Supreme Court Upholds Texas Conviction of Child Sex Abuser

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced that the Supreme Court of the United States has unanimously upheld the rule of law, ensuring that convicted child sexual abuser Danny Richard Rivers, Jr., 43, will remain in prison. The decision rejects Rivers’ attempt to circumvent procedural barriers in federal court to challenge his state conviction.

“In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court sided with Texas and ensured that dangerous convicted criminals will not be able to use procedural games to escape justice,” said Attorney General Paxton. “This is a great win for Texas and the rest of America because it makes it harder for prisoners to weaponize federal courts to attack their state convictions. Rivers was convicted of unbelievably heinous sexual abuse of his own children, and he will face the consequences of his actions.”

Danny Rivers, despite his own lawyers stating he admitted to sexually abusing his two daughters for years, claimed to have been “wrongly convicted” of sexual abuse, indecency with a child, and possession of child pornography. He sought his release through an application for federal habeas corpus. However, Rivers had already unsuccessfully filed such a petition years earlier. He attempted to bypass the consequences of that prior unsuccessful petition by arguing it should not count because his appeal had not yet concluded. The Supreme Court unanimously disagreed, stating that Rivers’s theory ignores that “Congress chose to promote finality” and that his “policy arguments do not move the needle in our analysis.”

Supreme Court Opinion Details:

The Supreme Court’s opinion, delivered by Justice Jackson for a unanimous Court, clarified the application of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), specifically 28 U.S.C. §2244(b), which strictly limits a court’s ability to hear “second or successive habeas corpus application[s].”

Rivers was convicted in Texas state court of continuous sexual abuse of a child and related charges. After exhausting direct appeal and state habeas relief, he filed his first federal habeas petition in August 2017. This petition was denied in September 2018, and Rivers appealed to the Fifth Circuit. While his appeal was pending, Rivers filed a second §2254 petition based on newly discovered evidence—a state investigator’s report from his trial counsel’s client file, which he believed was exculpatory.

The District Court classified this second filing as a “second or successive” application under §2244(b) and transferred it to the Fifth Circuit for authorization to file. Rivers appealed this transfer order, and the Fifth Circuit affirmed.

The Supreme Court held that once a district court enters its judgment on a first-filed habeas petition, a subsequent filing qualifies as a “second or successive application” subject to the requirements of §2244(b), regardless of whether the initial petition’s appeal is still pending. The Court emphasized that AEDPA’s restrictions aim to conserve judicial resources, reduce piecemeal litigation, and provide finality to state-court judgments. Rivers’s argument that his second filing should not trigger §2244(b) due to a pending appeal was rejected, as the Court’s precedents, including Banister v. Davis, confirm that entry of final judgment generally separates first from second or successive habeas filings.

The Court also confirmed its jurisdiction to review the dispute, noting that a favorable decision would redress Rivers’s alleged injury regarding the transfer of his second habeas application. The Court also found that Rivers remaining incarcerated on related sexual-abuse sentences, which the newly discovered evidence might implicate, preserved habeas jurisdiction despite his release from the child-pornography conviction.

The Court declined to address Rivers’s alternative argument that his second filing, which he contended was a Rule 15 motion to amend, was not a new application by its nature, as this theory was not presented in the petition for certiorari or to the lower courts.

The case was prosecuted by the State of Texas and represents a significant win for the state in defending its convictions against federal challenges.

To read the opinion, click here. To read Texas’s brief, click here.