[PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
FILED
No. 07-13086 U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________ APRIL 19, 2010
JOHN LEY
D. C. Docket No. 01-01296-CV-WBH CLERK
MARCUS WELLONS,
Petitioner-Appellant,
versus
HILTON HALL, Warden,
Georgia Diagnostic and
Classification Prison,
Respondent-Appellee.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
_________________________
ON REMAND FROM THE
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
(April 19, 2010)
Before TJOFLAT, BLACK and WILSON, Circuit Judges.
WILSON, Circuit Judge:
In this case, one or more jurors gave the judge and the bailiff tasteless and
disturbing gifts. No court that has reviewed this case has been comfortable with
these gifts.1 Yet, troubling facts do not automatically give rise to a legal claim.
Articulating a rule that fairly addresses this scenario poses an uncommon
challenge. The Supreme Court’s opinion in this case, Wellons v. Hall, 558
U.S. ___, 130 S. Ct. 727 (2010) (per curiam), demonstrates that point. In view of
the extraordinary circumstances of this case, and for the purposes of this case
alone, we reverse the district judge’s denial of discovery and an evidentiary
hearing and remand this case for further proceedings that are consistent with the
Supreme Court’s opinion, as well as its opinion in Cone v. Bell, 556 U.S. ___, 129
S. Ct. 1769 (2009). The district court should grant discovery and conduct an
evidentiary hearing as it sees fit, in keeping with its analysis of Tanner v. United
States, 483 U.S. 107, 107 S. Ct. 2739 (1987) and the related cases.
REVERSED AND REMANDED.
1
The district court, for example, noted that the gifts demonstrated “an unusual display of poor
taste in the context of a proceeding so grave as a capital trial.” Final Order 43. There is no basis
to the Supreme Court’s intimations that this Court or the district court failed to appreciate the
seriousness of these proceedings.