O'Sullivan v. Boerckel, 526 U.S. 838, 3 (1999)

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840

O'SULLIVAN v. BOERCKEL

Opinion of the Court

discretionary review in order to satisfy the exhaustion requirement. We conclude that he must.

I

In 1977, respondent Darren Boerckel was tried in the Circuit Court of Montgomery County, Illinois, for the rape, burglary, and aggravated battery of an 87-year-old woman. The central evidence against him at trial was his written confession to the crimes, a confession admitted over Boerckel's objection. The jury convicted Boerckel on all three charges, and he was sentenced to serve 20 to 60 years' imprisonment on the rape charge, and shorter terms on the other two charges, with all sentences to be served concurrently.

Boerckel appealed his convictions to the Appellate Court of Illinois, raising several issues. He argued, among other things, that his confession should have been suppressed because the confession was the fruit of an illegal arrest, because the confession was coerced, and because he had not knowingly and intelligently waived his rights under Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966). Boerckel also claimed that prosecutorial misconduct denied him a fair trial, that he had been denied discovery of exculpatory material held by the police, and that the evidence was insufficient to support his conviction. The Illinois Appellate Court, with one justice dissenting, rejected Boerckel's claims and affirmed his convictions and sentences. People v. Boerckel, 68 Ill. App. 3d 103, 385 N. E. 2d 815 (1979).

Boerckel next filed a petition for leave to appeal to the Illinois Supreme Court. In this petition, he raised only three issues. Boerckel claimed first that his confession was the fruit of an unlawful arrest because, contrary to the Appellate Court's ruling, he was under arrest when he gave his confession. Boerckel also contended that he was denied a fair trial by prosecutorial misconduct and that he had been erroneously denied discovery of exculpatory material

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