Robert Henry Moormann v. Dora B. Schriro, Director, Arizona Department of Corrections

SCHROEDER, Chief Judge.

Robert Henry Moormann was convicted in Arizona of the first degree murder of his elderly adoptive mother and sentenced to death in 1985. This is an appeal from the district court’s denial of his first federal petition for habeas corpus relief. He earlier filed two unsuccessful state petitions for collateral relief after losing his direct appeal from the conviction and sentence in state court.

We heard oral argument in this case in November 2001. We then deferred submission pending the Supreme Court’s decision in Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d…