The Short-Circuited Federal Appeals Process
I have long sought to streamline federal appeals for convicted criminals sentenced to the death penalty – President Bill Clinton, April 24, 1996
Troy Davis has been caught in a trap set by the US Congress a decade ago when it withdrew funding from post-conviction defender organizations in 1995 and passed the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), which then President Bill Clinton signed in April 1996.
The withdrawal of funding denied Troy Davis effective representation during his State Appeals:
I desperately tried to represent Mr. Davis during this period, but the lack of adequate resources and the numerous intervening crises made that impossible ... We were simply trying to avert total disaster rather than provide any kind of active or effective representation. – lawyer working on Troy Davis' state appeals
The passage of AEDPA required federal courts to show greater deference to the decisions of state courts, meaning that relief was now only permissible if the decision of a state court had "resulted in a decision that was contrary to, or involved in an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law." Federal appeals courts have rejected Troy Davis' claim that his trial was constitutionally unfair, despite 21 separate affidavits either recanting testimony (and in many cases alleging police coercion), or implicating another suspect. Troy Davis has never had a hearing in federal court on the reliability of the witness testimony used against him at trial.
The Court finds that because the submitted affidavits are insufficient to raise doubts as to the constitutionality of the result at trial, there is no danger of a miscarriage of justice in declining to consider the claim. – District Court Judge John F. Nangle, US District Court, Southern District of Georgia, Savannah Division, May 13, 2004
[W]e cannot say that the district court erred in concluding that Davis has not borne his burden to establish a viable claim that his trial was constitutionally unfair. – 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, September 26, 2006
