Yearslong Delay In State Post-Trial Proceedings Moot Because of Decisions During Pendency of Appeal

Hicks v. Frame: Hicks was convicted of first-degree murder in West Virginia and sentenced to life in prison in 1988. While his direct appeal was still pending, in 1989, he filed a motion for a reduced sentence, which sat for eight years without activity. In 1997, he filed a motion in state court for habeas corpus relief which was assigned to a judge who had been one of the prosecutors in Hicks’ case. In the years since nothing had come of Hicks’ pending motions, through a combination of judicial turnover (five judges have been assigned to his case, including two of his former prosecutors), attorney turnover (several attorneys appointed to represent Hicks did nothing for years before being replaced), and issues gathering the trial transcript.  In 2021, Hicks filed a §2254 motion in federal court, arguing that he should be excused for not exhausting state remedies due to the lengthy delay. The district court denied the motion.

On appeal, the Fourth Circuit affirmed the denial of Hicks’ §2254 motion, although on a different basis that the district court. Limiting the issues (due to the wording of the certificate of appealability) to whether the state process was ineffective to protect his rights, the court noted that by the time of oral argument the state court, at long last, had ruled on (and denied) Hicks’ pending motions. Because the inquiry as to the ineffectiveness of state proceedings is prospective, rather than retrospective, it was controlling that Hicks’ case had been ruled upon in state court, regardless of the decades-long delay in getting there.