By: Derek Hawkins//April 4, 2017//
7th Circuit Court of Appeals
Case Name: Ivan Johnson v. Karen Jaimet
Case No.: 15-2577
Officials: WOOD, Chief Judge, and ROVNER and SYKES, Circuit Judges.
Focus: Exclusion of Hearsay Evidence
Douglas Keefer’s badly beaten body was found by police in Keefer’s own backyard in Rock Falls, Illinois, the morning of November 27, 2006. A jury convicted Ivan Johnson of Keefer’s murder. While Johnson admits he beat Keefer the night before, in the same backyard, he insists that he did not kill him. Keefer’s actual murderers, Johnson says, were two men with baseball bats who attacked Keefer later that night, in the same spot. Johnson’s theory apparently came from Dustin Manon, a one‐time occupant of the Whiteside County Jail. Manon told police that his cellmate there, Donnie Masini, told him that Masini had hired two men to kill Keefer with bats and that they did so. Unsurprisingly, Masini denied making the statement when police questioned him. The trial court barred Johnson from introducing Masini’s hearsay statement, reasoning that it was too unreliable to allow into evidence. The Illinois Appellate Court affirmed. After exhausting other options, Johnson now seeks habeas corpus relief. He argues, as relevant here, that the state court’s exclusion of the hearsay evidence was an unreasonable application of Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284 (1973). The district court denied Johnson’s petition, but it granted him a certificate of appealability. We agree with our colleague that the state court’s decision did not run afoul of Chambers and thus that Johnson is not entitled to habeas corpus relief.
Affirmed