Justia Criminal Law Opinion Summaries

The district court granted petitioner's petition for a 28 U.S.C. 2254 writ of habeas corpus, concluding that petitioner had ineffective assistance of trial counsel and that California's Court of Appeal's application of the Strickland v. Washington standard was unreasonable. The district court also concluded that the Court of Appeal's factual findings in support of its decision were unreasonable. Counsel failed to timely object to an unsworn witness's testimony, knowing at the time that the witness had decided to change his story, and, therefore, counsel waived any objections he might of had to the testimony. The court affirmed, concluding that the Court of Appeal's conclusion that counsel's decision not to object in a timely fashion was acceptably tactical and not error was objectively unreasonable; the Court of Appeal's factual determinations were unsupported by the record and thus demonstrably and clearly erroneous; and petitioner was prejudiced by these errors. View "Griffin v. Harrington" on Justia Law

Defendant pleaded guilty to possession of a firearm by a felon and was sentenced to 46-months in prison. The principal issue on appeal concerned U.S.S.G. 4A1.2(d)(2)(A), which assigned criminal history points for crimes that were committed when the defendant was a juvenile. The court concluded that consideration of juvenile criminal history in determining the sentence for an adult convicted of a crime did not violate the Eighth Amendment. The court also concluded that the district court's application of the modified categorical approach to determine that defendant's prior attempted burglary conviction was for a "crime of violence" did not survive the Supreme Court's recent decision in Descamps v. United States. Further, the government has never contended in this litigation that the burglary statute was categorically a crime of violence. Accordingly, the court vacated the sentence and remanded for resentencing without the "crime of violence" enhancement. View "United States v. Edwards" on Justia Law

Defendant pleaded guilty to knowingly filing false federal income tax returns. On appeal, defendant challenged the district court's revocation of her probation. The court concluded that the record demonstrated defendant's fugitive status. Because defendant's fugitive status tolled her Probation Term from July 2010 until she was found and arrested by federal authorities in April 2012, the time added to her Probation Term extended it well beyond its original expiration date. Consequently, the Revocation hearing occurred during defendant's Probation Term and the district court had jurisdiction to revoke defendant's probation. Accordingly, the district court did not abuse its discretion in sentencing defendant and the court affirmed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Grant" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of illegal reentry after deportation and subsequently appealed his sentence of 30 months' imprisonment. The district court concluded that his 2005 Illinois conviction for aggravated criminal sexual abuse was a crime of violence under U.S.S.G. 2L1.2(b)(1)(A)(ii). In Descamps v. United States, the Supreme Court clarified the proper application of the modified categorical approach. Applying Descamps, the court concluded that the district court erred in holding that defendant's crime was a crime of violence, an error which resulted from the district court's application of the modified categorical approach when it compared the elements of defendant's offense with the elements of its federal analogue. Because the error was not harmless, the court vacated and remanded for resentencing. View "United States v. Acosta-Chavez" on Justia Law

Defendant pleaded guilty to five counts of mail fraud and two counts of wire fraud. On appeal, defendant challenged his conviction, sentence, order of restitution, and imposition of a special condition. The court concluded that there was no breach of the plea agreement where the government's arguments at sentencing were directed to the specific objective identified in and permitted by the plea agreement; notice under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 32(h) was not required in this instance where the district court's outside the Guidelines sentence was the result of a variance, not a departure, where it relied on 8 U.S.C. 3553(a) factors; the district court did not err by failing to sua sponte determine the sufficiency and reliability of the statements proffered by the government in support of restitution for newly-discovered victims; and the district court did not abuse its discretion in imposing Special Condition No. 8, which required that defendant apply all monies received to his court-ordered financial obligations, to ensure that the victims received restitution should defendant receive any sort of unexpected financial gain. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Moschella" on Justia Law

Defendants were convicted of obstruction of justice for their involvement in leaking information regarding an FBI investigation to members of the Hells Angels gang and thus facilitating their criminal enterprise. On appeal, defendants claimed that they could not be convicted under the obstruction of justice statute, 18 U.S.C. 1512, because their alleged obstruction of an FBI investigation did not qualify as obstruction of an "official proceeding" under the statute. In light of the plain meaning of the term "proceeding," its use in the grammatical context of the "official proceeding" definition, and the broader statutory context, the court concluded that a criminal investigation was not an "official proceeding" under the obstruction of justice statute. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded so the district court could enter a judgment of acquittal on those charges. View "United States v. Ermoian" on Justia Law

Defendant was indicted for possession with intent to distribute marijuana on March 24, 2010. On May 18, 2011, a superseding indictment issued adding a charge of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute marijuana. Defendant was found guilty of the conspiracy charge and subsequently appealed, raising claims concerning the Speedy Trial Act, 18 U.S.C. 3161 et seq., and the use of a drug-detection dog. The court held that charges in a superseding indictment not required to be joined with the original charges come with a new seventy-day clock under the Act. In this instance, defendant's prosecution for the conspiracy charge complied with the Act because trial commenced within seventy days of the superseding indictment. The court concluded, however, that the government's failure to turn over a full complement of dog-history discovery was an error that was not harmless. Therefore, the court reversed the district court's denial of defendant's motion to suppress and vacated defendant's conviction. View "United States v. Thomas" on Justia Law

Petitioner, sentenced to 254 years of imprisonment for nonhomicide crimes he committed when he was sixteen years old, petitioned for review of the district court's denial of his petition for federal habeas corpus relief. In Graham v. Florida, the Supreme Court held that the Constitution prohibits States from sentencing a juvenile offender to life in prison without parole for a nonhomicide crime. The court concluded that Graham established a new rule of law that was retroactively applicable on collateral review under Teague v. Lane. Further, the state court's decision was contrary to clearly established Federal law set forth in Graham where defendant's sentence was materially indistinguishable from the sentence in Graham and where defendant's nonhomicide crimes were materially indistinguishable from the nonhomicide crimes in Graham. Accordingly, the court reversed and remanded with instructions to grant defendant's petition. View "Moore v. Biter" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed her sentence stemming from her conviction of crimes related to her involvement in the Ichihara drug network. The court concluded that the district court failed to use the Sentencing Guidelines as a starting point for its analysis but, instead, selected the sentence first and then placed defendant in the Guidelines range that would allow the sentence; the district court incorrectly calculated the base offense level because it improperly held that defendant had pled guilty to transporting methamphetamine of a certain purity level; and the district court failed to calculate the revised statutory mandatory minimum sentence under 18 U.S.C. 3553(e) and, therefore, the court could not determine the legality or appropriateness of defendant's 96-month sentence. Therefore, the court vacated and remanded for resentencing. On remand, the court advised the district court to give further consideration at resentencing to defendant's age and the likelihood that she will die in prison. View "United States v. Lee" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of mail fraud and theft by an officer or employee of a gaming establishment on Indian lands. On appeal, defendant challenged his conviction. The court concluded that the location of the gaming establishment was not an element of the offense under 18 U.S.C. 1168(b) and that the indictment adequately alleged mail fraud and theft by an officer or employee of a gaming establishment on Indian lands; there was no error in the jury instructions where the instructions correctly defined "intent to defraud;" and there was no error in the admission of prior acts evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b). Accordingly, the court affirmed defendant's convictions. View "United States v. Livingston" on Justia Law