Andrew Stuart Luster v. Joe A. Lizarraga, Warden

Petitioner, Andrew Luster’s case presents questions that implicate the Sixth Amendment rights to counsel and jury trial and the Due Process guarantees provided by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution – they are issues of national importance and critical to the administration of criminal justice. The case also presents questions regarding the circuit courts obligations to issue Certificates of Appealability (COA) in habeas cases. Thus, this case presents the questions, to wit: 1) Is the Sixth Amendment right to effective counsel violated without a showing of prejudice when the defense attorney suffered from an actual conflict of interest? Mr. Luster’s defense counsel (during the majority of the proceedings) hatched a criminal plot to enter into his defense with the specific purpose of advising Luster that absconding his jury trial in exchange for payment for arranging the escape was the best route – this attorney represented Luster at every critical stage of the proceedings leading up to trial and did so while executing this criminal plot. A serious split of authority exists on this issue amongst the circuits and even within the circuits and state courts identifying this split in authority. Certain circuit courts assertion of lack of clarity in this Court’s precedents has been used as reason to deny federal habeas in cases involving serious actual conflicts of interest because the petitioner