Argument of Speaker
Mr. Speaker: The opinion of the court in number 01-301 Carey versus Saffold and another case will be announced by Justice Breyer.
Argument of Justice Breyer
Mr. Breyer: The first case is Carey versus Saffold.
It is about the Federal Habeas Corpus Statute which has a requirement that the State prisoner has to file for Federal Habeas Corpus within one year after his State conviction has become final.
Well, what about State collateral review proceeding like State Habeas Corpus which normally takes place after the conviction becomes final.
The statute says that that one year period will be tolled while an application for State collateral review is pending.
Now, this case presents three questions about the meaning of that word "pending": First, is a state application pending during the interval between the time a lower State Court rules on the application and the time the petitioner files a notice of appeal to the higher State Court.
Normally that is a few days because normally in most States there is a period of time say 30 days or 45 days during which you have to file your notice of appeal while you suppose wait 10 days before filing it.
What about those 10 days?
We say the answer to the question is, yes, That period is part of the ordinary application process and it counts for tolling purposes.
What about California’s collateral review System which is special?
It is special because they do not have a period of appeal from the lower court to the next higher court; what they say is you have to file a new petition in the higher court, and you have to do it within a reasonable time.
But what about that period of time, Between the lost in the lower court you have not yet filed your petition in the higher court.
Well, we say that it is different but the difference does not matter.
We say that California’s original filing review system is functionally similar to the appeal system that other States have and we find that the law treats them similarly.
Alright third, what about the petitioner's request for review in this case?
And here the petitioner filed his new original writ in the higher court 4 months really later.
Well, was it pending or was he out of time?
Now, that is a little complicated because California’s time period is not like 30 days or 45 days it just says reasonable time.
Well, what we say there and we spell out the reasons is that the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit when it faced that question it did not do so correctly; It had an absolute rule they tried to apply.
We say they were wrong on that but we remand the case so that they can work out whether or not it was timely given the principles in our opinion.
Justice Kennedy has filed a dissenting opinion which is joined by the Chief Justice, Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas.
