071234P.pdf   09/05/2008  David Barnett  v.  Don Roper
   U.S. Court of Appeals Case No:  07-1234
   U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri - St. Louis   
   [PUBLISHED] [Wollman, Author, with Murphy and Smith, Circuit Judges]
   Prisoner case - habeas. State had forfeited any objection to the
   untimely filing of Barnett's Section 2254 petition and could not raise the
   issue for the first time on appeal; Missouri's procedural rule on the
   adequacy of pleadings in post-conviction relief proceedings is firmly
   established and constitutes an independent and adequate ground that bars
   the court's review of the state court's decision not to grant an evidentiary
   hearing on Barnett's claim of ineffective assistance of counsel; the
   pleading Barnett submitted, which appears to claim that trial counsel was
   ineffective for failing to call 450 witnesses to the death penalty phase of
   the case, failed to connect a specific portion of the narrative to a
   particular witness, did not allege that counsel had been informed of their
   existence and did not state that any of the witnesses were available; as a
   result, the pleading violated Rule 29.15, and did not require an
   evidentiary hearing; with respect to Barnett's claim that his rights were
   violated by the prosecutor's use of peremptory strikes to remove female
   jurors, the district court did not err in ruling that the Missouri Supreme
   Court's decision denying Barnett's challenge was neither contrary to, nor
   an unreasonable application of, federal law; prosecutor's comment about
   personal belief concerning the applicability of the death penalty to
   Barnett were not so outrageous or prejudicial as to warrant a sua sponte
   declaration of a mistrial, nor did it inject such unfairness into the penalty
   phase of the case as to deny Barnett due process.