Legal Question in Appeals and Writs in California

There is no appeal from a denial by the California Supreme Court. But if your appeal involved an issue of federal law you have the option of petitioning the United States Supreme Court for a writ of certiorari, which is roughly equivalent to a petition for review in a state-court case. Your cert petition must be filed no later than 90 days after the California Supreme Court denied review.

I presume that the "criminal matter" you refer to is a direct appeal from a conviction and/or a sentencing decision. If so, you also have the option of petitioning for a writ of habeas corpus. You can bring that petition in the federal district court. But if you intend to raise any issues that were not raised in your state-court appeal, you should first raise them in a habeas petition in the state courts. That petition can be filed in the Superior Court, the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court.

If you don't bring a cert petition. your federal habeas petition must be filed within one year plus 90 days after the decision of the California Supreme Court *except that* the clock will stop ticking while you have a petition pending in the state courts. But note that if one state court denies your petition and you then bring it again (there is no appeal from the denial of a habeas petition in the California courts, but the petitioner instead may file a new petition in a higher court), the clock will be ticking again in the meantime.

If you do bring a cert petition and it is denied (almost all of them are), then you will have one year from the denial of that petition by the U.S. Supreme Court in which to file a federal habeas petition. If the Court grants your cert petition, then your year will begin once the case is decided or dismissed. What I said before about your federal clock ticking between state-court petitions will still be true.

The timing rules are actually more nuanced than what I have described here. And there may be unusual aspects to your case that would affect how the rules apply. And timing is just one of many issues you need to be careful about. You should treat this only as guidance, and you should discuss your case in detail with a knowledgeable appellate lawyer.

Good luck.

Let me add to my prior response:

Sometimes a federal habeas corpus petition from a state-court conviction will raise multiple issues, of which some were raised in the state courts and some were not. When that happens the best strategy is to file the federal petition while simultaneously pursuing the state petition, and to ask the federal court to await the outcome of the state-court petitions before letting the case go forward.