NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FILED
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT JAN 13 2015
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
MARK WAYNE HAUSEUR, No. 11-56480
Petitioner - Appellant, D.C. No. 5:08-cv-00094-CJC-SS
v.
MEMORANDUM*
TIM V. VIRGA, Warden,
Respondent - Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Cormac J. Carney, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted January 5, 2015
Pasadena, California
Before: KOZINSKI, W. FLETCHER, and OWENS, Circuit Judges.
California state prisoner Mark Wayne Hauseur appeals the denial of his 28
U.S.C. § 2254 habeas petition. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 2253. We
review de novo the district court’s decision to deny Hauseur’s habeas petition, see
Clabourne v. Ryan, 745 F.3d 362, 370 (9th Cir. 2014), and we affirm.
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
Hauseur was convicted of first-degree murder in 2004. He argues that
various irregularities compromised the integrity of the jury. We assume without
deciding that these arguments are properly before us, and that our review is de
novo. On the record presented, neither the statements made by the victim’s wife
nor one juror’s alleged conversation with a police officer were the kind of extrinsic
material likely to have “substantially and injuriously affected the verdict.” Cook v.
LaMarque, 593 F.3d 810, 827 (9th Cir. 2010) (internal punctuation marks
omitted). Any relationship that another juror may have had with a prosecution
witness was, similarly, too insubstantial to have rendered that juror incapable of
“decid[ing] the case solely on the evidence before [him].” McDonough Power
Equip., Inc. v. Greenwood, 464 U.S. 548, 554 (1984) (quoting Smith v. Phillips,
455 U.S. 209, 217 (1982)). The district court did not err in rejecting these claims.
Nor did it abuse its discretion in denying an evidentiary hearing.
Hauseur also argues that he received ineffective assistance of trial counsel.
Because the state court adjudicated Hauseur’s ineffective assistance claim on the
merits, we can grant relief only if its adjudication was “contrary to, or involved an
unreasonable application of,” clearly established Supreme Court law. 28 U.S.C. §
2254(d)(1). We conclude it was neither. The fact that the state court did not cite to
or fully articulate the standard of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 694
2
(1984), does not mean it applied a standard “contrary to” Strickland’s. See
Woodford v. Visciotti, 537 U.S. 19, 24 (2002) (per curiam). And its conclusion
that Hauseur was not prejudiced by any deficiencies in his counsel’s performance
was not “unreasonable” given the strength of the state’s evidence against Hauseur.
AFFIRMED.
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