NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS AUG 31 2021
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
TANNEN SOOJIAN, No. 19-15833
Petitioner-Appellant, D.C. No.
1:16-cv-00254-AWI-SAB
v.
JOE A. LIZARRAGA, Warden, MEMORANDUM*
Respondent-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of California
Anthony W. Ishii, Senior District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted July 6, 2021
San Francisco, California
Before: GRABER and LEE, Circuit Judges, and VRATIL, ** District Judge.
Petitioner Tannen Soojian appeals the district court’s denial of his federal
habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. Petitioner argues that, by admitting
evidence of his statements to police, the state trial court violated his Fifth
Amendment rights under Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966). On this issue,
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
**
The Honorable Kathryn H. Vratil, United States District Judge for the
District of Kansas, sitting by designation.
the state court of appeals found that the state trial court did not err when it admitted
evidence of Petitioner’s statements to police. On federal habeas review, the district
court denied the petition for a writ of habeas corpus. We have jurisdiction under 28
U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253, and we affirm.
We review de novo a district court’s denial of a habeas petition. Henry v.
Ryan, 720 F.3d 1073, 1078 (9th Cir. 2013). Under the Antiterrorism and Effective
Death Penalty Act of 1996, we may grant relief only when a state court determination
was (1) “contrary to or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established
federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States” or (2) “based
on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in
the State court proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. §2254(d). Review of a state court’s decision
is “highly deferential,” Renico v. Lett, 559 U.S. 766, 773 (2010) (internal quotation
marks omitted), and a federal court may not grant relief where “fairminded jurists
could disagree” about the correctness of the state court determination, Harrington v.
Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 101 (2011) (citation omitted).
We assume, without deciding, that admitting evidence of Petitioner’s
statements to police was constitutional error. Nonetheless, any error was harmless.
At trial, the prosecutor did not rely extensively on Petitioner’s statements, and other
evidence of Petitioner’s guilt was very strong. Petitioner argues that the jury’s
decision was close and that admission of his statements could have substantially
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affected the verdict. Specifically, Petitioner emphasizes that jury deliberations
lasted 17 hours over the course of four days. The reason for the length of
deliberations is speculative, however, and is at least as plausibly attributable to
deliberations on counts on which the jury did not convict Petitioner. In the
circumstances, the length of deliberations, standing alone, does not inform the
harmless error analysis.
The state court of appeals did not analyze whether the admission of
Petitioner’s statements to police was harmless error, so Petitioner is entitled to
habeas relief “only if the federal court has ‘grave doubt about whether a trial error
of federal law had substantial and injurious effect or influence in determining the
jury’s verdict.’” Davis v. Ayala, 576 U.S. 257, 268 (2015) (quoting O’Neal v.
McAninch, 513 U.S. 432, 436 (1995) (internal quotation marks omitted)). This
standard requires more than a “reasonable possibility” that the error was harmful.
Id. (citing Brecht v. Abrahamson, 507 U.S. 619, 637 (1993)). Petitioner’s statements
to police played a relatively small role in the prosecutor’s closing statements. On
this record, especially given the other evidence of Petitioner’s guilt, Petitioner has
not demonstrated that evidentiary errors at trial had a substantial and injurious effect
or influence on the jury’s verdict.
AFFIRMED.
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