Gilbert G. Ybanez v. Gary L. Johnson, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division Rolland E. Lawson v. Gary L. Johnson, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice, Institutional Division’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

8 federal appellate · 1 district ·

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 16 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “He proposes that the year to file a federal petition begins when a prisoner actually understands what legal theories are available. That is not what § 2244(d)(1) says. First, the time commences when the factual predicate “could have been discovered through the exercise of due diligence,” not when it was actually discovered by a given prisoner. Second, the trigger in § 2244(d)(1)(D) is (actual or imputed) discovery of the claim’s “factual predicate,” not recognition of the facts’ legal significance. Most federal statutes of limitations are injury-based. Unlike some state systems, which start the time only when a party knows (or should recognize) that a legal wrong has been done, federal statutes use objective indicators as triggers. ... Section 2244(d)(1)(D) follows the norm for a federal statute of limitations. Time begins when the prisoner knows (or through diligence could discover) the important facts, not when the prisoner recognizes their legal significance. If § 2244(d)(1) used a subjective rather than an objective standard, then there would be no effective time limit, as [the petitioner’s] case illustrates. Like most members of street gangs, [the petitioner] is young, has a limited education, and knows little about the law. If these considerations delay the period of limitations until the prisoner has spent a few years in the institution’s law library, however, then § 2244(d)(1) might as well not exist; few prisoners are lawyers.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 327 F. Supp. 2d 97 - Ledoux v. Dennehy