Section 15 Utilization of the Writ

• Library: Remedies 2006

For a discussion of when habeas corpus relief is available in Missouri, see State ex rel. Simmons v. White, 866 S.W.2d 443 (Mo. banc 1993). Out of concern over “duplicative and unending challenges to the finality of a judgment,” a person cannot usually utilize a writ of habeas corpus to raise procedurally-barred claims—“those that could have been raised, but were not raised, on direct appeal or in a post conviction proceeding.” Clay v. Dormire, 37 S.W.3d 214, 217 (Mo. banc 2000).

But there are rare exceptions, and in those instances, the cause and prejudice standard applies. The cause of procedural default “‘must ordinarily turn on whether the prisoner can show that some objective factor external to the defense impeded counsel’s efforts to comply with the State’s procedural rule.’” State ex rel. Nixon v. Jaynes, 63 S.W.3d 210, 215 (Mo. banc 2001) (citing Murray v. Carrier, 477 U.S. 478, 488 (1986)). To establish prejudice, the habeas petitioner must show that errors at trial “worked to his actual and substantial disadvantage, infecting his entire trial with error of constitutional dimensions.” Jaynes, 63 S.W.3d at 215–16 (quoting United States v. Frady, 456 U.S. 152, 170 (1982)).

The Supreme Court also discussed procedural default in Brown v. State, 66 S.W.2d 721 (Mo. banc 2002), in which the Court held that:

habeas corpus . . . provides the proper avenue for relief in those limited circumstances in which the petitioner asserts a claim that is of the type enumerated in Rule 24.035, but that is time-barred...