Federal circuit court reopens death-row inmate's appeals

By ROB JOHNSON
The Tennessean
14 December 2004

Abdur'Rahman can seek hearing to allege misconduct by prosecutor

In a victory for a Tennessee death-row inmate, a federal appeals court gave the green light for a U.S. District judge in Nashville to consider whether Abu-Ali Abdur'Rahman should receive a hearing on the condemned man's claims that prosecutorial misconduct led to his death sentence.

Abdur'Rahman's attorneys hope that yesterday's ruling by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals will enable their client to get a long-sought federal court hearing to explore claims that he received an unfair trial following the 1986 stabbing death of Patrick Daniels.

"We are very pleased," said Bradley MacLean, who with Nashville defense lawyer Bill Reddick, has pleaded Abdur'Rahman's case. "He is very hopeful that all of his claims will be heard."

If Abdur'Rahman's appeals succeed, he could get a new trial or have his sentence reduced.

The state attorney general's office will appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court. Abdur'Rahman, the state says, has exhausted his federal claims.

Four other Tennessee death-row residents had also been awaiting the ruling. Federal courts had stayed their executions pending the ruling of the appeals court in Abdur'Rahman's case, because it can affect whether their appeals are heard in federal courts.

Delivered more than a year after attorneys argued the appeal in Cincinnati, yesterday's 7-6 ruling does not address whether Abdur'Rahman's sentence for killing Daniels should be set aside.

Nor does it delve into the questions that defense attorneys have raised about the way the case was investigated and tried. Rather, the case is about court procedure and the complicated rules that determine whether a judge can even consider taking up certain matters.

Abdur'Rahman contends that U.S. District Judge Todd Campbell should have held a hearing on misconduct allegations against Davidson County Assistant District Attorney General John Zimmermann, the original prosecutor in the case.

Abdur'Rahman's defense alleges Zimmerman withheld and mischaracterized evidence. Zimmermann, who has been disciplined in three unrelated cases, has said he acted properly. He is serving in the military in Iraq and could not be contacted yesterday for comment.

State Attorney General Paul Summers has argued Abdur'Rahman failed to claim misconduct at each level of the state court system. By the time Abdur'Rahman made those claims in federal court, his window of opportunity had closed, the state said.

Campbell agreed, ruling in 1998 to bar Abdur'Rahman from bringing those claims to federal court.

Then, while the case was still on federal appeal in 2001, the Tennessee Supreme Court said a defendant who did not raise certain claims in state court should not necessarily be barred from bringing them up later in federal court.

Yesterday, the appeals court agreed with the state justices.
It is unknown whether the U.S. Supreme Court will agree to hear the state attorney general's appeal on this latest ruling.

The issue reprises the debate that has already been before the U.S. Supreme Court. After agreeing to hear arguments, the nation's highest court made the extremely rare decision that it should not have agreed to hear Abdur'Rahman's case in the first place.

The case has been working through federal courts ever since.

Congress passed the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act in 1996 to streamline the process of deciding death penalty cases in the federal courts.

"In effect, just the opposite has occurred," MacLean said yesterday. "There has been a tremendous amount of litigation since then over the very procedural issues that the statute has created - before the parties can even get to the merits of the case."

Summers said that the 6th Circuit's opinion, if allowed to stand, "would substantially undermine" the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act.