The Ninth U

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said a majority of the 24 judges taking part in the vote had agreed to rehear Blufford Hayes Jr.'s challenge to his conviction and death sentence, which had been upheld by a 3-judge panel of the court exactly 2 years ago. The case will now be reassigned to an 11-judge panel. Hayes, now 49, was convicted of fatally stabbing Vinod Patel in a room of the motel Patel managed in January 1980. Cartons of cigarettes and $23 in cash were taken from the motel office. Hayes testified that he had acted in self-defense and blamed the killing on motel resident Andrew James, who drove him from the scene. But James testified at Hayes's trial that Hayes had told him he had committed both the murder and the theft. Hayes' conviction of murder in the course of a burglary made him eligible for the death penalty. James was given immunity from prosecution for the murder in exchange for his testimony, but he told the jury that he had gotten no other benefits. In fact, according to the August 2002 appellate court ruling in Hayes' case, prosecutors had agreed to drop unrelated theft charges against James but had not told him about the agreement and allowed him to deny its existence to the jury. The panel then upheld Hayes' death sentence in a 2-1 ruling, criticizing the prosecution's conduct but saying it had not affected the verdict. No date has been scheduled for the new hearing.