Shawn C. Rutland v. Warden, Smith State Prison

In this case, the district court dismissed Petitioner’s 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition as being untimely under AEDPA, finding that Petitioner was not entitled to equitable tolling of AEDPA’s one year statute of limitations. On appeal, the Eleventh Circuit concluded that Petitioner may have been entitled to equitable tolling based upon misleading instructions of the trial court at sentencing that he had four years from the date of conviction in which to file any type of habeas petition, which could have included a federal habeas petition. Nevertheless, the circuit court affirmed the district court’s dismissal of the petition, finding that equitable tolling would lapse the instant Petitioner hired counsel to file a state habeas petition on his behalf, even though that date was 20 months after the one-year federal habeas deadline had passed. The question presented for review is: Did the Eleventh Circuit opinion improperly create a new bright-line rule, unsupported by authority and in derogation of principles of equity and of the discretion afforded to district courts, that equitable tolling of the one-year statute of limitation of AEDPA for filing a § 2254 habeas petition automatically lapses the moment a petitioner procures assistance of counsel?