FILED
DEC 23 2013
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
ALY TAMBOURA, No. 11-17243
Petitioner - Appellant, D.C. No. 5:08-cv-01143-JF
v. MEMORANDUM*
ROBERT L. AYERS, Jr., Warden,
Respondent - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of California
Jeremy D. Fogel, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted December 3, 2013
San Francisco, California
Before: GOULD and PAEZ, Circuit Judges, and HUFF, District Judge.**
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
**
The Honorable Marilyn L. Huff, United States District Judge for the
Southern District of California, sitting by designation.
Petitioner Aly Tamboura (“Petitioner”) appeals the district court’s denial of
his petition for writ of habeas corpus. Tamboura contends that the state trial court
violated his due process right to an impartial decisionmaker at his probation
revocation hearing.
We have jurisdiction to review the final order of the district court pursuant to
28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253. We review the underlying state court ruling pursuant
to the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”), 28
U.S.C. § 2254.
The trial court judge conducted an in-depth probation revocation hearing to
explore whether Petitioner violated the conditions of his probation and whether
those violations were willful. After determining that Petitioner’s conduct
constituted a willful violation by a preponderance of the evidence, see People v.
Rodriguez, 795 P.2d 783, 789 (Cal. 1990), the trial court judge imposed the
suspended sentence.
Petitioner has not demonstrated that the trial court judge predetermined the
result of the probation revocation hearing. The trial court judge’s statements
during the proceedings did not display the type of deep-seated antagonism that
would make fair judgment impossible. See Liteky v. United States, 510 U.S. 540,
555 (1994) (“[J]udicial remarks during the course of a trial that are critical or
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disapproving of, or even hostile to, counsel, the parties, or their cases, ordinarily do
not support a bias or partiality challenge.”).
On the basis of the record, and taking into account the high degree of
deference that the court must afford to the findings of the state appellate court, see
Hibbler v. Benedetti, 693 F.3d 1140, 1146 (9th Cir. 2012), cert denied, 133 S. Ct.
1262 (U.S. 2013), we affirm the district court’s denial of the petition.
AFFIRMED.
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