Page:United States Reports 502 OCT. TERM 1991.pdf/395

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Cite as: 502 U. S. 236 (1992)

237

Per Curiam

Court of Appeals to issue its decision on an appeal from the District Court’s denial of a second federal habeas petition in a capital case. The appeal was argued and submitted to the Court of Appeals on June 27, 1989, and no decision has been forthcoming. Charles Rodman Campbell was convicted of multiple murders in 1982 in the State of Washington and sentenced to death. After his conviction was affirmed on direct appeal and we denied certiorari, Campbell v. Washington, 471 U. S. 1094 (1985), his first federal habeas petition was filed in July 1985 in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. Proceedings in that matter were completed when we denied certiorari in November 1988. Campbell v. Kincheloe, 488 U. S. 948. No relief was granted. In March 1989, Campbell filed a second federal habeas petition in the same District Court. The court acted with commendable dispatch, holding a hearing and issuing a written opinion denying a stay or other relief within days after the second petition was filed. On March 28, 1989, Campbell appealed to the Ninth Circuit. The Court of Appeals granted an indefinite stay of execution and set a briefing schedule. The case was argued and submitted in June 1989, but no decision was announced and the stay of execution remains in effect. The Washington attorney general sent letters to the panel in April and October 1990 inquiring about the status of the case, but neither letter was answered. In January 1990, Campbell filed a motion to withdraw certain issues from consideration by the Ninth Circuit panel, and he renewed this motion in April. The panel took no action. In July 1990, Campbell filed his third state action for collateral relief, a personal restraint petition, with the Washington Supreme Court. In September, Campbell again moved the Court of Appeals to withdraw three issues from consideration in the case that it was still holding under submission, leaving eight others to be decided. The panel did not respond until by order of February 21, 1991, it noted