Mayle v. Felix

(Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2004 1

Syllabus

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

MAYLE, WARDEN v. FELIX

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR
THE NINTH CIRCUIT

No. 04–563. Argued April 19, 2005—Decided June 23, 2005
Respondent Felix was convicted of murder and robbery in California
state court and sentenced to life imprisonment. His current applica-
tion for federal habeas relief centers on two alleged trial-court errors,
both involving the admission of out-of-court statements during the
prosecutor’s case-in-chief but otherwise unrelated. Felix had made
inculpatory statements during pretrial police interrogation. He al-
leged that those statements were coerced, and that their admission
violated his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.
He also alleged that the admission of a videotape recording of testi-
mony of a prosecution witness violated the Sixth Amendment’s Con-
frontation Clause.
Felix’s conviction was affirmed on appeal and became final on Au-
gust 12, 1997. Under the one-year limitation period imposed by the
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 28
U. S. C. §2244(d)(1), Felix had until August 12, 1998 to file a habeas
petition in federal court. On May 8, 1998, in a timely filed habeas pe-
tition, Felix asserted his Confrontation Clause challenge to admission
of the videotaped prosecution witness testimony, but did not then
challenge the admission of his own pretrial statements. On January
28, 1999, over five months after the August 12, 1998 expiration of
AEDPA’s time limit and eight months after the court appointed coun-
sel to represent him, Felix filed an amended petition asserting a Fifth
Amendment objection to admission of his pretrial statements. In re-
sponse to the State’s argument that the Fifth Amendment claim was
time barred, Felix asserted the rule that pleading amendments relate
back to the filing date of the original pleading when both the original
plea and the amendment arise out of the same “conduct, transaction,
or occurrence set forth . . . in the original pleading,” Fed. Rule Civ.
2 MAYLE v. FELIX

Syllabus

Proc. 15(c)(2). Because his Fifth Amendment and Confrontation
Clause claims challenged the constitutionality of the same criminal
conviction, Felix urged, both claims arose out of the same “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence.” The District Court dismissed the Fifth
Amendment claim as time barred, and rejected the Confrontation
Clause claim on its merits. The Ninth Circuit affirmed as to the lat-
ter claim, but reversed the dismissal of the coerced statements claim
and remanded it for further proceedings. In the court’s view, the
relevant “transaction” for Rule 15(c)(2) purposes was Felix’s state-
court trial and conviction. Defining transaction with greater specific-
ity, the court reasoned, would unduly strain the meaning of “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence” by dividing the trial and conviction into a
series of individual occurrences.
Held: An amended habeas petition does not relate back (and thereby
avoid AEDPA’s one-year time limit) when it asserts a new ground for
relief supported by facts that differ in both time and type from those
set forth in the original pleading. Pp. 7–18.
(a) Under §2244(d)(1), a one-year limitation period applies to a
state prisoner’s federal habeas application. Habeas Corpus Rule 11
permits application of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in habeas
cases “to the extent [the civil rules] are not inconsistent with any
statutory provisions or [the habeas] rules.” Section 2242 provides
that habeas applications “may be amended . . . as provided in the
rules of procedure applicable to civil actions.” Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 15(a) allows pleading amendments with “leave of court”
any time during a proceeding. Before a responsive pleading is
served, pleadings may be amended once as a “matter of course,” i.e.,
without seeking court leave. Ibid. Amendments made after the stat-
ute of limitations has run relate back to the date of the original
pleading if the original and amended pleadings “ar[i]se out of the
same conduct, transaction, or occurrence.” Rule 15(c)(2). The “origi-
nal pleading” in a habeas proceeding is the petition as initially filed.
That pleading must “specify all the grounds for relief available to the
petitioner” and “state the facts supporting each ground.” Habeas
Corpus Rule 2(c). A prime purpose of Rule 2(c)’s demand that peti-
tioners plead with particularity is to assist the district court in de-
termining whether the State should be ordered to “show cause why
the writ should not be granted,” §2243, or the petition instead should
be summarily dismissed without ordering a responsive pleading.
Habeas Corpus Rule 4. Pp. 7–9.
(b) Under the Ninth Circuit’s comprehensive definition of “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence,” virtually any new claim introduced in an
amended habeas petition will relate back, for federal habeas claims,
by their very nature, challenge the constitutionality of a conviction or
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 3

Syllabus

sentence, and commonly attack proceedings anterior thereto. The
majority of Circuits define “conduct, transaction, or occurrence” in
federal habeas cases far less broadly, allowing relation back only
when the claims added by amendment arise from the same core facts
as the timely filed claims, and not when the new claims depend upon
events separate in both time and type from the originally raised epi-
sodes. Under that view, Felix’s own pretrial statements, newly
raised in his amended petition, would not relate back because they
were separated in time and type from the videotaped witness testi-
mony. This Court is not aware, in the run-of-the-mine civil proceed-
ings Rule 15 governs, of any reading of “conduct, transaction, or oc-
currence” as capacious as the Ninth Circuit’s construction for habeas
cases. Decisions applying Rule 15(c)(2) in the civil context illustrate
that Rule 15(c)(2) relaxes, but does not obliterate, the statute of limi-
tations; hence relation back depends on the existence of a common
core of operative facts uniting the original and newly asserted claims.
The Court disagrees with Felix’s assertion that he seeks, and the
Ninth Circuit accorded, no wider range for Rule 15(c)’s relation-back
provision than was given the words “conduct, transaction, or occur-
rence” in Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 323 U. S. 574, 580–581.
There, the amended complaint invoked a legal theory not suggested
in the original complaint and relied on facts not originally asserted.
Relation back was nevertheless permitted. In Tiller, however, there
was but one “occurrence,” the death of the petitioner’s husband,
which she attributed throughout to the respondent’s failure to pro-
vide a safe workplace. In contrast, Felix targeted discrete episodes,
the videotaped witness testimony in his original petition and his own
interrogation at a different time and place in his amended petition.
Pp. 9–13.
Felix’s contention that the trial itself is the appropriate “transac-
tion” or “occurrence” artificially truncates his claims by homing in
only on what makes those claims actionable in a habeas proceeding.
Although his self-incrimination claim did not ripen until the prosecu-
tor introduced his pretrial statements at trial, the essential predicate
for his Fifth Amendment claim was an extrajudicial event, i.e., an
out-of-court police interrogation. The dispositive question in an ad-
judication of that claim would be the character of the police interro-
gation, specifically, did Felix answer voluntarily or were his state-
ments coerced. See Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S. 503, 513–514.
Under Habeas Corpus Rule 2(c)’s particularity-in-pleading require-
ment, Felix’s Confrontation Clause claim would be pleaded discretely,
as would his self-incrimination claim. Each separate congeries of
facts supporting the grounds for relief, the Rule suggests, would de-
lineate an “occurrence.” Felix’s and the Ninth Circuit’s approach is
4 MAYLE v. FELIX

Syllabus

boundless by comparison, allowing a miscellany of claims for relief to
be raised later rather than sooner and to relate back. If claims as-
serted after the one-year period could be revived simply because they re-
late to the same trial, conviction, or sentence as a timely filed claim,
AEDPA’s limitation period would have slim significance. Pp. 13–16.
Felix’s argument that a firm check against petition amendments pre-
senting new, discrete claims after AEDPA’s limitation period has run is
provided by Rule 15(a)—which gives district courts discretion to deny
petition amendments once a responsive pleading has been filed—
overlooks a pleader’s right to amend without leave of court “any time be-
fore a responsive pleading is served.” That time can be long under Ha-
beas Corpus Rule 4, pursuant to which a petition is not served until the
judge first examines it to determine whether “it plainly appears . . . that
the petitioner is not entitled to relief.” This Court’s reading that rela-
tion back will be in order so long as the original and amended peti-
tions state claims that are tied to a common core of operative facts is
consistent with Rule 15(c)(2)’s general application in civil cases, with
Habeas Corpus Rule 2(c), and with AEDPA’s tight time line for peti-
tions. Pp. 16–18.
379 F. 3d 612, reversed and remanded.

GINSBURG, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST,
C. J., and O’CONNOR, SCALIA, KENNEDY, THOMAS, and BREYER, JJ.,
joined. SOUTER, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which STEVENS, J.,
joined.
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 1

Opinion of the Court

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
preliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested to
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
ington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order
that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
_________________

No. 04–563
_________________

DENEICE A. MAYLE, WARDEN, PETITIONER v.
JACOBY LEE FELIX
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
[June 23, 2005]

JUSTICE GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court.
This case involves two federal prescriptions: the one-
year limitation period imposed on federal habeas corpus
petitioners by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death
Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), 28 U. S. C. §2244(d)(1); and
the rule that pleading amendments relate back to the
filing date of the original pleading when both the original
plea and the amendment arise out of the same “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence,” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 15(c)(2).
Jacoby Lee Felix, California prisoner and federal habeas
petitioner, was convicted in California state court of first-
degree murder and second-degree robbery, and received a
life sentence. Within the one-year limitation period
AEDPA allows for habeas petitions, Felix filed a pro se
petition in federal court. He initially alleged, inter alia,
that the admission into evidence of videotaped testimony
of a witness for the prosecution violated his rights under
the Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause. Five
months after the expiration of AEDPA’s time limit, and
eight months after the federal court appointed counsel to
represent him, Felix filed an amended petition in which he
2 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

added a new claim for relief: He asserted that, in the
course of pretrial interrogation, the police used coercive
tactics to obtain damaging statements from him, and that
admission of those statements at trial violated his Fifth
Amendment right against self-incrimination. The ques-
tion presented concerns the timeliness of Felix’s Fifth
Amendment claim.
In ordinary civil proceedings, the governing Rule, Rule 8
of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, requires only “a
short and plain statement of the claim showing that the
pleader is entitled to relief.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 8(a)(2).
Rule 2(c) of the Rules Governing Habeas Corpus Cases
requires a more detailed statement. The habeas rule
instructs the petitioner to “specify all the grounds for relief
available to [him]” and to “state the facts supporting each
ground.”1 By statute, Congress provided that a habeas
petition “may be amended . . . as provided in the rules of
procedure applicable to civil actions.” 28 U. S. C. §2242.
The Civil Rule on amended pleadings, Rule 15 of the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, instructs: “An amend-
ment of a pleading relates back to the date of the original
pleading when . . . the claim . . . asserted in the amended
pleading arose out of the conduct, transaction, or occur-
rence set forth or attempted to be set forth in the original
pleading.” Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 15(c)(2).
The issue before us is one on which federal appellate
courts have divided: Whether, under Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 15(c)(2), Felix’s amended petition, filed after
AEDPA’s one-year limitation and targeting his pretrial
statements, relates back to the date of his original timely
filed petition, which targeted the videotaped witness

——————
1 TheHabeas Corpus Rules were recently amended, effective Decem-
ber 1, 2004. Because the amended Rules are not materially different
from those in effect when Felix filed his habeas petition, this opinion
refers to the current version of the Rules.
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 3

Opinion of the Court

testimony. Felix urges, and the Court of Appeals held,
that the amended petition qualifies for relation back be-
cause both the original petition and the amended pleading
arose from the same trial and conviction. We reverse the
Court of Appeals’ judgment in this regard. An amended
habeas petition, we hold, does not relate back (and thereby
escape AEDPA’s one-year time limit) when it asserts a
new ground for relief supported by facts that differ in both
time and type from those the original pleading set forth.
I
In 1995, after a jury trial in Sacramento, California,
respondent Jacoby Lee Felix was found guilty of murder
and robbery stemming from his participation in a carjack-
ing in which the driver of the car was shot and killed.
App. E to Pet. for Cert. 2–7. He was sentenced to life
imprisonment without the possibility of parole. App. C to
Pet. for Cert. 1–2. The current controversy centers on two
alleged errors at Felix’s trial. Both involve the admission
of out-of-court statements during the prosecutor’s case in
chief, but the two are otherwise unrelated. One prompted
a Fifth Amendment self-incrimination objection originally
raised in the trial court, the other, a Sixth Amendment
Confrontation Clause challenge, also raised in the trial
proceedings.
Felix’s Fifth Amendment claim rested on the prosecu-
tion’s introduction of statements Felix made during pre-
trial police interrogation. These statements were adduced
at trial on direct examination of the investigating officer.
Felix urged that the police used coercive tactics to elicit
the statements. Id., at 8–9. His Sixth Amendment claim
related to the admission of the videotaped statements
prosecution witness Kenneth Williams made at a jailhouse
interview. The videotape records Williams, a friend of
Felix, telling the police that he had overheard a conversa-
tion in which Felix described the planned robbery just
4 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

before it occurred. When Williams testified at trial that he
did not recall the police interview, the trial court deter-
mined that Williams’ loss of memory was feigned, and that
the videotape was admissible because it contained prior
inconsistent statements. App. E to Pet. for Cert. 10–13.
On direct appeal, Felix urged, inter alia, that the admis-
sion of Williams’ videotaped statements violated Felix’s
constitutional right to confront the witnesses against him.
He did not, however, argue that admission of his own
pretrial statements violated his right to protection against
self-incrimination. The intermediate appellate court
affirmed Felix’s conviction and sentence, id., at 10–13, 17,
and the California Supreme Court denied his petition for
review, App. F to Pet. for Cert. 2. Felix’s conviction be-
came final on August 12, 1997. App. C to Pet. for Cert. 10.
Under AEDPA’s one-year statute of limitations, Felix
had until August 12, 1998 to file a petition for a writ of
habeas corpus in federal district court. See §2244(d)(1)(A).
Within the one-year period, on May 8, 1998, he filed a pro
se petition for federal habeas relief. Felix’s federal petition
repeated his Sixth Amendment objection to the admission
of the Williams videotape, but he again failed to reassert
the objection he made in the trial court to the admission of
his own pretrial statements. App. G to Pet. for Cert. 1–7.
On May 29, 1998, a Magistrate Judge appointed counsel to
represent Felix. App. C to Pet. for Cert. 6; App. H to Pet.
for Cert. 2. Thereafter, on September 15, 1998, the Magis-
trate Judge ordered Felix to file an amended petition
within 30 days. Id., at 3. On Felix’s unopposed requests,
that period was successively extended. Id., at 4–5. Pend-
ing the filing of an amended petition, the State was not
required to interpose an answer.
On January 28, 1999, over five months after the August
12, 1998 expiration of AEDPA’s time limit, and eight
months after the appointment of counsel to represent him,
Felix filed an amended petition. Id., at 5. In this plead-
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 5

Opinion of the Court

ing, he reasserted his Confrontation Clause claim, and
also asserted, for the first time post-trial, that his own
pretrial statements to the police were coerced and there-
fore inadmissible at trial. App. I to Pet. for Cert. 4. Fur-
ther, he alleged that his counsel on appeal to the Califor-
nia intermediate appellate court was ineffective in failing
to raise the coerced confession claim on direct appeal. Id.,
at 18–19.2 In its answer to the amended petition, the
State asserted that the Fifth Amendment claim was time
barred because it was initially raised after the expiration
of AEDPA’s one-year limitation period. Felix argued in
response that the new claim related back to the date of his
original petition. Because both Fifth Amendment and
Confrontation Clause claims challenged the constitutional-
ity of the same criminal conviction, Felix urged, the Fifth
Amendment claim arose out of the “conduct, transaction,
or occurrence set forth . . . in the original pleading,” Fed.
Rule Civ. Proc. 15(c)(2). App. C to Pet. for Cert. 16.
The Magistrate Judge recommended dismissal of Felix’s
Fifth Amendment coerced statements claim. Relation
back was not in order, the Magistrate said, because Felix’s
“allegedly involuntary statements to police d[id] not arise
out of the same conduct, transaction or occurrence as the
videotaped interrogation of [prosecution witness] Kenneth
Williams.” Id., at 16. It did not suffice, the Magistrate
——————
2 Because Felix had not presented his coerced statements Fifth

Amendment claim on appeal to the California courts, the State moved
to dismiss the amended petition on the ground that it contained both
exhausted and unexhausted claims. See 28 U. S. C. §2254(b)(1)(A);
Brief for Respondent 6–7. Before the Magistrate Judge acted on the
motion, Felix presented the coerced statements/ineffective assistance
claim to the California Supreme Court in a habeas petition. Opposition
to Respondents’ Motion to Dismiss in No. Civ. S–98–0828 WBS GGH P
(ED Cal.), p. 3. After that court denied the petition without comment,
the State withdrew its motion to dismiss. See Request to Vacate
Hearing on Motion to Dismiss in No. Civ. S–98–0828 WBS GGH P (ED
Cal.), pp. 1–2.
6 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

observed, that Felix’s Fifth and Sixth Amendment claims
attack the same criminal conviction. Ibid. Adopting the
Magistrate Judge’s report and recommendation in full, the
District Court dismissed the Fifth Amendment claim as
time barred, and rejected the Confrontation Clause claim
on its merits. App. B to Pet. for Cert. 1–3.
A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit affirmed the District Court’s dismissal of Felix’s
Confrontation Clause claim, but reversed the dismissal of
his coerced statements claim and remanded that claim for
further proceedings. 379 F. 3d 612 (2004). In the major-
ity’s view, the relevant “transaction” for purposes of Rule
15(c)(2) was Felix’s “trial and conviction in state court.”
Id., at 615. Defining the transaction at any greater level
of specificity, the majority reasoned, would “unduly
strai[n] the usual meaning of ‘conduct, transaction, or
occurrence’ ” by dividing the “trial and conviction [into] a
series of perhaps hundreds of individual occurrences.”
Ibid. Judge Tallman concurred in part and dissented in
part. In his view, defining “conduct, transaction, or occur-
rence” under Rule 15(c)(2) “so broadly that any claim
stemming from pre-trial motions, the trial, or sentencing
relates back to a timely-filed habeas petition” would
“obliterat[e] AEDPA’s one year statute of limitation.” Id.,
at 618. “While an amendment offered to clarify or amplify
the facts already alleged in support of a timely claim may
relate back,” he reasoned, “an amendment that introduces
a new legal theory based on facts different from those
underlying the timely claim may not.” Id., at 621.
We granted certiorari, 543 U. S. ___ (2005), to resolve
the conflict among Courts of Appeals on relation back of
habeas petition amendments. Compare 379 F. 3d, at 614
(if original petition is timely filed, amendments referring
to the same trial and conviction may relate back); Ellzey v.
United States, 324 F. 3d 521, 525–527 (CA7 2003) (same),
with United States v. Hicks, 283 F. 3d 380, 388–389
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 7

Opinion of the Court

(CADC 2002) (relevant transaction must be defined more
narrowly than the trial and conviction); United States v.
Espinoza-Saenz, 235 F. 3d 501, 503–505 (CA10 2000)
(same); Davenport v. United States, 217 F. 3d 1341, 1344–
1346 (CA11 2000) (same); United States v. Pittman, 209
F. 3d 314, 317–318 (CA4 2000) (same); United States v.
Duffus, 174 F. 3d 333, 337 (CA3 1999) (same); United
States v. Craycraft, 167 F. 3d 451, 457 (CA8 1999) (same).
We now reverse the Ninth Circuit’s judgment to the extent
that it allowed relation back of Felix’s Fifth Amendment
claim.
II
A
In enacting AEDPA in 1996, Congress imposed for the
first time a fixed time limit for collateral attacks in federal
court on a judgment of conviction. Section 2244(d)(1)
provides: “A 1-year period of limitation shall apply to an
application for a writ of habeas corpus by a person in
custody pursuant to the judgment of a State court.” See
also §2255, ¶6 (providing one-year limitation period in
which to file a motion to vacate a federal conviction).3
A discrete set of Rules governs federal habeas proceed-
ings launched by state prisoners. See Rules Governing
Section 2254 Cases in the United States District Courts.4
The last of those Rules, Habeas Corpus Rule 11, permits
application of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in
habeas cases “to the extent that [the civil rules] are not
inconsistent with any statutory provisions or [the habeas]
rules.” See also Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 81(a)(2) (The civil
rules “are applicable to proceedings for . . . habeas cor-
pus.”). Rule 11, the Advisory Committee’s Notes caution,
——————
3 Section 2255 establishes a separate avenue for postconviction chal-
lenges to federal, as opposed to state, convictions.
4 Habeas corpus proceedings are characterized as civil in nature. See,

e.g., Fisher v. Baker, 203 U. S. 174, 181 (1906).
8 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

“permits application of the civil rules only when it would
be appropriate to do so,” and would not be “inconsistent or
inequitable in the overall framework of habeas corpus.”
Advisory Committee’s Note on Habeas Corpus Rule 11, 28
U. S. C., p. 480. In addition to the general prescriptions
on application of the civil rules in federal habeas cases,
§2242 specifically provides that habeas applications “may
be amended . . . as provided in the rules of procedure
applicable to civil actions.”
The Civil Rule governing pleading amendments, Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 15, made applicable to habeas
proceedings by §2242, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure
81(a)(2), and Habeas Corpus Rule 11, allows pleading
amendments with “leave of court” any time during a pro-
ceeding. See Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 15(a). Before a respon-
sive pleading is served, pleadings may be amended once as
a “matter of course,” i.e., without seeking court leave.
Ibid. Amendments made after the statute of limitations
has run relate back to the date of the original pleading if
the original and amended pleadings “ar[i]se out of the
conduct, transaction, or occurrence.” Rule 15(c)(2).
The “original pleading” to which Rule 15 refers is the
complaint in an ordinary civil case, and the petition in a
habeas proceeding. Under Rule 8(a), applicable to ordi-
nary civil proceedings, a complaint need only provide “fair
notice of what the plaintiff’s claim is and the grounds upon
which it rests.” Conley v. Gibson, 355 U. S. 41, 47 (1957).
Habeas Corpus Rule 2(c) is more demanding. It provides
that the petition must “specify all the grounds for relief
available to the petitioner” and “state the facts supporting
each ground.” See also Advisory Committee’s Note on
subd. (c) of Habeas Corpus Rule 2, 28 U. S. C., p. 469 (“In
the past, petitions have frequently contained mere conclu-
sions of law, unsupported by any facts. [But] it is the
relationship of the facts to the claim asserted that is im-
portant . . . .”); Advisory Committee’s Note on Habeas
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Opinion of the Court

Corpus Rule 4, 28 U. S. C., p. 471 (“ ‘[N]otice’ pleading is
not sufficient, for the petition is expected to state facts
that point to a real possibility of constitutional error.”
(internal quotation marks omitted)). Accordingly, the
model form available to aid prisoners in filing their habeas
petitions instructs in boldface:
“CAUTION: You must include in this petition all
the grounds for relief from the conviction or
sentence that you challenge. And you must
state the facts that support each ground. If you
fail to set forth all the grounds in this petition,
you may be barred from presenting additional
grounds at a later date.” Petition for Relief From a
Conviction or Sentence By a Person in State Custody,
Habeas Corpus Rules, Forms App. (emphasis in
original).
A prime purpose of Rule 2(c)’s demand that habeas
petitioners plead with particularity is to assist the district
court in determining whether the State should be ordered
to “show cause why the writ should not be granted.”
§2243. Under Habeas Corpus Rule 4, if “it plainly appears
from the petition . . . that the petitioner is not entitled to
relief in district court,” the court must summarily dismiss
the petition without ordering a responsive pleading. If the
court orders the State to file an answer, that pleading
must “address the allegations in the petition.” Rule 5.
B
This case turns on the meaning of Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 15(c)(2)’s relation-back provision in the context
of federal habeas proceedings and AEDPA’s one-year
statute of limitations. Rule 15(c)(2), as earlier stated,
provides that pleading amendments relate back to the
date of the original pleading when the claim asserted in
the amended plea “arose out of the conduct, transaction, or
10 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

occurrence set forth or attempted to be set forth in the
original pleading.” The key words are “conduct, transac-
tion, or occurrence.” The Ninth Circuit, whose judgment
we here review, in accord with the Seventh Circuit, de-
fines those words to allow relation back of a claim first
asserted in an amended petition, so long as the new claim
stems from the habeas petitioner’s trial, conviction, or
sentence. Under that comprehensive definition, virtually
any new claim introduced in an amended petition will
relate back, for federal habeas claims, by their very na-
ture, challenge the constitutionality of a conviction or
sentence, and commonly attack proceedings anterior
thereto. See Espinoza-Saenz, 235 F. 3d, at 505 (A “major-
ity of amendments” to habeas petitions raise issues falling
under the “broad umbrella” of “a defendant’s trial and
sentencing.”); Hicks, 283 F. 3d, at 388.
The majority of Circuits, mindful of “Congress’ decision
to expedite collateral attacks by placing stringent time
restrictions on [them],” id., at 388, define “conduct, trans-
action, or occurrence” in federal habeas cases less broadly.
See id., at 388–389; Espinoza-Saenz, 235 F. 3d, at 503–
505; Davenport, 217 F. 3d, at 1344–1346; Pittman, 209
F. 3d, at 317–318; Duffus, 174 F. 3d, at 337; Craycraft, 167
F. 3d, at 457. They allow relation back only when the
claims added by amendment arise from the same core
facts as the timely filed claims, and not when the new
claims depend upon events separate in “both time and
type” from the originally raised episodes. Craycraft, 167
F. 3d, at 457. Because Felix’s own pretrial statements,
newly raised in his amended petition, were separated in
time and type from witness Williams’ videotaped state-
ments, raised in Felix’s original petition, the former would
not relate back under the definition of “conduct, transac-
tion, or occurrence” to which most Circuits adhere.
We are not aware, in the run-of-the-mine civil proceed-
ings Rule 15 governs, of any reading of “conduct, transac-
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Opinion of the Court

tion, or occurrence” as capacious as the construction the
Ninth and Seventh Circuits have adopted for habeas
cases. Compare Maegdlin v. International Assn. of Ma-
chinists and Aerospace Workers, 309 F. 3d 1051, 1052
(CA8 2002) (allowing relation back where original com-
plaint alleged that defendant union had breached its duty
of fair representation by inadequately representing plain-
tiff because of his gender, and amended complaint as-
serted a Title VII gender discrimination claim based on
the same differential treatment); Clipper Exxpress v.
Rocky Mountain Motor Tariff Bureau, Inc., 690 F. 2d 1240,
1246, 1259, n. 29 (CA9 1982) (claim asserting that defen-
dant included fraudulent information in rate protests filed
with the Interstate Commerce Commission related back to
original complaint, which asserted that defendant filed the
same rate protests “for the purpose of . . . restricting . . .
competition” (internal quotation marks omitted))5;
Santana v. Holiday Inns, Inc., 686 F. 2d 736, 738 (CA9
1982) (original complaint alleging slander and amendment
alleging interference with employment relations arose out
of the same conduct or occurrence because both were
based on defendant’s making allegedly untruthful state-
ments about plaintiff’s behavior to plaintiff’s employer);
Rural Fire Protection Co. v. Hepp, 366 F. 2d 355, 361–362
——————
5 The dissent asserts that Clipper Exxpress is comparable to this case

in according Rule 15(c)(2) a “ ‘capacious’ ” reading. Post, at 4, n. 2.
Clipper Exxpress involved a series of allegedly sham protests, com-
monly designed to restrain trade, a charge of the pattern or practice
type. The amendment in question added a fraud charge, a new legal
theory tied to the same operative facts as those initially alleged.
Clipper Exxpress, 690 F. 2d, at 1259, n. 29. That unremarkable appli-
cation of the relation-back rule bears little resemblance to the argu-
ment made by Felix and embraced by the dissent—that all manner of
factually and temporally unrelated conduct may be raised after the
statute of limitations has run and relate back, so long as the new and
originally pleaded claims challenge the same conviction. See infra, at
12–15.
12 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

(CA9 1966) (in a Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 suit
alleging minimum wage violations for certain pay periods,
amendment asserting the same type of violation during an
additional pay period related back), with Nettis v. Levitt,
241 F. 3d 186, 193 (CA2 2001) (disallowing relation back
where Nettis’ original complaint alleged that his employer
retaliated in response to Nettis’ objections to employer’s
sales tax collection procedure, and amendment alleged
retaliation for Nettis’ report of payroll and inventory
irregularities); In re Coastal Plains, Inc., 179 F. 3d 197,
216 (CA5 1999) (Coastal Plains’s claim that creditor inter-
fered with business relations by attempting to sell Coastal
Plains to a third party did not relate back to claim based
on creditor’s failure to return inventory to Coastal Plains,
even though both claims were linked to creditor’s alleged
“broader plan to destroy Coastal [Plains]”); Sierra Club v.
Penfold, 857 F. 2d 1307, 1315–1316 (CA9 1988) (where
original complaint challenged the manner in which an
agency applied a regulation, an amendment challenging
the agency’s “conduct in adopting the regulatio[n]” did not
relate back). See also Jackson v. Suffolk County Homicide
Bureau, 135 F. 3d 254, 256 (CA2 1998) (although all of
plaintiff’s 42 U. S. C. §1983 claims arose out of a single
state-court criminal proceeding, plaintiff’s First Amend-
ment claims did not arise out of the same conduct as the
originally asserted excessive force claims, and therefore
did not relate back). As these decisions illustrate, Rule
15(c)(2) relaxes, but does not obliterate, the statute of
limitations; hence relation back depends on the existence
of a common “core of operative facts” uniting the original
and newly asserted claims. See Clipper Exxpress, 690
F. 2d, at 1259, n. 29; 6A C. Wright, A. Miller, & M. Kane,
Federal Practice and Procedure §1497, p. 85 (2d ed. 1990).
Felix asserts that he seeks, and the Ninth Circuit ac-
corded, no wider range for Rule 15(c)’s relation back provi-
sion than this Court gave to the Rule’s key words “con-
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 13

Opinion of the Court

duct, transaction, or occurrence” in Tiller v. Atlantic Coast
Line R. Co., 323 U. S. 574, 580–581 (1945). We disagree.
In Tiller, a railroad worker was struck and killed by a
railroad car. His widow sued under the Federal Employ-
ers Liability Act, 45 U. S. C. §51 et seq., to recover for his
wrongful death. She initially alleged various negligent
acts. In an amended complaint, she added a claim under
the Federal Boiler Inspection Act for failure to provide the
train’s locomotive with a rear light. We held that the
amendment related back, and therefore avoided a statute
of limitations bar, even though the amendment invoked a
legal theory not suggested by the original complaint and
relied on facts not originally asserted.
There was but one episode-in-suit in Tiller, a worker’s
death attributed from the start to the railroad’s failure to
provide its employee with a reasonably safe place to work.
The federal rulemakers recognized that personal injury
plaintiffs often cannot pinpoint the precise cause of an
injury prior to discovery. See 5 C. Wright & A. Miller,
Federal Practice and Procedure §1215, pp. 138–143 (2d ed.
1990). They therefore included in the Appendix to the
Federal Rules an illustrative form indicating that a per-
sonal injury plaintiff could adequately state a claim for
relief simply by alleging that the defendant negligently
operated a certain instrumentality at a particular time
and place. See Form 9, Complaint for Negligence, Forms
App., Fed. Rule Civ. Proc., 28 U. S. C. App., p. 829. The
widow in Tiller met that measure. She based her com-
plaint on a single “occurrence,” an accident resulting in
her husband’s death. In contrast, Felix targeted separate
episodes, the pretrial police interrogation of witness Wil-
liams in his original petition, his own interrogation at a
different time and place in his amended petition.
Felix contends, however, that his amended petition
qualifies for relation back because the trial itself is the
“transaction” or “occurrence” that counts. See Brief for
14 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

Respondent 21–23. Citing Chavez v. Martinez, 538 U. S.
760 (2003) (plurality opinion), Felix urges that neither the
videotaped interview with witness Williams nor the pre-
trial police interrogation to which Felix himself was ex-
posed transgressed any constitutional limitation. Until
the statements elicited by the police were introduced at
trial, Felix argues, he had no actionable claim at all. Both
the confrontation right he timely presented and the privi-
lege against self-incrimination he asserted in his amended
petition are “trial right[s],” Felix underscores. Brief for
Respondent 21 (emphasis deleted). His claims based on
those rights, he maintains, are not “separate,” id., at 22;
rather, they are related in time and type, for “they arose
on successive days during the trial and both challenged
[on constitutional grounds] admission of pretrial state-
ments,” id., at 22–23.
Felix artificially truncates his claims by homing in only
on what makes them actionable in a habeas proceeding.
We do not here question his assertion that his Fifth
Amendment right did not ripen until his statements were
admitted against him at trial. See Chavez, 538 U. S., at
766–767. Even so, the essential predicate for his self-
incrimination claim was an extrajudicial event, i.e., an
out-of-court police interrogation. The dispositive question
in an adjudication of that claim would be the character of
Felix’s conduct, not in court, but at the police interroga-
tion, specifically, did he answer voluntarily or were his
statements coerced. See Haynes v. Washington, 373 U. S.
503, 513–514 (1963) (voluntariness is evaluated by examin-
ing the “totality of circumstances” surrounding the “making
and signing of the challenged confession”).
Habeas Corpus Rule 2(c), we earlier noted, see supra, at
8–9, instructs petitioners to “specify all [available]
grounds for relief” and to “state the facts supporting each
ground.” Under that Rule, Felix’s Confrontation Clause
claim would be pleaded discretely, as would his self-
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 15

Opinion of the Court

incrimination claim. Each separate congeries of facts
supporting the grounds for relief, the Rule suggests, would
delineate an “occurrence.” Felix’s approach, the approach
that prevailed in the Ninth Circuit, is boundless by com-
parison. A miscellany of claims for relief could be raised
later rather than sooner and relate back, for “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence” would be defined to encompass
any pretrial, trial, or post-trial error that could provide a
basis for challenging the conviction. An approach of that
breadth, as the Fourth Circuit observed, “views ‘occur-
rence’ at too high a level of generality.” Pittman, 209
F. 3d, at 318.6
Congress enacted AEDPA to advance the finality of
criminal convictions. See Rhines v. Weber, 544 U. S. ___,
___ (2005) (slip op., at 6). To that end, it adopted a tight
time line, a one-year limitation period ordinarily running
from “the date on which the judgment became final by the
conclusion of direct review or the expiration of the time for
seeking such review,” 28 U. S. C. §2244(d)(1)(A). If claims
asserted after the one-year period could be revived simply
——————
6 The dissent builds a complex discussion on an apparent assumption
that claim preclusion operates in habeas cases largely as it does in
mine-run civil cases. See post, at 9–11. Ironically, few habeas petitions
would survive swift dismissal were that so, for the very objective of the
petition is to undo a final judgment after direct appeals have been
exhausted or are time barred. On judicial and legislative development
of standards governing successive habeas petitions, standards that do
not track the Restatement of Judgments, see Schlup v. Delo, 513 U. S.
298, 317–320 (1995); 2 R. Hertz & J. Liebman, Federal Habeas Corpus
Practice and Procedure §28.2b, pp. 1270–1275 (4th ed. 2001); Note,
Developments in the Law—Federal Habeas Corpus, 83 Harv. L. Rev.
1038, 1113, 1148–1154 (1970). The dissent would read Rule 15(c)(2)’s
words, “conduct, transaction, or occurrence,” into AEDPA’s provisions
governing second or successive petitions and motions (28 U. S. C.
§§2244(b) and 2255, ¶8), although Congress did not put those words
there. Nor is there any other reason to believe that Congress designed
AEDPA’s confinement of successive petitions and motions with a view
to the relation back concept employed in Rule 15(c)(2).
16 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

because they relate to the same trial, conviction, or sen-
tence as a timely filed claim, AEDPA’s limitation period
would have slim significance. See 379 F. 3d, at 619
(Tallman, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part)
(Ninth Circuit’s rule would permit “the ‘relation back’
doctrine to swallow AEDPA’s statute of limitation”);
Pittman, 209 F. 3d, at 318 (“If we were to craft such a rule,
it would mean that amendments . . . would almost in-
variably be allowed even after the statute of limitations
had expired, because most [habeas] claims arise from a
criminal defendant’s underlying conviction and sen-
tence.”); Duffus, 174 F. 3d, at 338 (“A prisoner should not
be able to assert a claim otherwise barred by the statute of
limitations merely because he asserted a separate claim
within the limitations period.”). The very purpose of Rule
15(c)(2), as the dissent notes, is to “qualify a statute of
limitations.” Post, at 2. But “qualify” does not mean
repeal. See Fuller v. Marx, 724 F. 2d 717, 720 (CA8 1984).
Given AEDPA’s “finality” and “federalism” concerns, see
Williams v. Taylor, 529 U. S. 420, 436 (2000); Hicks, 283
F. 3d, at 389, it would be anomalous to allow relation back
under Rule 15(c)(2) based on a broader reading of the
words “conduct, transaction, or occurrence” in federal
habeas proceedings than in ordinary civil litigation, see
supra, at 10–12.
Felix urges that an unconstrained reading of Rule
15(c)(2) is not problematic because Rule 15(a) arms district
courts with “ample power” to deny leave to amend when
justice so requires. See Brief for Respondent 31–33.
Under that Rule, once a responsive pleading has been
filed, a prisoner may amend the petition “only by leave of
court or by written consent of the adverse party.” Rule
15(a); see Ellzey v. United States, 324 F. 3d 521, 526 (CA7
2003) (AEDPA’s aim to “expedite resolution of collateral
attacks . . . should influence the exercise of discretion
under Rule 15(a)—which gives the district judge the right
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 17

Opinion of the Court

to disapprove proposed amendments that would unduly
prolong or complicate the case.”). This argument over-
looks a pleader’s right to amend without leave of court
“any time before a responsive pleading is served.” Rule
15(a). In federal habeas cases that time can be rather
long, as indeed it was in the instant case. See supra, at 4.
Under Habeas Corpus Rule 4, a petition is not immedi-
ately served on the respondent. The judge first examines
the pleading to determine whether “it plainly appears . . .
that the petitioner is not entitled to relief.” Only if the
petition survives that preliminary inspection will the
judge “order the respondent to file an answer.” In the
interim, the petitioner may amend his pleading “as a
matter of course,” as Felix did in this very case. Rule
15(a). Accordingly, we do not regard Rule 15(a) as a firm
check against petition amendments that present new
claims dependent upon discrete facts after AEDPA’s limi-
tation period has run.
Our rejection of Felix’s translation of same “conduct,
transaction, or occurrence” to mean same “trial, convic-
tion, or sentence” scarcely leaves Rule 15(c)(2) “meaning-
less in the habeas context,” 379 F. 3d, at 615. So long as
the original and amended petitions state claims that are
tied to a common core of operative facts, relation back will
be in order.7 Our reading is consistent with the general
——————
7 For example, in Mandacina v. United States, 328 F. 3d 995, 1000–1001

(CA8 2003), the original petition alleged violations of Brady v. Maryland,
373 U. S. 83 (1963), while the amended petition alleged the Government’s
failure to disclose a particular report. Both pleadings related to evidence
obtained at the same time by the same police department. The Court of
Appeals approved relation back. And in Woodward v. Williams, 263 F. 3d
1135, 1142 (CA10 2001), the appeals court upheld relation back where the
original petition challenged the trial court’s admission of recanted state-
ments, while the amended petition challenged the court’s refusal to allow
the defendant to show that the statements had been recanted. See also 3
J. Moore, et al., Moore’s Federal Practice §15.19[2], p. 15–82 (3d ed. 2004)
(relation back ordinarily allowed “when the new claim is based on the
18 MAYLE v. FELIX

Opinion of the Court

application of Rule 15(c)(2) in civil cases, see supra, at 10–
12, with Habeas Corpus Rule 2(c), see supra, at 8–9, and
with AEDPA’s installation of a tight time line for §2254
petitions, see supra, at 15–16.8
* * *
As to the question presented, for the reasons stated, the
judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is
reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings
consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.

——————
same facts as the original pleading and only changes the legal theory”).
8 The dissent is concerned that our decision “creates an unfair dispar-

ity between indigent habeas petitioners and those able to afford their
own counsel.” Post, at 1; see post, at 11 (“[T]oday’s decision . . . will fall
most heavily on the shoulders of indigent habeas petitioners who can
afford no counsel without the assistance of the court.”). The concern is
understandable, although we note that in Felix’s case, counsel was
appointed, and had some two and a half months to amend the petition
before AEDPA’s limitation period expired. See supra, at 4. That was
ample time to add a claim based on the alleged pretrial extraction of
damaging statements from Felix. Ordinarily, as we observed in Halbert
v. Michigan, ante, at 17, n. 8, the government (federal or state) “ ‘need not
equalize economic conditions’ between criminal defendants of lesser and
greater wealth.” (quoting Griffin v. Illinois, 351 U. S. 12, 23 (1956)
(Frankfurter, J., concurring in judgment); see Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481
U. S. 551, 557 (1987) (holding that States need not provide appointed
counsel in postconviction proceedings). This case, it is inescapably true,
does not fit within the confined circumstances in which our decisions
require appointment of counsel for an indigent litigant at a critical stage
to ensure his meaningful access to justice. See Halbert, ante, at 2–4, 17,
n. 8.
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 1

SOUTER, J., dissenting

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
_________________

No. 04–563
_________________

DENEICE A. MAYLE, WARDEN, PETITIONER v.
JACOBY LEE FELIX
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
[June 23, 2005]

JUSTICE SOUTER, with whom JUSTICE STEVENS joins,
dissenting.
This case requires the Court to decide how the relation
back provision of Rule 15(c)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure ought to apply in federal habeas corpus cases,
when neither text nor precedent provides clear guidance.
I see nothing in habeas law or practice that calls for the
Court’s narrow construction of the rule, and good reasons
to go the other way, including the unfortunate conse-
quence that the Court’s view creates an unfair disparity
between indigent habeas petitioners and those able to
afford their own counsel. I respectfully dissent.
I
At the outset, there is need for care in understanding
the narrow scope of the problem this case presents. A
habeas petitioner’s opportunity to amend as a matter of
course, without permission of the trial court, exists only
before the responsive pleading is served, and even then
only once. Rule 15(a). After one amendment, or after the
government files the answer or other response, assuming
one is even required, see Habeas Corpus Rule 4, the pris-
oner may not amend without the court’s leave or the gov-
ernment’s consent, Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 15(a). While leave
to amend “shall be freely given when justice so requires,”
2 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

ibid., justice does, after all, have to require it, and the
District Courts will presumably say no, for example, in the
face of unjustifiable delay or threatened prejudice to the
State. See Foman v. Davis, 371 U. S. 178, 182 (1962); see
also Brief for Professor Arthur R. Miller et al. as Amici
Curiae 20–21 (describing reasons courts regularly deny
leave to amend and citing cases); 6 C. Wright, A. Miller, &
M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure §§1487–1488 (2d
ed. 1990) (hereinafter Wright & Miller) (discussing reasons
leave to amend may be and often is denied, including delay
and prejudice). The Court’s concern for “unconstrained”
recourse to petition amendments, ante, at 16, is thus
misplaced.
The limited opportunity to amend also supplies perspec-
tive on the claim that Felix’s reading of the relation back
rule would undermine the 1-year limitation period of the
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996
(AEDPA) and the statute’s concomitant concern for final-
ity of judgments. See ante, at 15–16. In fact, AEDPA’s
objectives bear little weight in the analysis, because the
very point of every relation back rule is to qualify a statute
of limitations, and Rule 15(c) “is based on the notion that
once litigation involving particular conduct or a given
transaction or occurrence has been instituted, the parties
are not entitled to the protection of the statute of limita-
tions against the later assertion by amendment of de-
fenses or claims that arise out of the same conduct, trans-
action, or occurrence as set forth in the original pleading.”
6A Wright & Miller §1496, at 64. That AEDPA’s statute
of limitations, like any other, may be trumped by relating
back when the subject of the amendment arises out of the
same conduct, transaction, or occurrence described in the
original pleading, does not alone help us to figure out what
conduct, transaction, or occurrence is the same.
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005)
3

SOUTER, J., dissenting

II

Felix’s disputed right to amend with relation back effect
turns entirely, as the Court says, ante, at 9, on how nar-
rowly or how broadly the tripartite authorization for rela-
tion back ought to be construed: whether the relevant
“conduct, transaction, or occurrence”1 to which a habeas
petition refers includes the underlying trial (which re-
sulted in the custody being challenged) or is limited to the
set of facts underlying each trial ruling claimed to be
constitutionally defective (in this case, the unconfronted
videotaped testimony and the interrogation that produced
the incriminating statement). If the former, a habeas
petitioner will have the benefit of relation back for any
amendment raising trial error, subject to the district
judge’s discretion to deny leave except for the one amend-
ment of right; if the latter, a petitioner is effectively pre-
cluded from making any amendment unless a single trial
ruling amounts to distinct errors or an underlying fact is
the subject of distinct rulings, notwithstanding Congress’s
evident intent to provide relation back in habeas proceed-
ings, see 28 U. S. C. §2242; Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 81(a)(2);
Habeas Corpus Rule 11.
The text alone does not tell us the answer, for either the
facts specific to the claim or the trial as a whole could be
the relevant “conduct, transaction, or occurrence.” The
Court assumes that the former approach is correct and
then proceeds to explain, based on that assumption, the
infirmity of a contrary approach. For example, the Court
asserts that under Felix’s rule, “all manner of factually
and temporally unrelated conduct may be raised after the
statute of limitations has run . . . .” Ante, at 11, n. 6. But
in saying this the Court presumes that the relevant trans-
——————
1 There is a tendency toward the gestalt in reading the phrase, but

the three items are distinct, and a party claiming the benefit of the rule
need satisfy only one.
4 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

action is what occurred outside the courtroom. Felix’s
entire argument is that the proper transaction is instead
what occurred in court, namely the imposition of the con-
viction that justifies the challenged custody. If he is right,
then the Court’s assertion is incorrect, for what Felix
seeks to add is a claim not about “factually and temporally
unrelated conduct,” ibid., but about conduct that occurred
at the same trial as the conduct addressed in the initial
petition. That newly addressed conduct will hardly be
“temporally unrelated” to what was previously targeted; it
likely will have occurred on the same day of trial as the
original conduct or within a few days. Nor will it be “fac-
tually . . . unrelated” to the previously raised in-court
conduct, for it will almost certainly involve the same
judge, the same parties and attorneys, the same court-
room, and the same jurors. Again, my point is just that
much of the Court’s argument lacks force because it as-
sumes that the proper transaction is what occurred out-
side the courtroom rather than inside, when that is the
question we must answer.
The Court also cautions that “it would be anomalous to
allow relation back under Rule 15(c)(2) based on a broader
reading of the words ‘conduct, transaction, or occurrence’
in federal habeas proceedings than in ordinary civil litiga-
tion.” Ante, at 16. The cases the Court cites to establish
the scope of civil relation back, however, see ante, at 10–
13, simply stand for the proposition that an amendment
relates back only if it deals with the same conduct, trans-
action, or occurrence. Felix does not purport to claim
anything more.2
——————
2 In any event, it is not clear why it is more “capacious,” ante, at 11, to

regard a single trial lasting days or weeks as one transaction or occur-
rence than it is, for example, to view numerous separate protests filed
with the Interstate Commerce Commission over a period of two years
(each in response to a different proposed tariff amendment) as one
transaction or occurrence, see Clipper Exxpress v. Rocky Mountain
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 5

SOUTER, J., dissenting

At first glance, an argument for the narrow reading
urged by petitioner Mayle inheres in the distinctive plead-
ing requirement for habeas petitions. Unlike the generous
notice-pleading standard for the benefit of ordinary civil
plaintiffs under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a), see
Conley v. Gibson, 355 U. S. 41, 47 (1957), Habeas Corpus
Rule 2(c) requires habeas petitioners to “specify all the
grounds for relief available,” and to “state the facts support-
ing each ground.” The Court implies that because pleading
must be factually specific, the “conduct, transaction, or
occurrence” of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c) must be
specifically factual to a parallel degree; as the Court puts it,
a habeas petitioner will plead claims “discretely,” ante, at
14, such that each ground for relief “would delineate an
‘occurrence,’ ” ante, at 15. But this does not follow; all that
follows from “discret[e]” pleading is that each claim would
delineate a separate ground for relief, whatever may be the
conduct, transaction, or occurrence out of which the claims
arise. As Tiller v. Atlantic Coast Line R. Co., 323 U. S. 574
(1945), and the other civil cases the Court cites demon-
strate, see ante, at 11–13, relation back is regularly allowed
when an amendment raises a separate claim for relief aris-
ing out of the same transaction or occurrence, no matter
how discretely that claim might be stated. Indeed, this is
——————
Motor Tariff Bureau, Inc., 690 F. 2d 1240, 1260, n. 29 (CA9 1982) (“The
protests involve a single transaction or occurrence” (emphasis deleted)),
cited ante, at 11.
The Court responds that in Clipper Exxpress the amendment was
“tied to the same operative facts as those initially alleged. ” Ante, at 11,
n. 5. But as just noted, those “operative facts” (i.e., the relevant trans-
action) consisted of a number of separate protests filed with the Inter-
state Commerce Commission over a period of two years, each in re-
sponse to a different proposed tariff amendment. This is, to say the
least, a rather expansive transaction, much more so in my view than a
single trial involving (for all claims stemming from it) the same judge,
the same parties, the same attorneys, the same jury, the same indict-
ment, and so on.
6 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

what the text anticipates; Rule 15(c)(2) permits relation
back when “the claim or defense” asserted in the amend-
ment arises out of the same conduct, transaction, or occur-
rence set forth in the original pleading. That is, the same
conduct, transaction, or occurrence can support multiple,
discrete claims for relief.
Nor is there any policy underlying the particular habeas
pleading rule that requires a more grudging relation back
standard. As the Court concedes, ante, at 9, the purpose of
the heightened pleading standard in habeas cases is to
help a district court weed out frivolous petitions before
calling upon the State to answer. See Advisory Commit-
tee’s Note on Habeas Corpus Rule 2, 28 U. S. C., p. 469;
Advisory Committee Note on Rule 4, id., at 471 (“[I]t is the
duty of the court to screen out frivolous applications and
eliminate the burden that would be placed on the respon-
dent by ordering an unnecessary answer”); 1 R. Hertz & J.
Liebman, Federal Habeas Corpus Practice and Procedure
§11.6, p. 573, n. 3 (4th ed. 2001) (hereinafter Hertz &
Liebman) (“[F]act pleading, like other habeas corpus rules
and practices, enables courts . . . to separate substantial
petitions from insubstantial ones quickly and without
need of adversary proceedings”); Note, Developments in
the Law—Federal Habeas Corpus, 83 Harv. L. Rev. 1038,
1175 (1970) (“The justification for stringent pleading
requirements in habeas corpus is thought to lie in the
need to protect the courts from the burden of entertaining
frivolous applications”). Identifying meritless claims has
nothing to do with the effect of amendment to initial peti-
tions for relief, except in the remote sense that an
amendment will require a district judge to examine one
more item. But there is no claim here that Federal Rule of
Civil Procedure 15(c) has to be narrow to protect judges;
the government is objecting because it wants fewer claims
to defend, and that objection is unrelated to the habeas
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 7

SOUTER, J., dissenting

fact-pleading standard.3
While considerations based on habeas pleading fail to
pan out with support for Mayle’s restricted reading of Rule
15(c), several reasons convince me that Felix’s reading is
right. Most obvious is the fact that both of his claims can
easily fit within the same “transaction or occurrence,” un-
derstood as a trial ending in conviction resulting in a single
ultimate injury of unlawful custody. (“Conduct” sounds
closer to underlying facts, perhaps, but Rule 15(c) turns on
either conduct, transaction, or occurrence.) The Court
acknowledges that Felix’s claims regarding his own interro-
gation and the videotaped testimony of witness Kenneth
Williams are potentially actionable here only because the
resulting incriminating statements were introduced at trial,
ante, at 14, but argues that they nevertheless arise out of
separate transactions or occurrences because they rest on
distinct “essential predicate[s],” ibid., meaning pretrial acts.
It is certainly true that the claims depend on those distinct
pretrial acts, but the claims depend equally on the specified
trial errors, without which there would be no habeas claim:
without the introduction of each set of statements at trial,
Felix would have no argument for habeas relief, regardless
of what happened outside of court.4 The Court’s own opin-
——————
3 Neither does the warning on the model habeas petition (that failure
to set forth every ground for relief may preclude the presentation of
additional grounds later) tell us anything about relation back. The
Court implies that it does, ante, at 9, but the language on the form says
nothing about relation back, and if the Court’s implication were correct
then the warning would also bar amendments filed within the limita-
tions period.
4 By contrast, use at trial of the fruits of the alleged police misconduct

would not be a prerequisite to success in an action under Rev. Stat.
§1979, 42 U. S. C. §1983, because such an action would indeed be
challenging the conduct itself rather than the custody obtained by use
at trial of the fruits of that conduct. Cf. ante, at 12 (citing Jackson v.
Suffolk County Homicide Bureau, 135 F. 3d 254 (CA2 1998), where the
Court of Appeals, in a §1983 case, concluded that two different in-
8 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

ion demonstrates this, as its descriptions of Felix’s two
claims refer not only to what happened outside court but
also to what happened at trial, and they specifically ground
the alleged constitutional violations on the latter. See ante,
at 1 (“He initially alleged . . . that the admission into
evidence of videotaped testimony of a witness for the
prosecution violated his rights under the Sixth Amend-
ment’s Confrontation Clause”); ante, at 2 (“He asserted
that, in the course of pretrial interrogation, the police used
coercive tactics to obtain damaging statements from him,
and that admission of those statements at trial violated
his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination”).5
Moreover, habeas review will of course look at more of the
underlying trial record than just the ruling admitting the
disputed evidence, for Felix’s claims like a great many
others will call for examining the trial record as a whole for
signs of requisite prejudice or reversible error.6 Here, for
——————
stances of postarrest police conduct were not part of a single transac-
tion or occurrence). The Court’s analysis thus lies in some tension with
our understanding that the signal, defining feature setting habeas
cases apart from other tort claims against the State is that they “neces-
sarily demonstrat[e] the invalidity of the conviction,” Heck v. Humphrey,
512 U. S. 477, 481–482 (1994); see generally Wilkinson v. Dotson, 544
U. S. ___, ___ (2005) (slip op., at 3–7).
5 There are other examples of the Court’s describing Felix’s claims

with reference to the trial. See ante, at 3 (“Felix’s Fifth Amendment
claim rested on the prosecution’s introduction of statements Felix made
during pretrial police interrogation. . . . His Sixth Amendment claim
related to the admission of the videotaped statements prosecution
witness Kenneth Williams made at a jailhouse interview”); ante, at 4
(“On direct appeal, Felix urged . . . that the admission of Williams’
videotaped statements violated Felix’s constitutional right to confront
the witnesses against him. He did not, however, argue that admission
of his own pretrial statements violated his right to protection against
self-incrimination”).
6 See Neder v. United States, 527 U. S. 1, 18 (1999) (“The erroneous

admission of evidence in violation of the Fifth Amendment’s guarantee
against self-incrimination, and the erroneous exclusion of evidence in
violation of the right to confront witnesses guaranteed by the Sixth
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 9

SOUTER, J., dissenting

example, if a court were to conclude that introducing Felix’s
statements did violate the Fifth Amendment, relief would
still turn on whether the error was harmless. This would
call for a careful look at the other evidence admitted at trial,
including the statements said to have come in contrary to
the Confrontation Clause. In sum, Felix’s claims are not
outside the text of Rule 15(c)(2).
Then there are a number of indications that Congress
would not want the rule read narrowly, the first centering
on the word “transaction.” That term not only goes to the
breadth of relation back, but also to the scope of claim
preclusion. E.g., Kremer v. Chemical Constr. Corp., 456
U. S. 461, 482, n. 22 (1982) (“Res judicata has recently
been taken to bar claims arising from the same transac-
tion even if brought under different statutes . . .”); accord,
1 Restatement (Second) of Judgments §24(1) (1980) (“[T]he
claim extinguished includes all rights . . . with respect to
all or any part of the transaction, or series of connected
transactions, out of which the action arose”). For purposes
of claim preclusion in habeas cases, the scope of “transac-
tion” is crucial in applying AEDPA’s limitation on second
or successive petitions: with very narrow exceptions,
federal habeas limits a prisoner to only one petition chal-
——————
Amendment are both subject to harmless-error analysis under our cases”
(citations omitted)); Penry v. Johnson, 532 U. S. 782, 795 (2001) (success
on Fifth Amendment self-incrimination claim in habeas case requires
showing that the error had “substantial and injurious effect or influence in
determining the jury’s verdict” (internal quotation marks omitted)); see
also, e.g., Banks v. Dretke, 540 U. S. 668, 691 (2004) (elements of prosecu-
torial misconduct claim under Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83 (1963),
include showing of prejudice); Donnelly v. DeChristoforo, 416 U. S. 637,
643 (1974) (improper prosecutorial comment not reversible error unless
remarks “so infec[t] the trial with unfairness as to make the resulting
conviction a denial of due process”); Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S.
668, 695 (1984) (to find prejudice for purposes of ineffective assistance
claim, court “must consider the totality of the evidence before the judge or
jury”).
10 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

lenging his conviction or sentence. See 28 U. S. C.
§2244(b)(1). 7 The provisions limiting second or successive

habeas petitions regard the relevant “transaction” for
purposes of habeas claim preclusion as the trial that
yielded the conviction or sentence under attack; once a
challenge to that conviction or sentence has been rejected,
other challenges are barred even if they raise different
claims. By contrast, under the Court’s view of Rule 15(c)
that the relevant “transaction” is the facts or conduct
underlying each discrete claim, a prisoner should be al-
lowed to file a second habeas petition so long as it is based
on different underlying facts or conduct (i.e., on what the
Court considers a separate “transaction”). The Court thus
adopts, for purposes of relation back in habeas cases, a
definition of “transaction” different from the one Congress
apparently intended for purposes of claim preclusion in
habeas cases. Judge Easterbrook explained this tension in
Ellzey v. United States, 324 F. 3d 521 (CA7 2003), and the
Court offers no evidence that Congress would have de-
creed any such apparent anomaly within the body of ha-
beas standards.8
There is, rather, a fair indication that Congress would
have intended otherwise, in the fact that it has already
placed limits on the right of some habeas petitioners to
——————
7 The Court asserts that my argument here “builds . . . on an appar-

ent assumption that claim preclusion operates in habeas cases largely
as it does in mine-run civil cases.” Ante, at 15, n. 6. In actuality, the
argument rests only on a fact we have previously recognized: that
AEDPA’s “restrictions on successive petitions constitute a modified res
judicata rule . . . .” Felker v. Turpin, 518 U. S. 651, 664 (1996).
8 The Court is mistaken in stating that I “would read Rule 15(c)(2)’s

words, ‘conduct, transaction, or occurrence,’ into . . . 28 U. S. C.
§§2244(b) and 2255, ¶8 . . . .” Ante, at 15, n. 6. What I would do is
adopt, for purposes of reconciling Rule 15(c)(2) with AEDPA’s one-year
statute of limitations, a definition of “transaction” that is consistent
with what other sections of AEDPA, those governing second or succes-
sive petitions, functionally regard as the relevant “transaction.”
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 11

SOUTER, J., dissenting

amend their petitions. In Chapter 154 of Title 28, provid-
ing special procedures for habeas cases brought by peti-
tioners subject to capital sentences in certain States,
Congress specifically prohibited amendment of the origi-
nal habeas petitions after the filing of the answer, except
on the grounds specified for second or successive petitions
under 28 U. S. C. §2244(b). See §2266(b)(3)(B). Congress’s
intent to limit capital petitioners’ opportunity to amend
(and thus to take advantage of relation back) makes sense
owing to capital petitioners’ incentive for delay, but the
provision it enacted also helps us make sense of Rule 15(c)
in the usual habeas case where a prisoner has no incentive
to string the process out. For Congress has shown not
only that it knows how to limit amendment in habeas
cases, but also that it specifically considered the subject of
limiting amendment in such cases and chose not to limit
amendment in the ordinary ones.
The final reason to view the trial as the relevant “trans-
action” in Rule 15(c)(2) lies in the real consequences of
today’s decision, which will fall most heavily on the shoul-
ders of indigent habeas petitioners who can afford no
counsel without the assistance of the court. In practical
terms, the significance of the right to amend arises from
the fact that in the overwhelming majority of cases, the
original petition is the work of a pro se petitioner. See
Duncan v. Walker, 533 U. S. 167, 191 (2001) (BREYER, J.,
dissenting) (93% of habeas petitioners in study were pro se
(citing U. S. Dept. of Justice, Office of Justice Programs,
Bureau of Justice Statistics, Federal Habeas Corpus Re-
view: Challenging State Court Criminal Convictions 14
(1995))); 1 Hertz & Liebman, §12.2, at 601 (“[N]early all”
federal habeas petitioners commence proceedings either
without legal assistance or with only the aid of a fellow
inmate or a volunteer attorney). Unless required by stat-
ute, appointment of counsel is most often a matter of
discretion on the part of the court. The district judge may
12 MAYLE v. FELIX

SOUTER, J., dissenting

well choose not to exercise that discretion unless and until
a habeas proceeding advances to the stage of discovery or
evidentiary hearing. See Habeas Corpus Rule 6(a) (requir-
ing appointment of counsel for indigent petitioner “[i]f
necessary for effective discovery”); Rule 8(c) (requiring
appointment of counsel “[i]f an evidentiary hearing is
warranted”). And the judge almost certainly will not
appoint counsel until after the preliminary review of the
petition to see whether it plainly warrants dismissal. See
Rule 4. Where a petition (even in its pro se form) has
survived this review by showing enough merit to justify
appointing counsel, it makes no sense to say that counsel
(appointed because of that apparent merit) should be
precluded from exercising professional judgment when
that judgment calls for adding a new ground for relief that
would relate back to the filing of the original petition. For
by hobbling counsel this way, the Court limits the capacity
of appointed counsel to provide the professional service
that a paid lawyer, hired at the outset, can give a client.
The lawyer hired at the start of the proceeding will be able
to draft an original petition containing all the claims
revealed to his trained eye; if the same lawyer is ap-
pointed by the court only after the petitioner has demon-
strated some merit in an original pro se filing, he and his
prisoner client will have no right to state all claims by
adding to the original petition, unless the lawyer happens
to be appointed and able to get up to speed before the
statute of limitations runs out. The rule the Court adopts
today may not make much difference to prisoners with
enough money to hire their own counsel; but it will matter
a great deal to poor prisoners who need appointed counsel
to see and plead facts showing a colorable basis for relief. 9
——————
9 It is not that I see the Court’s rule as constitutionally troubling. But

this case requires us to apply text that is ambiguous, and the Court’s
resolution of that ambiguity is based on the assumption that when
 Cite as: 545 U. S. ____ (2005) 13

SOUTER, J., dissenting

The Court of Appeals got it right, and I respectfully
dissent.

——————
Congress authorized the appointment of counsel in habeas cases, it
would have intended the appointed lawyer to have one hand tied
behind his back, as compared with an attorney hired by a prisoner with
money. That is not in my view a sound assumption. (The Court also
observes that in this case counsel had plenty of time to file an amended
petition, but that fact cannot drive this decision, for the rule the Court
adopts today will of course apply in cases other than this one.)