## Facts

- A Los Angeles police detective approached Gill A.C. Stephens while Stephens was waiting to board a Greyhound bus.
- Officers searched Stephens’s bags and found cocaine.
- Stephens was federally charged with possession with intent to distribute cocaine under 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1).
- In the federal case, the district court (after an evidentiary hearing) found Stephens did not consent, held the search unconstitutional, and suppressed the cocaine; the federal indictment was dismissed rather than appealed.
- The same officers referred the matter to state prosecutors, who filed state charges in California Superior Court.
- In the state case, the trial judge credited the officers’ testimony that Stephens consented and denied suppression; Stephens pleaded guilty.
- Stephens’s direct appeal (raising Fourth Amendment and collateral estoppel arguments) was rejected by the California Court of Appeal, and the California Supreme Court denied review.
- Stephens filed a federal habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254; the district court denied relief, and Stephens appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether federal habeas review permitted overturning the state court’s finding that Stephens consented to the search, and thereby granting Fourth Amendment relief.
2. Whether collateral estoppel (as a due process matter) required California courts to treat the prior federal suppression ruling as preclusive of relitigating the legality of the search.

## Decision

- The Ninth Circuit affirmed the denial of § 2254 habeas relief.
- The court held the state court’s factual finding of consent was presumed correct under then-applicable § 2254(d), and Stephens did not establish a statutory basis to disregard it.
- The court held collateral estoppel did not bar the state prosecution from litigating the search’s legality because California was not a party (or in privity with a party) to the earlier federal prosecution and was not bound by that federal suppression order.

## Legal Principles

- On § 2254 review, state-court factual findings—including credibility-based findings regarding consent to search—carry a statutory presumption of correctness absent an applicable exception.
- A federal habeas court generally may not redecide state fact findings simply because a federal court reached a different factual conclusion in a separate proceeding.
- Collateral estoppel does not bind a sovereign that was not a party, did not control the prior litigation, and lacks privity with the prior prosecuting authority; a state is not required to treat an unappealed federal suppression ruling in a dismissed federal case as preclusive in a later state prosecution.

## Conclusion

The Ninth Circuit sustained Stephens’s state conviction by deferring to the state court’s fact finding that Stephens consented to the search and by rejecting any requirement that California give preclusive effect to an earlier, contrary federal suppression ruling from a federal prosecution brought and dismissed by the United States.


Stephens v. Att'y Gen. of Cal., 23 F.3d 248 (9th Cir. 1994)