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22 F. App'x 939

Pilarczyk v. Ayers

U.S. Courts of Appeals

Decided January 3, 2002

U.S. Courts of Appeals · decided 2002-01-03

Cited by 1 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 2002

Applies 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)

Relies on Williams v. Taylor · Montana v. Egelhoff

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 2002-01-03

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¶1MEMORANDUM

¶2Benjamin Pilarczyk appeals the district court’s denial of his § 2254 habeas corpus petition alleging that two evidentiary rulings by the state trial court violated his due process and confrontation clause rights. We affirm.

¶3The state court did not clearly err in holding that exclusion of prior incidents at the station did not render the trial fundamentally unfair. The evidence was neither relevant to a defense nor to the credibility of any witness. Montana v. Egelhoff, 518 *940U.S. 37, 42, 116 S.Ct. 2013, 135 L.Ed.2d 361 (1996).

¶4The state appellate court held that the trial court’s refusal to conduct an in camera inspection of a witness’s otherwise privileged psychological records did not deny petitioner his Sixth Amendment right of confrontation. After conducting an evi-dentiary hearing, the trial judge found that the witness’s visits to a psychologist were unrelated to his testimony. Petitioner has not come forward with clear and convincing evidence to rebut the presumptive correctness of this finding. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1). Likewise, the state appellate court’s holding was not contrary to or an unreasonable application of Supreme Court law. Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 402-13, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000) (O’Connor, J., concurring and delivering the opinion of the court). AFFIRMED

¶5 This disposition is not appropriate for publication and may not be cited to or by the courts of this circuit except as may be provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.

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