United States v. BANZACA, 3:08-cr-00014

James Edward Banzaca pleaded guilty in 2007 to three bank robberies (18 U.S.C. § 2113(a)) and one count of interstate transportation of a stolen motor vehicle (18 U.S.C. § 2312).
The Presentence Investigation Report and the court treated Banzaca as a career offender under U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1(a) based on prior felony convictions for crimes of violence, producing a Guidelines range of 151–188 months.
On September 26, 2008, the court sentenced him to concurrent terms of 160 months (robberies) and 120 months (vehicle), with concurrent supervised release; he did not appeal.
In 2016 Banzaca filed amended § 2255 motions arguing (1) the career-offender enhancement is invalid post-Johnson because the Guidelines’ residual clause is vague, and (2) related ineffective-assistance and predicate-offense challenges.
The Government opposed; the magistrate judge recommended denying relief based on Beckles (advisory Guidelines not subject to vagueness challenge) and holding the other claims time-barred under 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f).

Issue	Banzaca's Argument	Government's Argument	Held
Validity of career-offender enhancement under Guidelines after Johnson	Johnson's vagueness reasoning should invalidate the Guidelines’ residual clause, so prior convictions no longer qualify as crimes of violence	Beckles forecloses vagueness challenges to the advisory Guidelines; career-offender enhancement stands; robbery listed in §4B1.2 commentary	Denied — Beckles controls; Guidelines’ commentary lists robbery as a crime of violence, so no vagueness relief
Ineffective assistance re: career-offender challenge	Counsel failed to argue that predicate convictions are not crimes of violence post-Johnson	Claim is derivative of a Johnson-based attack foreclosed by Beckles; also untimely and procedurally defaulted	Denied and dismissed as untimely / procedurally defaulted
Challenge to three-level enhancement under §2B3.1(b)(2)(A) (explosive device)	Counsel should have contested that enhancement as not matching defendant’s conduct	Procedural/time-bar defenses; merits not reached because claim untimely	Denied as time-barred
Whether prior convictions qualify as crimes of violence (use-of-force or enumerated-offense)	Prior convictions did not involve threats, injury, or force and thus do not qualify	Robbery was listed in the Guidelines commentary as a crime of violence at sentencing; claim also untimely	Denied — substantive challenge fails as-applied; other claims untimely

Beckles v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 886 (advisory Sentencing Guidelines not subject to vagueness challenges under the Due Process Clause)
Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (ACCA residual clause is unconstitutionally vague)
Welch v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 1257 (Johnson announced a new substantive rule retroactive on collateral review)
Stinson v. United States, 508 U.S. 36 (Sentencing Commission commentary interpreting the Guidelines is authoritative)
Jones v. United States, 304 F.3d 1035 (11th Cir.) (standards for equitable tolling of § 2255 limitations)