expired on July 7, 2003.
A little over a month later, on August 13, 2003, Alabama Assistant Attorney General Jon Hayden, the attorney representing the State in Maples' collateral review proceedings, sent a letter directly to Maples. App. to Pet.for Cert. 253a–254a. Hayden's letter informed Maples of the missed deadline for initiating an appeal within theState's system, and notified him that four weeks remained during which he could file a federal habeas petition. Ibid. Hayden mailed the letter to Maples only, using his prison address. Ibid. No copy was sent to Maples' attorneys ofrecord, or to anyone else acting on Maples' behalf. Ibid.
Upon receiving the State's letter, Maples immediately
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contacted his mother. Id., at 258a. She telephoned Sullivan & Cromwell to inquire about her son's case. Ibid. Prompted by her call, Sullivan & Cromwell attorneysMarc De Leeuw, Felice Duffy, and Kathy Brewer submitted a motion, through Butler, asking the trial court toreissue its order denying Maples' Rule 32 petition, thereby restarting the 42-day appeal period. Id., at 222a.
The trial court denied the motion, id., at 222a–225a, noting that Munanka and Ingen-Housz had not withdrawnfrom the case and, consequently, were “still attor-neys of record for the petitioner,” id., at 223a. Furthermore, the court added, attorneys De Leeuw, Duffy, andBrewer had not “yet been admitted to practice in Alabama” or “entered appearances as attorneys of record.” Ibid. “How,” the court asked, “can a Circuit Clerk in Decatur, Alabama know what is going on in a law firm inNew York, New York?” Id., at 223a–224a. Declining toblame the clerk for the missed notice of appeal deadline, the court said it was “unwilling to enter into subterfuge in order to gloss over mistakes made by counsel for the petitioner.” Ibid.
Maples next petitioned the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals for a writ of mandamus, granting him leave to file an out-of-time appeal. Rejecting Maples' plea, the Court of Criminal Appeals determined that, although the clerk had“assumed a duty to notify the parties of the resolution ofMaples's Rule 32 petition,” the clerk had satisfied thatobligation by sending notices to the attorneys of record atthe addresses those attorneys provided. Id., at 234a–235a. Butler's receipt of the order, the court observed, sufficed to notify all attorneys “in light of their apparent co-counsel status.” Id., at 235a–236a (quoting Thomas v. Kellett, 489 So. 2d 554, 555 (Ala. 1986)). The Alabama Supreme Court summarily affirmed the Court of Criminal Appeals' judgment, App. to Pet. for Cert. 237a, and this Court denied certiorari, Maples v. Alabama, 543 U. S. 1148 (2005).
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Having exhausted his state postconviction remedies,Maples sought federal habeas corpus relief. Addressingthe ineffective-assistance-of-trial-counsel claims Maplesstated in his federal petition, the State urged that Maples had forever forfeited those claims. Maples did, indeed, present the claims in his state postconviction (Rule 32)petition, the State observed, but he did not timely appeal from the trial court's denial of his petition. That procedural default, the State maintained, precluded federalcourt consideration of the claims.6 Maples replied that thedefault should be excused, because he missed the appeal deadline “through no fault of his own.” App. 262 (internal quotation marks omitted).
The District Court determined that Maples had defaulted his ineffective-assistance claims, and that he had not shown “cause” sufficient to overcome the default. App. to Pet. for Cert. 49a–55a. The court understood Maples toargue that errors committed by his postconviction counsel, not any lapse on the part of the court clerk in Alabama, provided the requisite “cause” to excuse his failure to meetAlabama's 42-days-to-appeal Rule. Id., at 55a. Such an argument was inadmissible, the court ruled, because thisCourt, in Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U. S. 722 (1991), had held that the ineffectiveness of postconviction appellate counsel could not qualify as cause. App. to Pet. for Cert. 55a (citing Coleman, 501 U. S., at 751).
A divided panel of the Eleventh Circuit affirmed. Maples v. Allen, 586 F. 3d 879 (2009) (per curiam). In accord with the District Court, the Court of Appeals' majorityheld that Maples defaulted his ineffective-assistance
—————— 6In opposing Maples' request for an out-of-time appeal, the Stateargued to the Alabama Supreme Court that such an appeal was unwarranted. In that context, the State noted that Maples “may still present his postconviction claims to [the federal habeas] court.” 35 Record, Doc. No. 55, p. 22, n. 4. The State's current position is in some tension with that observation.
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claims in state court by failing to file a timely notice of appeal, id., at 890, and that Coleman rendered Maples'assertion of “cause” unacceptable, 586 F. 3d, at 891.
Judge Barkett dissented. Id., at 895–898. She concluded that the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals had acted“arbitrarily” in refusing to grant Maples' request for an out-of-time appeal. Id., at 896. In a case involving “indistinguishable facts,” Judge Barkett noted, the Alabamaappellate court had allowed the petitioner to file a lateappeal. Ibid. (citing Marshall v. State, 884 So. 2d 898, 899 (Ala. Crim. App. 2002)). Inconsistent application of the42-days-to-appeal rule, Judge Barkett said, “render[ed] the rule an inadequate ground on which to bar federal review of Maples's claims.” 586 F. 3d, at 897. The interests of justice, she added, required review of Maples'claims in view of the exceptional circumstances and high stakes involved, and the absence of any fault on Maples' part. Ibid.
We granted certiorari to decide whether the uncommonfacts presented here establish cause adequate to excuseMaples' procedural default. 562 U. S. ___ (2011).
II
A
As a rule, a state prisoner's habeas claims may not be entertained by a federal court “when (1) ‘a state court[has] declined to address [those] claims because the prisoner had failed to meet a state procedural requirement,' and (2) ‘the state judgment rests on independent andadequate state procedural grounds.'” Walker v. Martin, 562 U. S. ___, ___ (2011) (slip op., at 7) (quoting Coleman, 501 U. S., at 729–730). The bar to federal review may be lifted, however, if “the prisoner can demonstrate cause forthe [procedural] default [in state court] and actual prejudice as a result of the alleged violation of federal law.” Id., at 750; see Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 84–85
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(1977).
Given the single issue on which we granted review, wewill assume, for purposes of this decision, that the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals' refusal to consider Maples' ineffective-assistance claims rested on an independent and adequate state procedural ground: namely, Maples' failure to satisfy Alabama's Rule requiring a notice of appeal to be filed within 42 days from the trialcourt's final order. Accordingly, we confine our consideration to the question whether Maples has shown cause toexcuse the missed notice of appeal deadline.
Cause for a procedural default exists where “something external to the petitioner, something that cannot fairly beattributed to him[,] . . . ‘impeded [his] efforts to comply with the State's procedural rule.'” Coleman, 501 U. S., at 753 (quoting Murray v. Carrier, 477 U. S. 478, 488 (1986); emphasis in original). Negligence on the part of a prisoner's postconviction attorney does not qualify as “cause.” Coleman, 501 U. S., at 753. That is so, we reasoned in Coleman, because the attorney is the prisoner's agent, and under “well-settled principles of agency law,” the principal bears the risk of negligent conduct on the part of his agent. Id., at 753–754. See also Irwin v. Department of Veterans Affairs, 498 U. S. 89, 92 (1990) (“Under our system of representative litigation, ‘each party is deemedbound by the acts of his lawyer-agent.'” (quoting Link v. Wabash R. Co., 370 U. S. 626, 634 (1962))). Thus, when a petitioner's postconviction attorney misses a filing deadline, the petitioner is bound by the oversight and cannot rely on it to establish cause. Coleman, 501 U. S., at 753–
754. We do not disturb that general rule.
A markedly different situation is presented, however, when an attorney abandons his client without notice, and thereby occasions the default. Having severed the principalagent relationship, an attorney no longer acts, or failsto act, as the client's representative. See 1 Restatement
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(Third) of Law Governing Lawyers §31, Comment f (1998)(“Withdrawal, whether proper or improper, terminates the lawyer's authority to act for the client.”). His acts or omissions therefore “cannot fairly be attributed to [theclient].” Coleman, 501 U. S., at 753. See, e.g., Jamison v. Lockhart, 975 F. 2d 1377, 1380 (CA8 1992) (attorneyconduct may provide cause to excuse a state proceduraldefault where, as a result of a conflict of interest, the attorney “ceased to be [petitioner's] agent”); Porter v. State, 339 Ark. 15, 16–19, 2 S. W. 3d 73, 74–76 (1999) (finding “good cause” for petitioner's failure to file a timely habeas petition where the petitioner's attorney terminated his representation without notifying petitioner and without taking “any formal steps to withdraw as the attorneyof record”).
Our recent decision in Holland v. Florida, 560 U. S. ___ (2010), is instructive. That case involved a missed oneyear deadline, prescribed by 28 U. S. C. §2244(d), for filing a federal habeas petition. Holland presented two issues:first, whether the §2244(d) time limitation can be tolled for equitable reasons, and, second, whether an attorney's unprofessional conduct can ever count as an “extraordinary circumstance” justifying equitable tolling. 560 U. S., at ___, ___–___ (slip op., at 1, 16–17) (internal quotation marks omitted). We answered yes to both questions.
On the second issue, the Court recognized that an attorney's negligence, for example, miscalculating a filing deadline, does not provide a basis for tolling a statutory time limit. Id., at ___ (slip op., at 19); id., at ___–___ (ALITO, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (slip op., at 5–6); see Lawrence v. Florida, 549 U. S. 327, 336 (2007). The Holland petitioner, however, urged thatattorney negligence was not the gravamen of his complaint. Rather, he asserted that his lawyer had detached himself from any trust relationship with his client: “[Mylawyer] has abandoned me,” the petitioner complained to
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the court. 560 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., at 3–4) (bracketsand internal quotation marks omitted); see Nara v. Frank, 264 F. 3d 310, 320 (CA3 2001) (ordering a hearing on whether a client's effective abandonment by his lawyer merited tolling of the one-year deadline for filing a federalhabeas petition).
In a concurring opinion in Holland, JUSTICE ALITO homed in on the essential difference between a claim of attorney error, however egregious, and a claim that anattorney had essentially abandoned his client. 560 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., at 5–7). Holland's plea fit the latter category: He alleged abandonment “evidenced by counsel'snear-total failure to communicate with petitioner or torespond to petitioner's many inquiries and requests over aperiod of several years.” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 6); see id., at ___–___, ___ (majority opinion) (slip op., at 3–4, 20). If true, JUSTICE ALITO explained, “petitioner's allegationswould suffice to establish extraordinary circumstancesbeyond his control[:] Common sense dictates that a litigant cannot be held constructively responsible for theconduct of an attorney who is not operating as his agent in any meaningful sense of that word.” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 6).7
We agree that, under agency principles, a client cannot be charged with the acts or omissions of an attorney who has abandoned him. Nor can a client be faulted for failing to act on his own behalf when he lacks reason to believe his attorneys of record, in fact, are not representing him.We therefore inquire whether Maples has shown that his attorneys of record abandoned him, thereby supplying the
—————— 7 Holland v. Florida, 560 U. S. ___ (2010), involved tolling of a federal time bar, while Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U. S. 722 (1991), concernedcause for excusing a procedural default in state court. See Holland, 560
U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 18). We see no reason, however, why the distinction between attorney negligence and attorney abandonment should not hold in both contexts.
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“extraordinary circumstances beyond his control,” ibid., necessary to lift the state procedural bar to his federal petition.
B From the time he filed his initial Rule 32 petition untilwell after time ran out for appealing the trial court'sdenial of that petition, Maples had only three attorneys of record: Munanka, Ingen-Housz, and Butler. Unknown to Maples, not one of these lawyers was in fact serving as his attorney during the 42 days permitted for an appeal fromthe trial court's order.
1 The State contends that Sullivan & Cromwell represented Maples throughout his state postconviction proceedings. Accordingly, the State urges, Maples cannot establish abandonment by counsel continuing through thesix weeks allowed for noticing an appeal from the trial court's denial of his Rule 32 petition. We disagree. It is undisputed that Munanka and Ingen-Housz severed their agency relationship with Maples long before the defaultoccurred. See Brief for Respondent 47 (conceding that thetwo attorneys erred in failing to file motions to withdraw from the case). Both Munanka and Ingen-Housz leftSullivan & Cromwell's employ in the summer of 2002, at least nine months before the Alabama trial court entered its order denying Rule 32 relief. App. to Pet. for Cert. 258a. Their new employment—Munanka as a law clerkfor a federal judge, Ingen-Housz as an employee of the European Commission in Belgium—disabled them from continuing to represent Maples. See Code of Conduct for Judicial Employees, Canon 4(D)(3) (1999) (prohibiting judicial employees from participating in “litigation against federal, state or local government”); Staff Regulations ofOfficials of the European Commission, Tit. I, Art. 12b
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(2004) (employees cannot perform outside work with- out first obtaining authorization from the Commission),available at http://ec.europa.eu/civil_service/docs/toc100_en.pdf (as visited Jan. 13, 2012, and in Clerk of Court'scase file). Hornbook agency law establishes that the attorneys' departure from Sullivan & Cromwell and their commencement of employment that prevented them fromrepresenting Maples ended their agency relationship with him. See 1 Restatement (Second) of Agency §112 (1957)(hereinafter Restatement (Second)) (“[T]he authority of anagent terminates if, without knowledge of the principal, heacquires adverse interests or if he is otherwise guilty ofa serious breach of loyalty to the principal.”); 2 id., §394, Comment a (“[T]he agent commits a breach of duty [ofloyalty] to his principal by acting for another in an undertaking which has a substantial tendency to cause him todisregard his duty to serve his principal with only his principal's purposes in mind.”).
Furthermore, the two attorneys did not observe Alabama's Rule requiring them to seek the trial court's permission to withdraw. See Ala. Rule Crim. Proc. 6.2, Comment. Cf. 1 Restatement (Second) §111, Comment b (“[I]t is ordinarily inferred that a principal does not intendan agent to do an illegal act.”). By failing to seek permission to withdraw, Munanka and Ingen-Housz allowed the court's records to convey that they represented Maples.As listed attorneys of record, they, not Maples, would bethe addressees of court orders Alabama law requires the clerk to furnish. See Ala. Rule Crim. Proc. 34.5 (“Uponthe entry of any order in a criminal proceeding made in response to a motion, . . . the clerk shall, without unduedelay, furnish all parties a copy thereof by mail or by other appropriate means.”) and 34.4 (“[W]here the defendant isrepresented by counsel, service shall be made upon theattorney of record.”).
Although acknowledging that Munanka and Ingen17
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Housz severed their agency relationship with Maples upon their departure from Sullivan & Cromwell, the State argues that, nonetheless, Maples was not abandoned.Other attorneys at the firm, the State asserts, continuedto serve as Maples' counsel. Regarding this assertion, wenote, first, that the record is cloudy on the role other Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys played. In an affidavit submitted to the Alabama trial court in support of Maples' request that the court reissue its Rule 32 order, see supra,at 9, partner Marc De Leeuw stated that he had been “involved in [Maples'] case since the summer of 2001.” App.to Pet. for Cert. 257a. After the trial court initially denied the State's motion to dismiss in December 2001, De Leeuw informed the court, Sullivan & Cromwell “lawyers workingon this case for Mr. Maples prepared for [an anticipated]evidentiary hearing.” Id., at 258a. Another Sullivan & Cromwell attorney, Felice Duffy, stated, in an affidavit submitted to the Alabama trial court in September 2003,that she “ha[d] worked on [Maples'] case since October 14, 2002.” App. 231. But neither De Leeuw nor Duffy described what their “involve[ment]” or “wor[k] on [Maples']case” entailed. And neither attorney named the lawyers, other than Munanka and Ingen-Housz (both of them still with Sullivan & Cromwell in December 2001), engaged inpreparation for the expected hearing. Nor did De Leeuw identify the specific work, if any, other lawyers performed on Maples' case between Munanka's and Ingen-Housz's departures and the firm's receipt of the telephone call from Maples' mother.8
—————— 8The unclear state of the record is perhaps not surprising, given Sullivan & Cromwell's representation of Maples after the default. As amici for Maples explain, a significant conflict of interest arose for thefirm once the crucial deadline passed. Brief for Legal Ethics Professors et al. as Amici Curiae 23–27. Following the default, the firm's interest in avoiding damage to its own reputation was at odds with Maples' strongest argument—i.e., that his attorneys had abandoned him,
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The slim record on activity at Sullivan & Cromwell, however, does not warrant a remand to determine more precisely the work done by firm lawyers other than Munanka and Ingen-Housz. For the facts essential to our decision are not in doubt. At the time of the default, the Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys who later came forward—De Leeuw, Felice Duffy, and Kathy Brewer—had not been admitted to practice law in Alabama, had not enteredtheir appearances on Maples' behalf, and had done nothing to inform the Alabama court that they wished to substitute for Munanka and Ingen-Housz. Thus, none of these attorneys had the legal authority to act on Maples'behalf before his time to appeal expired. Cf. 1 Restatement (Second) §111 (The “failure to acquire a qualificationby the agent without which it is illegal to do an authorized act . . . terminates the agent's authority to act.”).9 What they did or did not do in their New York offices is therefore —————— therefore he had cause to be relieved from the default. Yet Sullivan & Cromwell did not cede Maples' representation to a new attorney, who could have made Maples' abandonment argument plain to the Court of Appeals. Instead, the firm represented Maples through briefing andoral argument in the Eleventh Circuit, where they attempted to castresponsibility for the mishap on the clerk of the Alabama trial court. Given Sullivan & Cromwell's conflict of interest, Maples' federal habeaspetition, prepared and submitted by the firm, is not persuasive evidence that Maples, prior to the default, ever “viewed himself” as represented by “the firm,” see post, at 4, rather than by his attorneys ofrecord, Munanka and Ingen-Housz.
9The dissent argues that the Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys had nobasis “to infer that Maples no longer wanted them to represent him,simply because they had not yet qualified before the Alabama court.” Post, at 6–7. While that may be true, it is irrelevant. What the attorneys could have inferred is that Maples would not have wanted them to file a notice of appeal on his behalf prior to their admission to practicein Alabama, for doing so would be “illegal,” post, at 7 (internal quotation marks omitted). See also 1 Restatement (Second) §111, Comment b, quoted supra, at 16. For the critical purpose of filing a notice of appeal, then, the other Sullivan & Cromwell attorneys had no authority to act for Maples.
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Opinion of the Court
beside the point. At the time critical to preserving Maples' access to an appeal, they, like Munanka and Ingen-Housz,were not Maples' authorized agents.
2 Maples' only other attorney of record, local counsel Butler, also left him abandoned. Indeed, Butler did not even begin to represent Maples. Butler informed Munanka and Ingen-Housz that he would serve as local counsel only for the purpose of enabling the two out-of-state attorneys to appear pro hac vice. Supra, at 5–6. Lacking thenecessary “resources, available time [and] experience,”Butler told the two Sullivan & Cromwell lawyers, he would not “deal with substantive issues in the case.” Ibid. That the minimal participation he undertook was inconsistent with Alabama law, see Rule VII, supra, at 5, underscores the absurdity of holding Maples barred because Butler signed on as local counsel.In recognizing that Butler had no role in the case other than to allow Munanka and Ingen-Housz to appear pro hac vice, we need not rely solely on Butler's and DeLeeuw's statements to that effect. App. to Pet. for Cert. 255a–258a. Other factors confirm that Butler did not “operat[e] as [Maples'] agent in any meaningful sense of that word.” Holland, 560 U. S., at ___ (ALITO, J., concurring in part and concurring in judgment) (slip op., at 6).The first is Butler's own conduct. Upon receiving a copy of the trial court's Rule 32 order, Butler did not contact Sullivan & Cromwell to ensure that firm lawyers weretaking appropriate action. Although Butler had reason tobelieve that Munanka and Ingen-Housz had received a copy of the court's order, see App. 225 (indicating thatMunanka and Ingen-Housz were CC'd on the order), Butler's failure even to place a phone call to the New Yorkfirm substantiates his disclaimer of any genuinely representative role in the case.
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Notably, the State did not treat Butler as Maples' actual representative. Assistant Attorney General Hayden addressed the letter informing Maples of the default directlyto Maples in prison. See supra, at 8. Hayden sent no copyto, nor did he otherwise notify, any of the attorneys listed as counsel of record for Maples. Lawyers in Alabama have an ethical obligation to refrain from communicating directly with an opposing party known to be represented by counsel. See Ala. Rule of Professional Conduct 4.2 (2003);Ala. Rule Crim. Proc. 34.4 (requiring that the service of all documents “be made upon the attorney of record”). In writing directly and only to Maples, notwithstanding this ethical obligation, Assistant Attorney General Haydenmust have believed that Maples was no longer represented by counsel, out-of-state or local.10
In sum, the record admits of only one reading: At notime before the missed deadline was Butler serving asMaples' agent “in any meaningful sense of that word.” Holland, 560 U. S., at ___ (opinion of ALITO, J.) (slip op., at 6).
3 Not only was Maples left without any functioning attorney of record, the very listing of Munanka, Ingen-Housz,and Butler as his representatives meant that he had noright personally to receive notice. See supra, at 16. He in
—————— 10It bears note, as well, that the State served its response to Maples'Rule 32 petition only on Munanka at Sullivan & Cromwell's New Yorkaddress, not on Butler. App. 26. While the State may not be obligatedto serve more than one attorney of record, its selection of New York rather than local counsel is some indication that, from the start, the State was cognizant of the limited role Butler would serve. Conformingthe State's Rule to common practice, in 2006, the Alabama SupremeCourt amended the provision on appearances by out-of-state counsel toeliminate the requirement that such attorneys associate local counsel when representing indigent criminal defendants pro bono in postconviction proceedings. See supra, at 5, n. 3.
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fact received none or any other warning that he had better fend for himself. Had counsel of record or the State's attorney informed Maples of his plight before the time to appeal ran out, he could have filed a notice of appealhimself11 or enlisted the aid of new volunteer attorneys.12 Given no reason to suspect that he lacked counsel able and willing to represent him, Maples surely was blocked from complying with the State's procedural rule.
C “The cause and prejudice requirement,” we have said, “shows due regard for States' finality and comity interestswhile ensuring that ‘fundamental fairness [remains] the central concern of the writ of habeas corpus.'” Dretke v. Haley, 541 U. S. 386, 393 (2004) (quoting Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668, 697 (1984)). In the unusual circumstances of this case, principles of agency law andfundamental fairness point to the same conclusion: Therewas indeed cause to excuse Maples' procedural default. Through no fault of his own, Maples lacked the assistanceof any authorized attorney during the 42 days Alabama allows for noticing an appeal from a trial court's denial of postconviction relief. As just observed, he had no reason to suspect that, in reality, he had been reduced to pro se status. Maples was disarmed by extraordinary circumstances
quite beyond his control. He has shown ample cause, we hold, to excuse the procedural default into which ——————
11The notice is a simple document. It need specify only: the party taking the appeal, the order or judgment appealed from, and the nameof the court to which appeal is taken. Ala. Rule App. Proc. 3(c) (2000).
12Alabama grants out-of-time appeals to prisoners proceeding pro sewho were not timely served with copies of court orders. See Maples v. Allen, 586 F. 3d 879, 888, and n. 6 (CA11 2009) (per curiam) (citing Ex parte Miles, 841 So. 2d 242, 243 (Ala. 2002), and Ex parte Robinson, 865 So. 2d 1250, 1251–1252 (Ala. Crim. App. 2003) (per curiam)).Though Maples was not a pro se petitioner on the record, he was, in fact, without authorized counsel.
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he was trapped when counsel of record abandoned himwithout a word of warning.
III Having found no cause to excuse the failure to file atimely notice of appeal in state court, the District Court and the Eleventh Circuit did not reach the question of prejudice. See supra, at 10–11. That issue, therefore, remains open for decision on remand.
* * * For the reasons stated, the judgment of the Court ofAppeals for the Eleventh Circuit is reversed, and the caseis remanded for further proceedings consistent with thisopinion.
It is so ordered.
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Cite as: 565 U. S. ____ (2012) 1
ALITO, J., concurring
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 10–63
CORY R. MAPLES, PETITIONER v. KIM T. THOMAS,
COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
[January 18, 2012]
JUSTICE ALITO, concurring.
I join the opinion of the Court. Unbeknownst to petitioner, he was effectively deprived of legal representation due to the combined effect of no fewer than eight unfortunate events: (1) the departure from their law firm of thetwo young lawyers who appeared as counsel of record inhis state postconviction proceeding; (2) the acceptance bythese two attorneys of new employment that precluded them from continuing to represent him; (3) their failure tonotify petitioner of their new situation; (4) their failure to withdraw as his counsel of record; (5) the apparent failureof the firm that they left to monitor the status of petitioner's case when these attorneys departed; (6) when notice of the decision denying petitioner's request for state postconviction relief was received in that firm's offices, the failure of the firm's mail room to route that importantcommunication to either another member of the firm or to the departed attorneys' new addresses; (7) the failure ofthe clerk's office to take any action when the envelopecontaining that notice came back unopened; and (8) local counsel's very limited conception of the role that he wasobligated to play in petitioner's representation. Under these unique circumstances, I agree that petitioner's attorneys effectively abandoned him and that this aban2
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ALITO, J., concurring
donment was a “cause” that is sufficient to overcome petitioner's procedural default.
In an effort to obtain relief for his client, petitioner'scounsel in the case now before us cast blame for what occurred on Alabama's system of providing legal representation for capital defendants at trial and in state collateral proceedings. See Brief for Petitioner 3–6. But whatever may be said about Alabama's system, I do not think thatAlabama's system had much if anything to do with petitioner's misfortune. The quality of petitioner's representation at trial obviously played no role in the failure to meetthe deadline for filing his notice of appeal from the denial of his state postconviction petition. Nor do I see any important connection between what happened in this caseand Alabama's system for providing representation for prisoners who are sentenced to death and who wish topetition the state courts for collateral relief. Unlike other States, Alabama relies on attorneys who volunteer torepresent these prisoners pro bono, and we are told that most of these volunteers work for large, out-of-state firms. Id., at 4. Petitioner's brief states that the Alabama systemhad “a direct bearing on the events giving rise . . . to the procedural default at issue,” id., at 3, but a similar combination of untoward events could have occurred if petitioner had been represented by Alabama attorneys who wereappointed by the court and paid for with state funds. The firm whose lawyers represented petitioner pro bono is one of the country's most prestigious and expensive, and I have little doubt that the vast majority of criminal defendants would think that they had won the lottery if theywere given the opportunity to be represented by attorneys from such a firm. See id., at 9 (stating that it “seemed asthough Maples had won the lottery when two attorneysworking at an elite New York law firm . . . agreed to represent Maples pro bono”).
What occurred here was not a predictable consequence
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ALITO, J., concurring
of the Alabama system but a veritable perfect storm ofmisfortune, a most unlikely combination of events that,without notice, effectively deprived petitioner of legal representation. Under these unique circumstances, I agree that petitioner's procedural default is overcome.
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_________________
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SCALIA, J., dissenting
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 10–63
CORY R. MAPLES, PETITIONER v. KIM T. THOMAS,
COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
[January 18, 2012]
JUSTICE SCALIA, with whom JUSTICE THOMAS joins,dissenting.
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals held that CoryMaples' appeal from the denial of his state postconviction petition was barred because he had not filed a notice ofappeal within the allotted time. The Court now concludes that Maples has established cause for his proceduraldefault by reason of abandonment by his attorneys. Because I cannot agree with that conclusion, and because Maples' alternative argument fares no better, I wouldaffirm the judgment.
I
A
Our doctrine of procedural default reflects, and furthers,the principle that errors in state criminal trials shouldbe remedied in state court. As we have long recognized, federal habeas review for state prisoners imposes significant costs on the States, undermining not only their practical interest in the finality of their criminal judgments, see Engle v. Isaac, 456 U. S. 107, 126–127 (1982), but also the primacy of their courts in adjudicating the constitutional rights of defendants prosecuted under state law, id., at 128. We have further recognized that “[t]hese costs are
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SCALIA, J., dissenting
particularly high . . . when a state prisoner, through aprocedural default, prevents adjudication of his constitutional claims in state court.” Coleman v. Thompson, 501
U. S. 722, 748 (1991). In that situation, the prisoner has“deprived the state courts of an opportunity to addressthose claims in the first instance,” id., at 732, thereby leaving the state courts without “a chance to mend theirown fences and avoid federal intrusion,” Engle, 456 U. S., at 129. For that reason, and because permitting federalcourt review of defaulted claims would “undercu[t] the State's ability to enforce its procedural rules,” ibid., we have held that when a state court has relied on an adequate and independent state procedural ground in denying a prisoner's claims, the prisoner ordinarily may not obtain federal habeas relief. Coleman, 501 U. S., at 729–730.
To be sure, the prohibition on federal-court review ofdefaulted claims is not absolute. A habeas petitioner's default in state court will not bar federal habeas review if “the petitioner demonstrates cause and actual prejudice,” id., at 748—“cause” constituting “something external to the petitioner, something that cannot fairly be attributedto him,” that impeded compliance with the State's procedural rule, id., at 753. As a general matter, an attorney'smistakes (or omissions) do not meet the standard “becausethe attorney is the petitioner's agent when acting, orfailing to act, in furtherance of the litigation, and the petitioner must ‘bear the risk of attorney error.'” Ibid. (quoting Murray v. Carrier, 477 U. S. 478, 488 (1986)). See also Link v. Wabash R. Co., 370 U. S. 626, 633–634, and n. 10 (1962).
When an attorney's error occurs at a stage of the proceedings at which the defendant has a constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel, that error may constitutecause to excuse a resulting procedural default. A State's failure in its duty to provide an effective attorney, as measured by the standard set forth in Strickland v. WashCite
as: 565 U. S. ____ (2012) 3
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ington, 466 U. S. 668 (1984), makes the attorney's error chargeable to the State, and hence external to the defense.See Murray, supra, at 488. But when the client has no right to counsel—as is the case in the postconviction setting, see Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U. S. 551, 555 (1987)—the client bears the risk of all attorney errorsmade in the course of the representation, regardless of theegregiousness of the mistake. Coleman, supra, at 754 (“[I]t is not the gravity of the attorney's error that matters,but that it constitutes a violation of petitioner's right tocounsel, so that the error must be seen as an external factor”).
B In light of the principles just set out, the Court is correctto conclude, ante, at 14, that a habeas petitioner's procedural default may be excused when it is attributable to abandonment by his attorney. In such a case, Coleman's rationale for attributing the attorney's acts and omissionsto the client breaks down; for once the attorney has ceased acting as the client's agent, “well-settled principles ofagency law,” 501 U. S., at 754, no longer support chargingthe client with his lawyer's mistakes. The attorney'smistakes may therefore be understood as an “external factor,” ibid., and in appropriate circumstances may justify excusing the prisoner's procedural default.I likewise agree with the Court's conclusion, ante, at 15, that Maples' two out-of-state attorneys of record, Jaasi Munanka and Clara Ingen-Housz, had abandoned Maplesby the time the Alabama trial court entered its orderdenying his petition for postconviction relief. As the Court observes, ante, at 15–16, without informing Maples or seeking leave from the Alabama trial court to withdrawfrom Maples' case, both Munanka and Ingen-Housz leftSullivan & Cromwell's employ and accepted new positions that precluded them from continuing to represent Maples.
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This conduct amounted to renunciation of their roles as Maples' agents, see 1 Restatement (Second) of Agency §119, Comment b (1957) (hereinafter Restatement 2d), and thus terminated their authority to act on Maples' behalf, id., §118. As a result, Munanka's and IngenHousz's failure to take action in response to the trialcourt's order should not be imputed to Maples.
It is an unjustified leap, however, to conclude that Maples was left unrepresented during the relevant windowbetween the Alabama trial court's dismissal of his postconviction petition and expiration of the 42-day period for filing a notice of appeal established by Alabama Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(1) (2009). Start with Maples' own allegations: In his amended federal habeas petition, Maples alleged that, at the time he sought postconvic- tion relief in Alabama trial court, he “was represented bySullivan & Cromwell of New York, New York.” App. 256.Although the petition went on to identify Munanka and Ingen-Housz as “the two Sullivan lawyers handling thematter,” id., at 257, its statement that Maples was “represented” by the firm itself strongly suggests that Maplesviewed himself as having retained the services of the firm as a whole, a perfectly natural understanding. “When a client retains a lawyer who practices with a firm, thepresumption is that both the lawyer and the firm havebeen retained.” 1 Restatement (Third) of the Law Governing Lawyers §31, Comment f, p. 222 (1998). Admittedly,in connection with the attempt before the Alabama trialcourt to extend the time for appeal, Sullivan & Cromwellpartner Marc De Leeuw submitted an affidavit stating that the firm's lawyers “handle pro bono cases on an individual basis” and that the lawyers who had appeared inMaples' case had followed that practice, “attempt[ing] not to use the firm name on correspondence or court papers.”App. to Pet. for Cert. 257a. But Maples' habeas petition isthe pleading that initiated the current litigation; and
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SCALIA, J., dissenting
surely the allegations that it contained should be givenpriority over representations made to prior courts.*
In any case, even if Maples had no attorney-client relationship with the Sullivan & Cromwell firm, Munankaand Ingen-Housz were surely not the only Sullivan &Cromwell lawyers who represented Maples on an individual basis. De Leeuw's affidavit acknowledged that he had “been involved in [Maples'] case since the summer of 2001,” ibid., roughly a year before Munanka and Ingen-Housz left Sullivan & Cromwell, and it further stated that after “Ms. Ingen-Housz and Mr. Munanka” learned of the court's initial order denying the State's motion to dismiss Maples' postconviction petition in December 2001, “the lawyers working on this case for Mr. Maples prepared for the evidentiary hearing” Maples had requested, id., at 258a. Moreover, when Sullivan & Cromwell attorney Felice Duffy filed a motion to appear pro hac vice before the Alabama trial court in connection with the attempt to extend the deadline, she st
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