Jeffrey A. Weisheit v. Ron Neal, Warden

(CAPITAL CASE) At critical junctures, the state and federal courts have failed to assess the totality of the evidence establishing the fundamental unsoundness of Mr. Weisheit’s capital sentencing. The Indiana Supreme Court, “in a fractured opinion,” Weisheit v. Neal, 151 F.4th 855, 867 (7th Cir. 2025), affirmed the denial of post-conviction relief on, in relevant part, multiple claims of trial counsel-ineffectiveness for the failure to investigate and present various mitigating evidence. At issue, inter alia, was Weisheit’s profound mental illness and impairments arising from multiple etiologies, including repeated childhood brain trauma. The state court’s majority opinion utterly overlooked four subclaims of trial counsel ineffectiveness. An opinion concurring in the judgment found Weisheit had proven deficient performance but could not prove prejudice, and the Chief Justice dissented finding cumulative ineffectiveness after properly considering the evidence of prejudice. In contravention of this Court’s clearly established law, the majority failed to consider the cumulative effect of the penalty phase deficiencies, instead only contemplating, in isolation, the prejudice of each piece of mitigation not seen by the jury while excluding any consideration of the evidence that was presented to the jury. In federal habeas corpus proceedings, Petitioner presented the exhausted penalty phase ineffective assistance claim. The district court denied on the merits after considering the cumulative effect of just three exhausted subclaims. On appeal, the Court of Appeals failed to consider cumulative prejudice, and instead analyzed prejudice in siloes, seriatim, cabined by various specific failures to present mitigating evidence. This petition presents the following questions:

1. Must federal habeas courts reweigh the “totality of available mitigating evidence,” Wiggins v. Smith, 539 U.S. 510, 534 (2003), when deciding penalty phase prejudice claims pursuant to enumerated grounds for deficient performance??

2. In such ineffectiveness claims, is “cumulative prejudice” a distinct claim for purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 2254 exhaustion purposes or Wiggins reweighing?

3. Under Indiana’s juror deadlock provision, Ind. Code § 35–50–2–9(f), does a reasonable likelihood under evidentiary reweighing that at least one juror would strike a different balance and vote against a death sentence amount to a “different outcome” under Wiggins?