Rumsfeld v. Padilla
A Misfiled Habeas Petition–But Favorable Prospects for a Hearing to Challenge Status
A United States citizen, Jose Padilla, a.k.a. Abdullah Al Muhajir, was arrested in Chicago on May 8, 2002, pursuant to a material witness warrant issued by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, for his connection to Al Qaeda and the September 11th attacks. The district court appointed Donna Newman as Padilla’s lawyer. After a month of detention in New York City, Padilla was transferred from civilian to military custody pursuant to an order, from President Bush to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, that identified Padilla as an “enemy combatant.” Padilla was transferred to a Navy Brig in Charleston South Carolina, where Commander Melanie Marr became his custodian. Two days later, on June 11, 2002, Newman filed a habeas petition in the district court of New York challenging the legality of Padilla’s detention. At the time, she did not know that Padilla had been transferred to military custody and was in South Carolina.
The issues before the Supreme Court were whether Padilla’s habeas petition was properly filed in the Southern District of New York and whether the President had authority to place Padilla in indefinite military custody without charging him with any crime.
The district court held that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld’s “personal involvement” in Padilla’s military custody was sufficient for him to be the named respondent on the petition. Based on New York’s long arm statute, Rumsfeld’s lack of physical presence in the Southern District was seen as inconsequential. On the merits, the district court held that the President had the authority to detain Padilla and other enemy combatant citizens captured on American soil during times of war. That entitlement was based on the President’s authority as Commander in Chief, regardless of an act of Congress approving such detentions.
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the district court that the Secretary of Defense was a proper respondent but reversed on the merits, holding that the President lacks the authority to detain American citizens on American soil during times of war. It concluded that there was no act of Congress that authorized Padilla’s detention.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari, reversed the judgment of the Second Circuit and remanded the case for further proceedings. The Court held that the Southern District lacked jurisdiction over Padilla’s habeas petition under the federal habeas statute. As a result, the Court never reached the question whether the President had the authority to detain Padilla.
Chief Justice Rehnquist, writing for the majority, held that Commander Marr was the only proper respondent to Padilla’s petition. The Court followed the immediate custodian rule of the habeas statute, holding that a proper respondent to a habeas petition is the warden of the facility where the prisoner is being detained, or, the person who has the ability to produce the prisoner’s body before the habeas court. Because Commander Marr was viewed to be the equivalent of the warden at a civilian prison, the Court held that she was the proper respondent. Personal jurisdiction over Commander Marr could only be obtained in South Carolina; therefore, the Court held that the Southern District of New York does not have jurisdiction over Marr.
Justice Stevens dissented, joined by Justices Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer. Justice Stevens concluded that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld was a proper respondent and hence that Commander Marr was not required to hold the habeas challenge. Reaching the merits, Justice Stevens concluded that Padilla should have a hearing on his status as an enemy combatant.
Challenges to physical confinement are considered “core” habeas challenges. The majority reasoned that the respondent’s detention falls within the normal rules for “core challenges” because the facts in Padilla’s case were not unique in any way that would provide an “arguable basis for a departure from the immediate custodial rule.” On the other hand, Justice Stevens believed that there was ample precedent for affording special treatment to this case by analyzing the unique aspects of this case and not establishing a bright line rule. More specifically, since the government did not inform Newman of Padilla’s whereabouts at the time she filed the habeas petition, she did not know that he had been moved to South Carolina. Justice Stevens asserted that the government’s departure from the “time-honored practice of giving one’s adversary fair notice of an intent to present an important motion to the court” was the initial catalyst creating the confusion regarding the proper respondent. Stevens argued that if Newman had been notified that Padilla was to be placed in military custody in a different state, she probably would have filed the habeas petition two days earlier. At that time, Padilla’s physical presence in New York would have made the Southern District a proper forum.
The majority and Justice Stevens differed in their interpretations of the habeas statute, which provides that the proper respondent is “the person who has custody over [the petitioner].” According to the statute, Rumsfeld is not the proper respondent since he was not in physical control of Padilla at the time the petition was filed. The majority distinguished Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Ky. and Strait v. Laird because those cases involved no immediate custodian. Justice Stevens focused on the holding of Braden: “so long as the custodian can be reached by service of process, the court can issue a writ ‘within its jurisdiction’ requiring that the prisoner be brought before the court for a hearing on his claim . . . even if the prisoner himself is confined outside the court’s territorial jurisdiction.” Justice Stevens opined that Rumsfeld was the proper respondent due to his “familiarity with the circumstances of Padilla’s detention, and his personal involvement in the handling of Padilla’s case.”
Justice Stevens also compared this case to Ex Parte Endo, 323 U.S. 283 (1944), in which the Court ruled that if a habeas petition was brought in one jurisdiction and then the defendant was moved to a different location, jurisdiction would still be intact based upon the original habeas petition. In Endo, the petitioner properly named her immediate custodian and filed in the district of confinement. Justice Stevens argued that had Padilla’s attorney filed in New York while he was still detained there, the fact pattern would have been identical to Endo. The majority held that Endo does not help Padilla because the Southern District never properly acquired jurisdiction over his petition.
Because this case was remanded, a filing in the proper court should produce a ruling on the merits. There appears to be a minimum of five justices prepared to decide that question in favor of Padilla: the four dissenting justices in Padilla, plus Justice Scalia, whose dissent in Hamdi indicates that he considers any detention of a citizen to be reviewable through habeas unless Congress suspends the writ. On the question of what type of review Padilla ought to receive, Hamdi would seem to identify the minimum required, with it being possible a court might require more, because none of the exigencies of a battlefield seizure are present in Padilla’s case.
Lauren Donner Chait, L ’06 and Chris Schroeder, director of the Program in Public Law, wrote this commentary.
