The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of the defendant’s motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, holding that despite counsel’s deficient performance in failing to advise the defendant of potential exposure to a life sentence, make a plea offer to the government as directed by the defendant, or convey the government’s time-limited plea offer to the defendant, the defendant was not prejudiced by the deficient performance based on his rejection of two other plea offers from the government.

The Court held that a movant under 28 U.S.C. 2255 is not entitled to discovery prior to filing his or her motion.

The Court affirmed the district court’s denial of the defendant’s second § 2255 motion, holding that the defendant’s federal second-degree murder offenses, based on pointing a firearm at boat passengers and throwing them overboard, was a “crime of violence” under § 924(c)’s residual and elements clause.

The Court vacated the defendant’s sentence and conviction after finding that he received ineffective assistance of counsel when trial counsel advised him that his plea would only trigger his possible deportation, where deportation was actually mandatory and the evidence reflected that the defendant would not have pleaded guilty if he knew deportation was mandatory. The Court added that the boilerplate language int he plea agreement indicating that deportation was mandatory was not dispositive.

A majority of the Court voted against granting a rehearing en banc. The Court produced three dissents and three opinions concurring in the decision to deny granting a rehearing en banc. This decision leaves in place the prior panel opinion regarding the ACCA and the binding authority of prior panel orders on Section 2255 petitions as applied to future, non-2255 cases.

United States v. Albert Pickett, No. 17-13476 (February 20, 2019) The Court remanded the defendant’s second § 2255 motion since the defendant did not have an opportunity to show his conviction was based solely on the ACCA’s residual clause prior to the Eleventh Circuit announcing the heightened standard in Beeman. 28 USC 2255/ACCA – Defendant’s …

United States v. Albert Pickett Read More »

The Court affirmed the denial of a defendant’s second § 2255 motion which alleged that the defendant’s conviction under the residual clause of § 924(c) was unconstitutional. The Court held that the defendant’s motion was not based on a “new rule of constitutional law” given this Court’s holdings in Ovalles II and In Re: Garrett.

The Court held that an application to file a successive motion under § 2255, brought by a defendant convicted under § 924(c) and based on Johnson and Dimaya, was not based on a “new rule of constitutional law,” since the Eleventh Circuit held en banc in Ovalles that “crime of violence” under § 924(c) is not void-for-vagueness. The Court also held that the “conduct-based approach” to § 924(c) announced in Ovalles did not create a “new rule of constitutional rule.”

The Court affirmed the district court’s denial of the defendant’s § 2255 motion, holding that the defendant’s Johnson claim was not a “new rule of constitutional law that was previously unavailable” since the defendant included a Johnson claim in his first § 2255, which were procedurally defaulted.