UNITED STATES, Appellee, v. Ademir CASTRO-VAZQUEZ, Defendant, Appellant.
No. 13-1508.
United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit.
Sept. 4, 2015.
28
Before BARRON, SELYA, and DYK,* Circuit Judges.
DYK, Circuit Judge.
Ademir Castro-Vazquez pled guilty to being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm in violation of
I.
On September 26, 2012, acting on an anonymous tip, Puerto Rico Police Department officers were investigating the presence of suspicious persons at a gas station in Trujillo Alto, Puerto Rico. They observed Castro-Vazquez, allegedly pacing nervously, accompanied by another man, Allen Miranda-Melendez, filling a container with gas for a car parked nearby at the side of a rural road. One officer observed a bulge on Castro-Vazquez‘s waist. After stopping the two men at the parked car, Castro-Vazquez was asked to lift up his shirt, which he refused to do. One of the officers then lifted up Castro-Vazquez‘s shirt, and saw a firearm on his waist, at which point both men were arrested.
Castro-Vazquez was charged with being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm under
At his arraignment on October 17, 2012, Castro-Vazquez pled not guilty. The magistrate judge ordered that the parties would have “7 days for discovery and 14 days thereafter to file any motions.” At a status conference held November 7, 2012, the district court set trial for December 3, 2012, and refused the defense counsel‘s request for additional time. On November 30, 2012, the defense counsel filed a motion to continue the trial for one week. The court instead granted a one-day continuance to December 4.
Two days before trial was scheduled, Miranda-Melendez‘s attorney filed a motion to suppress certain incriminating statements that Miranda-Melendez had allegedly made. One day before trial was scheduled, Castro-Vazquez‘s attorney also filed a motion to suppress evidence, including the firearm and a mobile phone with pictures of the defendant carrying the firearm, seized at the time of Castro-Vazquez‘s arrest. Castro-Vazquez alleged that this evidence should be suppressed because it was the result of an unlawful warrantless search, seizure, and arrest in violation of the Fourth Amendment. In opposing the motion to suppress, the government raised no timeliness objection to the motion. Instead, the government argued that the officers had reasonable suspicion to stop and frisk Castro-Vazquez, and probable cause to arrest him. The district court denied both defendants’ motions, stating that, with respect to Castro-Vazquez‘s motion, the court “will not entertain a motion to suppress filed on the eve of trial.” The court also stated that Miranda-Melendez and Castro-Vazquez should make their suppression arguments “at trial and as part of the Rule 29 motion.” Id.
Castro-Vazquez was sentenced on March 22, 2013. At his sentencing hearing, the district court sentenced him to 78 months, using as a guideline range 63 to 78 months, based on a total offense level of 22 and a criminal history category of IV. The total offense level of 22 was calculated by relying on Section 2K2.1 of the Sentencing Guidelines, which provides a prior felony enhancement for unlawful possession of a firearm. The base offense level is increased from 14 to 24 “if the defendant committed any part of the instant offense subsequent to sustaining at least two felony convictions of either a crime of violence or a controlled substance offense.”
II.
Castro-Vazquez challenges the voluntariness of his unconditional guilty plea. Although both Castro-Vazquez and the government suggest the standard of review is de novo, in fact we have yet to decide whether, when a defendant challenges the voluntariness of a plea on grounds other than a Rule 11 error, review
We first address Castro-Vazquez‘s complaint that the district court erred in refusing to decide the motion to suppress before trial.
Here, the magistrate judge at arraignment had set a deadline of “7 days for discovery and 14 days thereafter to file any motions.” Relying on his assertion that discovery in fact was not completed within the seven-day period and was not completed until December 3, 2012, Castro-Vazquez avers that his December 3, 2012, motion to suppress was well within the fourteen-day post-discovery deadline. The only effective deadline, he says, was thus the default deadline in
“Before trial” in
It is well-established that an unconditional guilty plea results in the waiver of errors preceding the plea. As the Supreme Court held in Tollett v. Henderson, 411 U.S. 258, 93 S.Ct. 1602, 36 L.Ed.2d 235 (1973), “[w]hen a criminal defendant has solemnly admitted in open court that he is in fact guilty of the offense with which he is charged, he may not thereafter raise independent claims relating to the deprivation of constitutional rights that occurred prior to the entry of the guilty plea.” Id. at 267, 93 S.Ct. 1602. This court has
There is no basis to conclude on this record that the plea was unknowing or involuntary. Castro-Vazquez does not allege the district court coerced or misinformed him in his change of plea hearing. See, e.g., Mack v. United States, 635 F.2d 20, 25 (1st Cir. 1980). Instead, he argues that the guilty plea was involuntary because of his counsel‘s ineffectiveness. His theory appears to be that the suppression motion was a strong one (as allegedly evidenced by the success of his co-defendant‘s motion) and that Castro-Vazquez‘s counsel was ineffective because she failed to counsel Castro-Vazquez to go to trial and pursue the suppression motion.
In such circumstances, this court will not review a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel on direct appeal. See United States v. Vázquez-Larrauri, 778 F.3d 276, 293-94 (1st Cir. 2015) (“As a general rule, this court does not review ineffective assistance of counsel claims on direct appeal ... except [] where the critical facts are not genuinely in dispute and the record is sufficiently developed....“) (internal quotation marks, citations omitted)); United States v. Torres-Rosario, 447 F.3d 61, 64 (1st Cir. 2006) (“Sixth Amendment attacks on counsel are rarely allowed on direct appeal because they require findings as to what happened and, as important, why counsel acted as he did—information rarely developed in the existing record.“); United States v. Mala, 7 F.3d 1058, 1063 (1st Cir. 1993) (same).
Castro-Vazquez relies on United States v. Mercedes-De La Cruz, 787 F.3d 61 (1st Cir. 2015), as permitting a direct appeal challenge to counsel‘s effectiveness, but that case is distinguishable. There, in a “rare case,” id. at 63, this court reviewed an ineffective assistance of counsel claim on direct appeal because it was clear that the defense attorney simply “never filed a motion to suppress on behalf of [the defendant], much less a timely one,” id. at 67, even though the motion would “quite likely” have been meritorious, id. at 68, and his co-defendants, who had less plausible grounds for doing so, did file timely motions, id. at 67. But here, there is a question whether the suppression motion Castro-Vazquez did file was in fact timely. And further, Castro-Vazquez‘s claim involves highly fact-dependent questions as to whether Castro-Vazquez was adequately counseled to plea when his suppression motion could be considered at trial.
“An ineffective assistance of counsel claim that requires further factual determinations should be brought through a collateral proceeding in district court un-
III.
We now turn to issues concerning Castro-Vazquez‘s sentencing. Castro-Vazquez objects to the prior felony enhancement pursuant to
Below, Castro-Vazquez failed to object to the sentence imposed, so our review is for plain error. See United States v. Serrano-Mercado, 784 F.3d 838, 844-45 (1st Cir. 2015). Castro-Vazquez must thus demonstrate “(1) that an error occurred (2) which was clear or obvious and which not only (3) affected [his] substantial rights, but also (4) seriously impaired the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings.” United States v. Duarte, 246 F.3d 56, 60 (1st Cir. 2001).
Before the district court, the government relied on several prior convictions listed in the presentence report, including robbery, burglary, and drug convictions. On appeal, however, the government does not argue that Castro-Vazquez‘s drug convictions qualify as predicate offenses and relies only on the robbery and burglary convictions. Under this approach, if either the burglary or robbery conviction failed to qualify as a “crime of violence,” there would have been no basis for an enhancement.
The guidelines define the term “crime of violence” in
[A]ny offense under federal or state law, punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year, that—
(1) has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person of another, or
(1) is burglary of a dwelling, arson, or extortion, involves use of explosives or otherwise involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another.
If the statute is indivisible, we apply a “categorical approach.” Id. (citing Taylor v. United States, 495 U.S. 575, 110 S.Ct. 2143, 109 L.Ed.2d 607 (1990)). Under that approach, if the statute has the same elements as the “generic” crime as defined in the guidelines, then the prior conviction serves as a predicate offense under the guidelines. Id. If the elements of the indivisible statute sweep more broadly than the generic crime, then the conviction cannot count as a predicate offense, “even if the defendant actually committed the offense in its generic form.” Id. (emphasis added).
If, but only if, the statute is “divisible“—that is, it comprises multiple, alternative versions of a crime not all of which qualify as a predicate offense—then we apply a “modified” categorical approach, whereby a limited set of “Shepard” documents, such as the charging documents, plea agreements, plea colloquies, jury instructions, and verdict forms, may be consulted to determine which of a statute‘s alternative elements formed the basis of the prior conviction. Id. at 2283-84 (citing Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13, 17, 25-26, 125 S.Ct. 1254, 161 L.Ed.2d 205 (2005)). However, the modified approach “retains the categorical approach‘s central feature: a focus on the elements, rather than the facts, of a crime.” Id. at 2285.
The district court did not at the time of sentencing have the benefit of the Supreme Court‘s Descamps decision. Nonetheless, we conclude that the district court‘s approach may have been inconsistent with the Descamps framework.
With respect to Castro-Vazquez‘s burglary conviction, Castro-Vazquez argues that it cannot be a “crime of violence” because burglary under Puerto Rico law does not have an “unlawful entry” requirement as does generic burglary under
Here, we are concerned that the district court‘s approach was inconsistent with Descamps’ stricture because the district court relied on the factual allegations of the presentence report rather than addressing whether the Puerto Rico burglary statute requires unlawful entry as an element of the offense. The government in its briefs on appeal makes no effort to square the approach below with Descamps’ approach, which requires determining whether the Puerto Rico burglary statute requires unlawful entry as an element.
It is true, of course, that plain error review presents a high bar, and the failure to follow the Descamps framework would not necessarily constitute plain error. See Serrano-Mercado, 784 F.3d at 845-46. However, as we also explained in Serrano-Mercado, the plain error standard can be overcome where there has been intervening legal authority that makes clear that the district court‘s approach was inconsistent with the intervening legal authority. See Serrano-Mercado, 784 F.3d at 849; United States v. Torres-Rosario, 658 F.3d 110, 116 (1st Cir. 2011) (holding that district court commits prejudicial plain error in characterizing a conviction as a crime of violence if, at the time of appeal, intervening law makes clear that a conviction does not necessarily qualify categorically as a crime of violence); Henderson v. United States, 568 U.S. 266, 133 S.Ct. 1121, 1127-28, 185 L.Ed.2d 85 (2013) (plain error assessed according to law at time of appeal, even if prior law was merely unsettled).
At the time of Castro-Vazquez‘s sentencing on March 22, 2013, the Supreme Court had not yet decided Descamps (decided June 20, 2013). After sentencing, Descamps established that in the case of an indivisible statute, such as the burglary statute here, the facts surrounding a particular prior conviction cannot qualify it as a predicate offense if the statute itself sweeps too broadly. See United States v. Fish, 758 F.3d 1, 14 (1st Cir. 2014) (noting that Descamps “clarified the ornate rules” of this approach, in particular clarifying that “the only way a facially overbroad statute can qualify as a [] predicate” is via the modified categorical approach in the case of divisible statutes). The law in this circuit before Descamps was not entirely settled as to whether facts alleged in a presentence report could be used to show a prior conviction is a predicate offense. See United States v. McVicar, 907 F.2d 1, 2 (1st Cir. 1990) (relying on conduct alleged in a presentence report and what robbery “typically involves,” concluding that robbery was a crime of violence); see also United States v. Martinez, 762 F.3d 127, 135-36 (1st Cir. 2014) (noting that the statement in
We address one other argument concerning Castro-Vazquez‘s burglary conviction.6 Castro-Vazquez contends that his burglary conviction was a misdemeanor rather than a felony punishable by imprisonment for over one year, thus preventing the conviction from being a predicate offense. See
As for Castro-Vazquez‘s arguments with respect to the robbery convictions, we conclude again that a remand is required in the light of Descamps. Puerto Rico‘s robbery statute criminalizes a person‘s “unlawfully tak[ing] personal property belonging to another in the immediate presence of said person and against his/her will by means of violence or intimidation.”
We decline on appeal to accept the government‘s invitation, presented for the first time in its Rule 28(j) letter, to decide whether unlawful entry was an element of the Puerto Rico burglary statute, whether the burglary offense was a felony or misdemeanor, and whether and to what extent violent physical force is an element of both divisible parts of the Puerto Rico robbery statute. See Ruskai v. Pistole, 775 F.3d 61, 66-67 (1st Cir. 2014) (Rule 28(j) “should not be used to introduce new arguments“). Upon remand, the district court should address in the first instance such questions. If on remand, the district court concludes that the guidelines calculation was erroneous and that an enhancement was not warranted, resentencing will be required. See United States v. Tavares, 705 F.3d 4, 25 (1st Cir. 2013). Here, there is a “reasonable likelihood ‘that, but for the error, the district court would have imposed a different, more favorable sentence.‘” United States v. Ortiz, 741 F.3d 288, 293-94 (1st Cir. 2014) (quoting United States v. Turbides-Leonardo, 468 F.3d 34, 39 (1st Cir. 2006)).
It remains to consider the residual clause in the guidelines’ definition of “crime of violence,” allowing a prior conviction to be a predicate offense where it “otherwise involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another.”
Moreover, although the government does not argue on appeal that Castro-Vazquez‘s prior drug convictions count as “controlled substance offenses” under
Finally, while Castro-Vazquez also argues on appeal that the district court did not abide by Rule 32‘s requirement that the court “verify” the defendant “read and discussed” the presentence report with his counsel, see
CONCLUSION
We affirm Castro-Vazquez‘s conviction, but we remand for further proceedings as to his sentence consistent with this opinion.
AFFIRMED-IN-PART, VACATED-IN-PART, AND REMANDED.