Justia U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

This case arose from a car accident between petitioner and another driver, who caused the accident while she was driving under the influence of alcohol. Petitioner sought a writ of mandamus after the district court denied restitution as a condition of the driver's probation.The Fourth Circuit held that it had subject matter jurisdiction over the petition pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 3771(d)(3). The court also held that the district court abused its discretion by failing to state why the burden of complexity or delay in sentencing outweighed petitioner's need for restitution, and this error harmed him because he received none of the requested restitution to which he may be entitled under the Victim and Witness Protection Act.The court also exercised its discretion to address certain issues that were likely to recur upon remand: United States v. Fountain should not be a guiding star for the lower court's balancing analysis on remand; in considering and balancing the statutory factors under section 3663(a)(1)(B)(ii), the district court may consider, among other factors, the availability of alternative civil remedies for petitioner's past lost earnings; and, in performing its section 3663(a)(1)(B)(ii) balancing analysis, the district court should confine its review to what petitioner requested—past lost earnings. View "In re: Carlos Brown" on Justia Law

The concurrent sentence doctrine is satisfied when the only potential harm to the defendant is grounded on unrealistic speculation. In this case, defendant alleged that the district court erred in applying the concurrent sentence doctrine because he would be exposed to the possibility of a collateral consequence if his firearm sentence were not reviewed and reduced.The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's application of the concurrent sentence doctrine in the circumstances presented to it. Nonetheless, after parties filed their briefs in this appeal, Congress enacted the First Step Act of 2018, and defendant subsequently claimed that leaving his firearm sentence unreviewed would also have the consequence of denying him relief under that Act. Given this development, the court remanded to allow the district court, in the first instance, to consider defendant's argument that he is eligible for a reduction of his drug-trafficking sentence under the First Step Act. View "United States v. Charles" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion to dismiss the indictment. Defendant had pleaded guilty to illegally being in the United States after having been removed after a felony conviction. The district court held that defendant failed to establish that the removal was fundamentally unfair and denied his motion to dismiss.The court held that when an expedited removal is alleged to be an element in a criminal prosecution, the defendant in that prosecution must, as a matter of due process, be able to challenge the element if he did not have a prior opportunity to do so. Because the rules attendant to expedited removal preclude review of the removal order, the defendant in a 8 U.S.C. 1326 prosecution premised on an expedited removal order under 8 U.S.C. 1225(b)(1)(A)(i) must be given the opportunity in the section 1326 prosecution to challenge the validity of that order. Because section 1225(b)(1)(D) strips courts in section 1326 prosecutions from hearing a defendant's challenge to an expedited removal element, the court held that this jurisdiction-stripping provision is unconstitutional.On the merits, the court held that defendant did not sufficiently demonstrate a reasonable probability that the Attorney General would have allowed him to withdraw his application for admission under section 1225(a)(4), and thus he failed to show prejudice, as required to demonstrate that his removal was fundamentally unfair. View "United States v. Silva" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit reversed defendant's conviction for knowingly making a false statement to a licensed firearms dealer in the acquisition of a firearm. The court held that it need not determine whether the expert testimony at issue was properly excluded because the evidence introduced at trial was insufficient to independently corroborate defendant's confession. Consequently, without the necessary corroboration of the confession, the prosecution failed to present sufficient independent evidence that a crime was committed, and where, as here, the prosecutor's failure to do so was "clear," the absence of substantial independent evidence cannot sustain the jury's verdict and required reversal. The court remanded with instructions to enter a judgment of acquittal. View "United States v. Rodriguez-Soriano" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit reversed the district court's denial of a petition for habeas relief under 28 U.S.C. 2241 and remanded with instructions to grant the writ. The court held that petitioner's current sentence stems from faulty arithmetic based on a now-obsolete scheme of statutory interpretation, and thus his petition met the requirements of section 2255(e), the savings clause. In this case, petitioner's conviction on Count IV—the second of his 18 U.S.C. 924(c) convictions—could not stand because it was not supported by an independent firearm possession under recent Tenth Circuit precedent. View "Hahn v. Moseley" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit held that it had jurisdiction over a petition for review of the IJ's determination that petitioner was removable, because petitioner had exhausted his administrative remedies.The court also held that petitioner's prior Virginia offense of participating in a criminal street gang was not categorically a crime involving moral turpitude. Therefore, petitioner's prior conviction could not be a basis for removing him. Accordingly, the court granted the petition for review, vacated the order of removal, and remanded with instructions. View "Rodriguez Cabrera v. Barr" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, an indigent state prisoner, filed three pro se civil rights actions in the district court against various employees of the South Carolina Department of Corrections and the City of Allendale. The Fourth Circuit joined the Ninth and Tenth Circuits to reaffirm that a district court's dismissal of a prisoner's complaint does not, in an appeal of that dismissal, qualify as a "prior" dismissal. Accordingly, plaintiff's motions to proceed in forma pauperis under the Prison Litigation Reform Act are granted. View "Taylor v. Grubbs" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's ruling on defendant's motion to dismiss the indictment. The court held that the premise of defendant's argument -- – that the purported filing defect in his case deprived the immigration court of authority to enter a removal order, so that he may collaterally challenge that order in subsequent criminal proceedings -- was incorrect. Rather, there was no defect, because the applicable regulations did not require that the information identified by defendant, a date and time for a subsequent removal hearing, be included in the "notice to appear" that was filed with an immigration court to initiate the proceedings. View "United States v. Cortez" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit vacated the district court's order granting petitioner's motion under Federal of Civil Procedure 60(b)(6), seeking to reopen the district court's final judgment dismissing the intellectual disability claim on the merits under 28 U.S.C. 2254(d). In this case, petitioner's Rule 60(b) motion filed in the district court asserted that his previous claim of intellectual disability was wrongly decided on the merits based upon Hall v. Florida, 572 U.S. 701 (2014), and his new ground for Rule 60(b) relief asserted that his previous claim of intellectual disability was wrongly decided on the merits based upon the state court's 2015 decision. The court held that these were habeas claims not properly brought in a Rule 60(b) motion and, if petitioner was to have a second chance to litigate the merits of his intellectual disability claim, he must do so under section 2244(b). Accordingly, the panel remanded with instructions to dismiss the motion. View "Richardson v. Thomas" on Justia Law

The Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's 28 U.S.C. 2255 motion to vacate, set aside or correct his sentence imposed after he pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography. Although the government could not successfully argue that the guilty plea or appeal waiver barred defendant's claim, the court held that defendant failed to show that it was more likely than not that no reasonable juror would have convicted him. Rather, a reasonable jury could have found that the video depicted a lascivious exhibition of the anus, genitals, or pubic area and convicted defendant of possessing child pornography. The court also held that counsel was not constitutionally deficient in failing to consult with defendant about taking an appeal, and his ineffective assistance claim failed. View "United States v. Courtade" on Justia Law