Last Wednesday, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears appeals from Georgia, Alabama, and Florida federal cases, voted to rehear Childers v. Floyd en banc. The Court vacated a panel opinion holding that Childers’s Confrontation Clause rights had been violated when the trial court refused to allow certain credibility evidence regarding the prosecution’s star witness.
This June, an Eleventh Circuit panel majority granted Mr. Childers § 2254 habeas relief. In a previous case stemming from the same activities, in which another defendant was acquitted, the star witness gave confusing and inconsistent testimony. The trial court refused to allow the jury to hear evidence that the prosecution had unsuccessfully tried to revoke the witness’s plea deal due to those inconsistencies. The Eleventh Circuit held that this refusal was a violation of the defendant’s sixth amendment right to confront witnesses against him.
This case is an important reminder of the value of effective cross-examination and the necessity to continue litigating on behalf of clients. We will watch for the en banc decision in Childers. The vacated panel opinion is available here.