Glebe v. Frost
135 S. Ct. 429
| SCOTUS | 2014Background
- In April 2003 Frost assisted two accomplices in a string of armed robberies in Washington, mainly by driving them; he at times entered a robbery scene and performed surveillance.
- At trial Frost admitted involvement but claimed the defense of duress; his counsel wished to argue both (1) that Frost was not an accomplice (i.e., attack elements) and (2) duress in closing.
- The trial judge forced the defense to choose between contesting elements and asserting duress, disallowing simultaneous argument; Frost’s counsel focused on duress and the jury convicted on multiple counts.
- The Washington Supreme Court held the restriction violated federal due process and assistance-of-counsel rights but treated the error as nonstructural (trial error) and harmless beyond a reasonable doubt given confessions and proper instructions.
- Frost sought federal habeas relief; a Ninth Circuit en banc panel reversed, finding the state court unreasonably applied clearly established federal law by not treating the restriction as structural error.
- The Supreme Court granted certiorari and reversed the Ninth Circuit, holding it was not clearly established that this kind of restriction is a structural error under AEDPA standards, and remanded for further proceedings.
Issues
| Issue | Frost's Argument | State/Respondent's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Whether forbidding simultaneous argument on elements and duress violated the Constitution | Trial court’s restriction violated right to effective assistance and due process | Restriction implicated procedural limits but raised a constitutional claim only if error was structural or not harmless | Court assumed possible constitutional violation but did not treat it as clearly established structural error |
| Whether that restriction is a structural error requiring automatic reversal | It functionally coerced a concession of guilt and thus infected the trial | Such a restriction is not clearly a structural error and can be reviewed for harmlessness | Not clearly established that restricting alternative closing theories is structural error; harmlessness framework governs |
| Whether Ninth Circuit could rely on its circuit precedents to show clearly established law under AEDPA | Circuit precedents supported treating the restriction as structural error | Supreme Court precedents, not circuit cases, alone constitute clearly established federal law under §2254(d)(1) | Circuit precedents cannot substitute for Supreme Court holdings to meet AEDPA’s clearly established-law requirement |
| Whether the trial court’s ruling effectively shifted burden of proof or directed verdict | It forced a tacit admission, relieving State’s burden and shifting it to Frost | Reasonable minds could disagree; even a tacit admission would not clearly be structural under Supreme Court precedents | Court rejected that it was clearly established that the ruling relieved burden or directed a verdict; such claims are not categorically structural |
Key Cases Cited
- Herring v. New York, 422 U.S. 853 (1975) (holding complete denial of summation violates the assistance-of-counsel right)
- Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1 (1999) (most constitutional errors are subject to harmless-error review; structural error is rare)
- Arizona v. Fulminante, 499 U.S. 279 (1991) (coerced confession treated as trial error subject to harmlessness analysis)