United States Ninth Circuit

The district court's denial of a habeas corpus petition challenging the trial court's decision to preclude defense counsel from making a reasonable doubt argument to the jury is reversed and remanded, where: 1) the trial court infringed petitioner's Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights by precluding counsel from making a reasonable doubt argument to the jury, 2) petitioner was deprived of his right to demand that the jury find him guilty of all the elements of the crime; 3) the burden of proof was unconstitutionally shifted; 4) petitioner's right to present a closing argument was violated; and 5) these errors were structural and not subject to harmless error review.

Appellate Information

• Decided 04/29/2014
• Published 04/29/2014

Judges

• THOMAS

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel