Trest v. Cain

Supreme Court of the United States · 1997 · Federal Courts

Federal CourtsHabeas CorpusProcedural Defaulthabeas corpusprocedural defaultsua sponteadequate and independent state groundcomity

Facts

Richard Trest was serving a long Louisiana sentence for armed robbery and sought habeas relief in federal court. The Fifth Circuit ruled against him based on procedural default, concluding that he had failed to raise his federal claims on time in state court and that a state court would now refuse to consider them on that basis. The parties had neither raised nor argued procedural default in the court of appeals. Trest argued that the Fifth Circuit appeared to think it was required to notice and decide procedural default on its own.

Issue

Whether a federal court of appeals reviewing a district court's habeas decision is required to raise a habeas petitioner's potential procedural default sua sponte when the State has not raised it. The Court did not decide whether a court may do so; it decided only whether it must.

Rule

In the habeas context, procedural default is not jurisdictional. Because it rests on concerns of comity and federalism and normally operates as a defense the State must raise and preserve, a federal court of appeals is not required to raise procedural default sua sponte.

🔒

See the holding & full analysis

Create a free KwikCourt account to unlock the rest of this brief — and practice the case.

The court's holding and reasoning
Doctrine tests, pitfalls & exam hypotheticals
10 practice questions + 4 AI-graded essays on this case

Free sample · practice this case

Test yourself

One of 10 multiple-choice questions for this case. Pick an answer to see why.

Darnell Price, imprisoned in Ohio, files a federal habeas petition challenging his conviction. The state attorney defends only on the merits in both the district court and the court of appeals, but the Sixth Circuit notices that Darnell may have failed to comply with an Ohio filing deadline in state postconviction proceedings.

If the Sixth Circuit says it must dismiss the habeas appeal on procedural-default grounds even though the State never raised that issue, which statement is most consistent with the governing rule?

Explanation. The controlling rule is narrow: in habeas, procedural default is not jurisdictional, and a court of appeals is not required to raise it on its own. The doctrine is grounded in comity and federalism and normally operates as a defense the State must raise and preserve. The decision does not hold that a court may never raise it sua sponte; it holds only that the court is not required to do so.