please the court counsel for the government right spears for the defendant williams the record before this court establishes serious confusion on the part of my client mr williams as the nature of the conspiracy charge against  and the consequences of pleaded guilty to that charge there is no other way to read this record this court hasn't poor district courts to actively engage with the defendant during the plea quality co ensure that the defendant understands the charges and the consequences of pleading guilty and that didn't happen in this case the record shows that during the plea colloquy mr williams clarified at every turn his understanding of what  i'm not disputing that your honor and you also you're not you're not disputing that the elements were described accurately you know that the elements of a rico conspiracy were accurately described right that's correct your honor the government did describe those elements correctly but what has to be read in the context of that is the manner in which the district court narrowed the scope of the conspiracy so the question here is whether the defended mr williams understood the scope of the conspiracy that he was pleading guilty to in light of his own allocution and to the district courts repeated efforts to narrow the scope of that conspiracy i was going to ask the follow up question and it pertains to some of what you're saying so let me ask it now if his plea allocution was adequate why isn't all of the rest matter of guideline calculation whether this is indeed related conduct to the conspiracy crime he pleaded guilty to because it's not required that he himself have committed the predicate act for it to calc for it to be considered as related conduct in a conspiracy i don't think you're just speeding that and as i understand it his plea agreement stipulated to a guideline calculation that included the murder the leadership role the other things that he's because the defendant didn't understand the nature of conspiracy that he was plead guilty to nor the consequences of the conspiracy that that he was pleading guilty to the district court never explained that the government was seeking to hold mr williams accountable for a murder that in fact he had no direct participation and it is my right that he stipulated to that as a as  a fact that would inform his side like calculation your honor the plea agreement does include a stipulation to that effect but this court is held in united states versus lloyd that general mentioned to a plea agreement in the context of a drastically you're saying never a defend your honor i don't believe that position we're taking it is far afield in any way from the precedent of this court what needed to happen here is that the defendant needed to understand that he was potentially exposed to  the murder guideline in a mere reference to the plea agreement without the district court explaining the nature of the guidelines calculation is what resulted in a plea here that was not nobody it was not a lot of under your reading  it wasn't reasonably foreseeable to him that these other crimes were part of that rico conspiracy you always get to argue that with respect to a conspiracy that you shouldn't be held accountable for confederates conduct that wasn't reasonably forseeable to you but that that's not your argument and it certainly wasn't a district court right that's that's close to the yard i mean you know what the argument here is is that he didn't understand that he was sitting potentially subjected to a a sentence that would include the murder guidelines i mean he what was clear from the police was him which is emphasized by the district court repeatedly was that he was  the narrow version of the rico conspiracy that included predicate acts of marijuana sales i'm not sure i understand how you can say he did not understand that he could be subjected to that bad lie when he your honor correct but the general mentioned to the please read it which contained the stipulation was not enough in a situation here where you're going from marijuana based rico conspiracy to only a defendant accountable for murder it's not asking too much under rule levon under basic jurisprudence of this court for the district court to go to the next step and say do you understand that you were potentially exposed to the murder guidelines you realize that that's in your plea agreement and th articulate for the defendant if not specific predicates at least kalam look if there are other predicate crimes committed as part of this conspiracy beyond that to use just did it to you can required in the room which case boyd i think is clearly distinguish a where have we ever said that before well i think more it touches on it in so far as it talks about the importance in the in the context of a conspiracy of making sure that the defend realizes fully the implications and scope of the conspiracy the government decided in its brief united states versus andre's which talks about the need to make sure the senate has read and understands the charge and discussed it counsel and of course there's also united states versus johnson which talks about the importance of when there's an ambiguity between the plea agreement and remarks being made on the record by the district i'm or johnson involved  fairly to tell the defendants putting a mandatory life count i mean that's completely different in this context it's not completely different in so far as i understand is a much more extreme circumstance but that is the issue identified there was the ambiguity that need to inform the defendant of the consequences of pleading guilty here ensuring that the defendant understood that he was that the government would seek to impose the sentence based on the murder guideline that the court could potentially do that is all that i'm to the extent of his providing but that there were no objections to that there were no objections to that he did note in his sentencing submission that he should not be held responsible for the murder because he did it he lacked direct participation that was just saying i was involved in the shooting he never said i gave the gun right that's correct and also at the end of the sentence he attributed to his lawyer essentially raze like an ineffective assistance of counsel coin which is not before us saying my court my name is maureen komi and i represent the united states on this appeal as i did in the district court or to the judgment of conviction should be affirmed st the district court did not claim lee air when determining that the defendant understood the nature of the racketeering conspiracy charge to which he pled guilty and nd the district court did not err in advising the defendant of the consequences of pleading guilty now the defense arguments here tend to ally those two issues the question of the nature of the charge and the consequences of pleading guilty and i think it's important to disentangle them because as your honour's conversation with defense counsel just reflected the complaint that the district judge didn't tell the defendant that his guidelines could take into account conduct beyond that what what was included in his allocution really goes to the consequences of pleading guilty so starting with the nature of the charge the record makes clear that the defendant was told and clearly understood in multiple different ways the basic elements of the racketeering conspiracy contained in count one of the indictment and i've asked you what i what i understand  primary argument which is either when the government suggested on the record that the two predicate acts on which it was going to rely if the case went to trial were homicide and he suggests that that gave him reason to think that that was all that was he was going to be held accountable for this what struck me about this is so that of course you don't have to prove any racket it adequately clear to the district court what your position was on this conspiracy cried help me out so your honor i do think that the government made clear the four basic the basic elements of racketeering which was the existence of an enterprise that affected interstate commerce and that the defend it knowingly became a part of that enterprise and agree that at least two acts of racketeering would have courage and there was a colloquy between government counsel and judge from on in which said from unclarified the objects of which were what the objects of which well i think what judge roman was seeking to understand was whether the objects could be just marijuana distribution i think he wanted the defendant so argument now is that's the only argument is that it's so focused on the marijuana that that's all he thought he was pleading guilty to i think that's why it's important to separate the nature of the charge and the consequences of pleading guilty the nature of the charge that he pled guilty to based on his allocution was a conspiracy that focused on distribution of marijuana but then when considering what the appropriate guidelines would be at sentencing and what the relevant conduct was for that conspiracy that he admitted to being a part of at that point it was appropriate for the judge to consider all of the facts that were stipulated to in the pre sentence report and so that's why i think that this complaint really goes to the consequences of pleading guilty as i believe your honour's have already pointed out rule eleven requires nothing more than ensuring that the defendant understands the maximum penalty and there's no dispute that he understood that the maximum sentence was twenty years here and understands that the district judge must consider the guidelines and the three thousand five hundred and fifty three a factors again there's no dispute the judge from on put that on the record and made sure the defendant understood that what the defense is really asking this court to say is that there's an obligation under will leaven for a district judge to tell a defendant i understand what you are saying you did i understand that you are describing a conspiracy that only involved marijuana but you should be aware that the court can consider additional conduct under the guidelines and that you may be exposed to additional that your guidelines range may be increased as a result of the extra conduct there is nothing in the text of ruhleben that requires a district court to provide that kind of advice and it would far extend beyond what this court has held as required in a rule eleven proceeding in fact this oh yes your honor is coming is it if it's not required by the ruling i think you are aware that a lot of district judges in this type of situation would specifically especially since in the plea agreement explain to a defendant even though you only pleading guilty to one robbery before me today your plea agreement you agree that you can be held responsible for ten robberies or ten pupils whatever the other relevant conduct might be and if the court doesn't do that often the prosecutor will stand up to that we cite often distinguishes between what is the baseline requirement under rule of and what is best practices i don't dispute your honor that it might have been better practice for the district court or the government to have gone through and more explicitly stated on the record the guidelines that the government and the defense had stipulated to in the plea agreement but does that does not create plain error and i would also note your honor that there is evidence in the record that the defendant was not actually shocked or surprised that his guidelines calculation included murder guidelines and additional enhanced ments and the most obvious sign of that is that when the defendant reviewed the p s r which he told judge roman he had done on the record at sentencing he didn't all of a sudden say i need to withdraw my plea i didn't understand that you could hold me responsible for this he didn't object to those facts or to that guideline calculation and we know that he knew how to ask his counsel to object because defense counsel at sentencing did object to one aspect of the criminal history guidelines and did get the p s r adjusted to reflect a lower criminal history category and so i don't think this is case where a defendant was in fact surprised to learn that the guidelines that were set forth in the plea agreement he signed were in fact going to be considered by the district judge when imposing sentence so even though even if a defendant didn't understand those specific enhanced with the could be applied it wouldn't be a rule eleven violation on this record that is not the case that we have here the defendant was informed that those were the guidelines that would be considered at sentencing and he expressed no surprise about that when asked about the p s r during sentencing i would finally note your honor is that because this is on a plane error review the defendant would also need to demonstrate a reasonable probability that he would not have pled guilty had judge romantics presley on the record said to him do you understand that i can consider conduct beyond what you're allocute into here and we submit that he cannot meet that here the evidence against him was overwhelming it included witnesses and physical evidence and he would have faced a much higher penalty had he proceeded to trial the plead green meant that he entered into kept his exposure at twenty years meaning that his guidelines range was much lower than it would have been  under the charges that he was initially facing and allowed him to avoid a mandatory minimum so given all of those factors your honor we believe that the judgment of conviction should be affirmed unless your honour's have any further questions for me otherwise rest on my submission plea and knowing the consequences of pleading guilty to that offense it's hard to i think and this case demonstrates why because they really are interrelated and that's their patient a rose by virtue of the manner in which explain to mr williams that yes you're pleading guilty to predicate acts of marijuana but i understand that the defendant is if the government is seeking to hold you responsible for the murder guidelines and i potentially might be able to do that i don't know because i haven't read the pre sentence report it's too early to to predict what my sentence might be but the district court could say you're potentially exposed to that under these circumstances you need to understand that  guidelines have been if only marijuana predicates had informed the guideline calculation they don't have the precise calculations are probably not but they would be well below the fifteen years based on cite i think so at i question to you is how could your client ever have thought that when he stipulated to a twenty year guideline calculation not only before sentence but then didn't object based on the murder and when his p s r calculated his guidelines by reference to the murder he signs the one and he doesn't object to the other and i am hard pressed to accept the conclusion that he did understand that was going to inform his sentence your honor respectfully the most compelling evidence of what the defendant understood is what he said and what he said that his plea and what he said it was and the record as a whole the