Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, a state prisoner is ordinarily only allowed one suit for habeas corpus in federal court. If the federal courts refuse to issue a writ of habeas corpus, an execution date may be set. In recent times, however, prisoners have postponed execution through a final round of federal litigation using the Civil Rights Act of 1871 — codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1983 — which allows people to bring lawsuits against state actors to protect their federal constitutional and statutory rights.
How many habeas corpus suits does the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act normally allow in federal court?
one