United States v. Joseph Frank Cantu

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FILED
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
________________________ ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
MAR 30, 2006
No. 05-14089 THOMAS K. KAHN
Non-Argument Calendar CLERK
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 03-14007-CR-KMM
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
JOSEPH FRANK CANTU,
Defendant-Appellant.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Florida
_________________________
(March 30, 2006)
Before DUBINA, CARNES and PRYOR, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Appellant Joseph Frank Cantu appeals his conviction and sentence for
conspiracy to manufacture five grams or more of methamphetamine, in violation of
21 U.S.C. § 846. In connection with a 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion to vacate, the
district court found that Cantu’s attorney at his first sentencing hearing in 2003 did
not file a timely notice of appeal as Cantu had requested. Thus, the district court
vacated his sentence and, during a second sentencing hearing, re-imposed the same
sentence to provide Cantu the opportunity to file a direct appeal. On appeal, Cantu
argues that the district court erred under United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220,
125 S. Ct. 738, 160 L. Ed. 2d 621 (2005), in sentencing him at his second
sentencing hearing to the sentence previously imposed on him because, at his first
hearing, the district court did not consider the Guidelines as advisory. Cantu also
argues that he was denied the effective assistance of counsel at various stages in his
criminal proceeding.
Booker Challenge
In United States v. Phillips, 225 F.3d 1198, 1201 (11th Cir. 2000), we
explained the procedure for district courts to follow when granting a § 2255 motion
based on counsel’s failure to file a direct appeal:
(1) the criminal judgment from which the out-of-time appeal is to be
permitted should be vacated; (2) the same sentence should then be
reimposed; (3) upon reimposition of that sentence, the defendant
should be advised of all the rights associated with an appeal from any
criminal sentence; and (4) the defendant should also be advised that
the time for filing a notice of appeal from that re-imposed sentence is
ten days, which is dictated by [Fed.R.App.P.] 4(b)(1)(A)(i).
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In this case, the district court determined that Cantu should be permitted another
opportunity to file a notice of appeal of his sentence because his attorney earlier
failed to file a timely notice of appeal after being requested to do so. The court
followed the procedure outlined in Phillips and held a second sentencing hearing
for Cantu in 2005, in which the court re-imposed the same sentence on him.
Because the district court expressed that it was limited in its power on resentencing
and re-imposed the same sentence previously given to Cantu in 2003 for the sole
purpose of allowing him to file a timely notice of appeal, we consider Cantu’s
sentence as being imposed before Booker and analyze his claims on appeal
accordingly.
Because Cantu did not raise a Booker claim at his sentencing hearings, we
review his claim for plain error only. See United States v. Dowling, 403 F.3d 1242,
1246-47 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 126 S. Ct. 462 (2005). Under a plain error
analysis, a defendant must show “(1) error, (2) that is plain, and (3) that affects
substantial rights.” Id. at 1247 (quotations omitted). If the defendant is able to
make a showing of all three conditions, we then may exercise our discretion to
notice the error if the error “seriously affects the fairness, integrity, or public
reputation of judicial proceedings.” Id. (quotations omitted). We have held that, in
the context of Booker error, the plain error test is satisfied only when the defendant
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can show that “‘there is a reasonable probability of a different result if the
guidelines had been applied in an advisory instead of a binding fashion . . . .’” Id.(quoting United States v. Rodriguez, 398 F.3d 1291, 1301 (11th Cir.), cert. denied
125 S. Ct. 2935 (2005)); see also United States v. Fields, 408 F.3d 1356, 1360-61
(11th Cir.) (explaining that a sentence at the low end of the Guidelines range does
not necessarily indicate that the district court would have sentenced the defendant
outside of the Guidelines if the court considered the Guidelines as advisory), cert.
denied, 126 S. Ct. 221 (2005).
In Booker, the Supreme Court concluded that the mandatory nature of the
Sentencing Guidelines rendered them incompatible with the Sixth Amendment’s
guarantee to the right to a jury trial. Booker, 543 U.S. at 231-35, 125 S. Ct. at 749-
51. The Supreme Court explained that, to preserve Congress’s intent in enacting
the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, two specific sections of the Act must be
excised – 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b)(1) (requiring a sentence within the Guideline range,
absent a departure) and 18 U.S.C. § 3742(e) (establishing standards of review on
appeal, including de novo review of departures from the applicable Guideline
range) – thereby effectively rendering the Guidelines advisory only. Id. at 259,
125 S. Ct. at 764. Based on the Supreme Court’s holding in Booker, we have
stated that statutory error occurs when a defendant is sentenced under a mandatory
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Guidelines system. See United States v. Shelton, 400 F.3d 1325, 1329-31 (11th
Cir. 2005).
The district court committed only statutory error under Booker in sentencing
him. Cantu was sentenced to the highest point of his applicable Guideline range,
and there is no indication from the record of his first sentencing hearing that the
district court would have considered a sentence below his applicable Guideline
range. Therefore, since the record does not show a reasonable probability that the
district court would have imposed a lesser sentence on Cantu had the Guidelines
been advisory, Cantu’s substantial rights were not affected by the court’s treatment
of the Guidelines as mandatory, and the district court did not commit plain error.
See Dowling, 403 F.3d at 1247; Fields, 408 F.3d at 1360-61. Accordingly, we
affirm Cantu’s conviction and sentence.
Ineffective Assistance of Counsel
“[A] claim of ineffective assistance of counsel may not be raised on direct
appeal where the claim has not been heard by the district court nor a factual record
developed.” United States v. Khoury, 901 F.2d 948, 969 (11th Cir. 1990), modified
on other grounds by, 910 F.2d 713 (11th Cir. 1990). The Supreme Court has
reasoned:
[w]hen an ineffective-assistance claim is brought on direct appeal,
appellate counsel and the court must proceed on a trial record not
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developed precisely for the object of litigating or preserving the claim
and thus often incomplete or inadequate for this purpose. . . . The
evidence introduced at trial. . . will be devoted to issues of guilt or
innocence, and the resulting record in many cases will not disclose the
facts necessary to decide either prong of the Strickland [v.
Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S. Ct. 2052, 2064, 2068, 80 L.
Ed. 2d 674 (1984)] analysis.
Massaro v. United States, 538 U.S. 500, 504-505, 123 S. Ct. 1690, 1694, 155 L.
Ed. 2d 714 (2003). Therefore, we will consider an ineffective assistance claim on
direct appeal only if the record is sufficiently developed. See United States v.
Perez-Tosta, 36 F.3d 1552, 1563 (11th Cir. 1994) (“It is settled law in this circuit
that a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel cannot be considered on direct
appeal if the claims were not first raised before the district court and if there has
been no opportunity to develop a record of evidence relevant to the merits of the
claim.”). The ineffective assistance claims may be pursued in a 28 U.S.C. § 2255proceeding. Id.In this case, when the district court granted Cantu’s § 2255 motion with
respect to his claim of ineffective assistance of counsel for failing to file a notice of
appeal, the court ordered that the other claims presented in Cantu’s § 2255 motion
be dismissed without prejudice. We decline to address Cantu’s remaining
ineffective assistance of counsel claims because the record is not sufficiently
developed with respect to these claims. See Khoury, 901 F.2d at 969.
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Accordingly, we dismiss the appeal as to this issue.
Conviction and Sentence AFFIRMED; DISMISS in part.
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