In Land v. Allen, No. 08-15254 (July 10, 2009), the Court affirmed the denial of habeas relief to an Alabama inmate sentenced to death for murder.
The Court held that despite evidence that a statement was taken from Land by Alabama police while he was in a semi-fetal position, with his hands covering his face, the totality of the circumstances did not indicate that his statement was involuntary.
The Court recognized that the trial court erred when it instructed the jury that "I determine the voluntariness of the statement [given by Land to police]." However, in view of the remainder of the instructions, this instruction by itself did so infect the entire trial so as to violate due process.
The Court also recognized that the prosecutor, in a case where the facts were all circumstantial, made improper closing argument when he speculated about the words that Land exchanged with the victim before murdering her. While the Court did not "condone the prosecutor’s behavior," it found that this misconduct did not so infect the trial as to make the resulting conviction invalid.
Finally, the Court did not find ineffective assistance of counsel in the failure to put on mitigating evidence about Land’s upbringing, noting the strategic decision behind it.
