Juan Enrique Rodriguez v. United States

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[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
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No. 12-15100
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket Nos. 1:12-cv-20370-MGC,
1:10-cr-20488-MGC-5
JUAN ENRIQUE RODRIGUEZ,
Petitioner-Appellant,
versus
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Respondent-Appellee.
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Florida
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(July 24, 2014)
Before PRYOR, MARTIN, and FAY, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Juan Enrique Rodriguez, a federal prisoner proceeding pro se, appeals the
district judge’s denial of his habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2255. We affirm.
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I. BACKGROUND
A. Prior Convictions
On June 14, 1993, Rodriguez with counsel pled guilty to cocaine trafficking,
in violation of Florida Statute § 893.135(1)(b). He was sentenced to 15 years of
imprisonment. Pursuant to his plea agreement, upon surrender, his sentence would
be mitigated to the mandatory minimum under § 893.135(1)(b), 5 years of
imprisonment. On July 2, 1993, Rodriguez appeared before a state judge without
counsel and received the mitigated sentence.
In 1997, Rodriguez was convicted of conspiracy to possess with intent to
distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(a)(1) and 846. He was
sentenced to 135 months of imprisonment. His sentence subsequently was
reduced to 90 months of imprisonment, pursuant to the government’s Federal Rule
of Criminal Procedure 35 motion.
B. Conviction and Sentence
In 2009, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and the Miami-Dade
Police Department conducted a year-long investigation into the narcotics-
trafficking activities of Rodriguez’s co-defendant, Jose Enriquez. During that
investigation, Rodriguez was intercepted 182 times on court-authorized wiretapped
calls and participated in four cocaine transactions that involved a total of
approximately 1.5 kilograms of cocaine. Rodriguez and 15 co-defendants were
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indicted in June 2010. Rodriguez was charged with conspiracy to possess with
intent to distribute five or more kilograms of cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§
841(a)(1), (b)(1)(A)(ii), 846 (Count 1); possession with intent to distribute 500 or
more grams of cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B)(ii) (Counts
9 and 13); possession with intent to distribute 5 or more grams of cocaine base, in
violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A), (b)(1)(B)(iii) (Count 16); and possession
with intent to distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(C)
(Count 33).
In 2010, Rodriguez pled guilty to Count 33, possession with intent to
distribute cocaine. In January 2011, the district judge sentenced Rodriguez to 151
months of imprisonment, based on his status as a career offender, under U.S.S.G.
§ 4B1.1. Rodriguez’s career-offender status resulted from his two prior controlled-
substance offenses, including the 1993 Florida cocaine-trafficking conviction.
C. Habeas Petition
In 2012, Rodriguez filed a habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 and
alleged his counsel’s ineffective assistance for failing to challenge his career-
offender status, because his 1993 conviction was uncounseled and did not qualify
as a “controlled substance offense” under U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2(b). Rodriguez alleged
he had pled guilty in the 1993 Florida case in return for being released on bond
until he finished repairing his home, which had been damaged by a hurricane. The
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state had agreed to this arrangement on the condition that the state judge impose a
15-year imprisonment sentence, which would be mitigated to 5 years, when
Rodriguez surrendered to serve his sentence. After his release on bond,
Rodriguez’s counsel obtained an extension of his surrender date to July 2, 1993.
Rodriguez represents he returned to state court on July 2, 1993, without counsel,
whom he had been unable to reach, and intended to seek an additional extension.
Rodriguez asserted he had intended to withdraw his guilty plea if the state judge
denied a second extension. Because his counsel was not present, the state judge
imposed a 5-year sentence and remanded Rodriguez to custody. Rodriguez
contended he had been denied counsel at a critical stage of the state proceedings.
Because his counsel in his federal prosecution failed to argue the uncounseled state
conviction could not be used as a basis for a career-offender enhancement,
Rodriguez argued his counsel was ineffective.
Rodriguez also argued his state conviction did not qualify as a “controlled
substance offense” under the career-offender guidelines. He contended § 893.135
encompassed conduct, such as cocaine possession, that did not satisfy the U.S.S.G.
§ 4B1.2(b) definition of “controlled substance offense.” Rodriguez submitted a
copy of the state information in his 1993 Florida case, which alleged Rodriguez
“did knowingly sell, manufacture or deliver and/or was knowingly in actual or
constructive possession of” cocaine, in violation of § 893.135(1)(b). R1-8 at 15.
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He additionally argued his counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to
object to his career-offender enhancement.
A magistrate judge issued a Report and Recommendation (“R&R”),
recommending Rodriguez’s § 2255 motion be denied. In his R&R objections,
Rodriguez argued, for the first time, he had pled guilty to buying cocaine, but not
to possessing it, in his 1993 Florida case. The district judge adopted the R&R and
denied Rodriguez’s § 2255 motion. The judge granted a certificate of appealability
(“COA”) for Rodriguez’s claim that his counsel rendered ineffective assistance by
failing to object to his career-offender status, because his prior state conviction had
been uncounseled and did not qualify as a controlled-substance offense under the
career-offender Guidelines. This court denied Rodriguez’s request to enlarge the
scope of the COA. On appeal, Rodriguez argues the district judge erroneously
denied his claims that his counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to
object to his classification as a career offender on multiple grounds. 1
1
By failing to make any arguments on appeal to support his claim that his state surrender
proceeding constituted a “resentencing” entitling him to counsel, Rodriguez has abandoned this
issue. See Timson v. Sampson, 518 F.3d 870, 874 (11th Cir. 2008) (per curiam) (recognizing
that, although pro se briefs are to be construed liberally, a pro se litigant who offers no
substantive argument on an issue in his initial brief abandons that issue on appeal). Because they
are outside the scope of the COA, Rodriguez’s arguments that his counsel was ineffective for
failing to file a Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 35(a) motion to correct sentence, to file an
appeal, and to advise Rodriguez to file an appeal are not properly before us. See Jordan v. Sec’y,
Dep’t of Corr., 485 F.3d 1351, 1356 (11th Cir. 2007) (recognizing the law of this circuit
prohibits consideration of any issue not specified in the COA).
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II. DISCUSSION
We review de novo a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, which is a
mixed question of fact and law. Payne v. United States, 566 F.3d 1276, 1277 (11th
Cir. 2009) (per curiam). To establish ineffective assistance of counsel, Rodriguez
must show his (1) counsel’s performance was deficient, and (2) the deficient
performance prejudiced the defense. Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687,
104 S. Ct. 2052, 2064 (1984). Prejudice is a reasonable probability that, but for
counsel’s errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different. Id. at 694,
104 S. Ct. at 2068. The petitioner bears the burden of proof on both prongs of an
ineffective-assistance claim. Johnson v. Alabama, 256 F.3d 1156, 1176 (11th Cir.
2001).
To qualify as a career offender, a defendant must have at least two prior
felony convictions for either a crime of violence or a controlled-substance crime.
U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1(a)(3). A sentencing court cannot ignore or discount a prior
conviction that has not been invalidated in a prior proceeding, unless there was an
unwaived absence of counsel in the proceedings resulting in that conviction.
United States v. Phillips, 120 F.3d 227, 231 (11th Cir. 1997). In § 4B1.1,
“controlled substance offense” is defined as:
an offense under federal or state law, punishable by imprisonment for
a term exceeding one year, that prohibits the manufacture, import,
export, distribution, or dispensing of a controlled substance . . . or the
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possession of a controlled substance . . . with intent to manufacture,
import, export, distribute, or dispense.
U.S.S.G. § 4B1.2(b).
Florida’s cocaine-trafficking statute provides:
Any person who knowingly sells, purchases, manufactures, delivers,
or brings into [Florida], or who is knowingly in actual or constructive
possession of, 28 grams or more of cocaine, . . . or of any mixture
containing cocaine, but less than 150 kilograms of cocaine or any such
mixture, commits a felony of the first degree, which felony shall be
known as “trafficking in cocaine” . . . .
Fla. Stat. § 893.135(1)(b)1. Under the version of § 893.135(1)(b) in effect at the
time of Rodriguez’s arrest in his 1993 Florida case, a 5-year mandatory minimum
sentence applied to violations of § 893.135(1)(b) involving at least 200, but less
than 400, grams of cocaine. Id. § 893.135(1)(b)1.b. (1992).
We have held § 893.135(1)(b) necessarily infers an intent to distribute once
a defendant possesses 28 grams or more of cocaine, and that a prior conviction for
cocaine trafficking by possessing between 200 and 400 grams of the drug qualified
as a “serious drug offense” under the Armed Career Criminal Act, 18 U.S.C.
§ 924(e). United States v. James, 430 F.3d 1150, 1155-56 (11th Cir. 2005). We
subsequently determined, where a court is unable to determine the statutorily
prohibited act for which a defendant previously was convicted under
§ 893.135(1)(b), it must be assumed the prior conviction involved only the
purchase of a controlled substance, the least prohibited act under the statute.
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United States v. Shannon, 631 F.3d 1187, 1189 (11th Cir. 2011) (holding the
district judge erred by sentencing the defendant as a career offender based on a
prior § 893.135 conviction, because it could not be determined whether the prior
conviction merely involved buying cocaine, which would not qualify as a
“controlled substance offense” under § 4B1.2(b)). Had the district judge been able
to determine the prior § 893.135 conviction involved possessing cocaine—as
opposed to buying, which did not necessarily entail possessing—we recognized the
judge would have been entitled to infer an intent to distribute. See id. at 1189-90
& n.3 (citing James, 430 F.3d at 1152-56).
Rodriguez does not dispute he was represented by counsel, when he pled
guilty to and was sentenced for violating § 893.135(1)(b). He has cited no
authority for the proposition that a prior conviction may not form the basis for a
career-offender enhancement based solely on the absence of counsel during a
surrender proceeding in which a state judge mitigates a previously imposed
sentence in accordance with an existing plea agreement.
Regardless of whether he would have been entitled to counsel to assist with
a motion to withdraw his guilty plea in state court, Rodriguez has not alleged he
sought to extend the deadline for his surrender or informed the state judge he
wanted to withdraw his plea. Nor has Rodriguez alleged he told his federal
defense counsel he had intended to withdraw his plea if the state judge did not
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grant his request for an extension. Therefore, he has not met his burden of
showing either that his federal defense counsel performed deficiently by failing to
object to the use of his § 893.135 conviction as a basis for his career-offender
enhancemen, because it was “uncounseled,” or that such an objection would have
yielded a different result. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687, 694, 104 S. Ct. at 2064,
2068; Johnson, 256 F.3d at 1176.
Rodriguez also has not shown his § 893.135 conviction did not satisfy the
§ 4B1.2(b) definition of “controlled substance offense.” He has alleged no facts to
support his allegation that his § 893.135 conviction was for buying but not
possessing cocaine. He further has not alleged any facts suggesting his counsel
should have known he was convicted of buying but not possessing cocaine. The
charging document in his 1993 Florida case did not allege Rodriguez had bought
cocaine; instead, it alleged Rodriguez “did knowingly sell, manufacture or deliver
and/or was knowingly in actual or constructive possession of” cocaine. R1-8 at 15.
Similarly, nothing in the state judgment or sentencing document suggests the
conviction involved buying cocaine but not possessing it.
The district judge was entitled to infer an intent to distribute from the
amount of cocaine required to establish a violation of § 893.135. See James, 430
F.3d at 1155-56 (recognizing a violation of Florida’s drug trafficking statute, Fla.
Stat. § 893.135, constitutes a predicate offense because the “statute necessarily
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infers an intent to distribute [cocaine] once a defendant possesses 28 grams or
more”); see also Shannon, 631 F.3d at 1189-90 & n.3 (stating a violation of
Florida’s drug law is not a “controlled substance offense” under the Guidelines if
the conviction is for the “purchase” of a controlled substance with the intent to
distribute). Specifically, the judgment in his 1993 Florida case showed
Rodriguez’s mitigated 5-year sentence was the mandatory-minimum sentence
under § 893.135(1). Under the then-current version of § 893.135(1), a 5-year,
mandatory-minimum-imprisonment sentence applied to violations of
§ 893.135(1)(b) involving at least 200 but less than 400 grams of cocaine. Fla.
Stat. § 893.135(1)(b)1.b. (1992). Consequently, Rodriguez has not met his burden
of showing either his federal defense counsel performed deficiently by failing to
argue his § 893.135 conviction did not qualify as a “controlled substance offense”
under § 4B1.2(b) or, had his counsel made that argument, the result would have
been different. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687, 694, 104 S. Ct. at 2064, 2068;
Johnson, 256 F.3d at 1176.
AFFIRMED.
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