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Nature of Suit Code: 510
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Vacate Sentence
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 7, 2007 Decided October 9, 2007

No. 05-3129

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

EDDIE J. MATHIS,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 97cr00334-01)

Jenifer Wicks argued the cause and filed the briefs for

appellant.

Elizabeth H. Danello, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the

cause for appellee. With her on the brief were Jeffrey A. Taylor,

U.S. Attorney, and Roy W. McLeese, III, Assistant U.S.

Attorney.

Before: RANDOLPH and BROWN, Circuit Judges, and

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge.

USCA Case #05-3129 Document #1072152 Filed: 10/09/2007 Page 1 of 6
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RANDOLPH, Circuit Judge: A jury convicted Eddie Mathis

of several drug and money laundering offenses, the details of

which are described in our opinion affirming his convictions and

sentence. United States v. Mathis, 216 F.3d 18 (D.C. Cir. 2000).

This is an appeal from the district court’s denial of Mathis’s

motion, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255, to set aside his

convictions on the grounds that he was deprived of the effective

assistance of counsel and that the government knowingly offered

perjured testimony against him. 

Mathis distributed heroin and cocaine in the Washington,

D.C. area and laundered the proceeds. After his arraignment,

the government offered him a sentence of 262 to 327 months in

return for his plea of guilty to two charges: participating in a

drug conspiracy and a conspiracy to launder money. Without

doing any research, Mathis’s attorney assumed that his client

was a “career offender” assigned to criminal history category VI

under § 4B1.1 of the Sentencing Guidelines, and told him that

if he were convicted at trial he would not receive a significantly

higher sentence than the government offered in the plea deal.

According to Mathis, he relied on his attorney and rejected the

government’s offer. After the jury returned its guilty verdicts,

the court assigned Mathis to criminal history category III – not

category VI, as Mathis’s attorney had assumed. Finding that

Mathis’s offense level was 36, the court sentenced him to 293

months in prison – the maximum sentence for a category III

offender at that offense level. U.S.S.G. ch. 5, pt. A.

Mathis’s first claim arises from his attorney’s failure to

calculate his criminal history category. His attorney was

ineffective, he argues, because he did not evaluate whether

Mathis fell within criminal history category VI. And he suffered

prejudice because, had his attorney performed properly, the

attorney would have discovered that Mathis fell within category

USCA Case #05-3129 Document #1072152 Filed: 10/09/2007 Page 2 of 6
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III and could have persuaded the government to offer a sweeter

deal.

Deficient performance and prejudice, the two prerequisites

for a successful Sixth Amendment claim, are often mixed

questions of law and fact. See Strickland v. Washington, 466

U.S. 668, 687, 698 (1984). Whatever the ultimate standard of

review might be for these questions, see United States v. Toms,

396 F.3d 427, 432-33 (D.C. Cir. 2005), the district court’s

factual findings made in the course of judging an ineffective

assistance of counsel claim may be set aside only if clearly

erroneous, as Strickland recognized, 466 U.S. at 698 (citing

Rule 52(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure). See United

States v. Askew, 88 F.3d 1065, 1070 (D.C. Cir. 1996); Adams v.

Jago, 703 F.2d 978, 980 (6th Cir. 1983); Washington v. Watkins,

655 F.2d 1346, 1354 (5th Cir. 1981). 

We shall assume that the performance of Mathis’s trial

attorney was deficient. The district court so ruled and the

government does not contest that ruling. To establish prejudice,

Mathis must also prove “that there is a reasonable probability

that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the

proceeding would have been different. A reasonable probability

is a probability sufficient to undermine confidence in the

outcome.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694. We have noticed before

that using “reasonable” probability in this context “may lead us

in a circle: one cannot be confident of the outcome when there

is a ‘reasonable’ probability that it may be wrong, and a

‘reasonable’ probability is one high enough to undermine

confidence in the outcome.” United States v. Bowie, 198 F.3d

905, 909 (D.C. Cir. 1999). Despite this difficulty, we can be

sure – in light of a factual finding of the district court – that

Mathis would not have obtained a shorter sentence even if his

attorney had correctly computed his criminal history category.

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At the § 2255 hearing, the prosecutor testified that he

offered a sentencing range of 262 to 327 months independent of

any determination the court might make about Mathis’s offense

level or criminal history category. Responding to a question

about Mathis’s desire for a sentence of ten to fifteen years, the

prosecutor stated that the government would have proceeded to

trial rather than agree to such a sentence. The district court

credited the prosecutor’s testimony and found that Mathis would

not have gotten a better deal even if his attorney had done an

accurate computation.

 

If Mathis had pleaded to the indictment, which would have

reduced his offense level under § 3E1.1 of the Guidelines, he

would have done so without knowing the amount of drugs for

which he would be held responsible. When the government

proposed its plea agreement, Mathis’s indictment contained two

counts on which he was later acquitted and two counts not

submitted to the jury, all of which involved possession with

intent to distribute heroin or cocaine. As a result, it is

conceivable that pleading to the indictment would have

increased his sentence. 

Because Mathis’s speculation regarding a more favorable

plea agreement does not undermine our confidence in the

outcome of his prosecution, Mathis’s claim fails the Strickland

test. In United States v. Gaviria, we held that to succeed on a

claim of ineffective assistance arising from plea negotiations,

the defendant had to show that he would have accepted the

government’s plea offer had his attorney advised him correctly

about his criminal history category. 116 F.3d 1498, 1514 (D.C.

Cir. 1997). We remanded to determine the probability that the

defendant could have and would have taken the offer. Id. In

United States v. Day, on which Mathis relies, the defendant

claimed that he would have taken an alleged plea offer had he

known that he would be sentenced as a career offender. 969

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 A defendant is permitted to bring an ineffective assistance

claim for the first time in his § 2255 hearing, Massaro v. United

States, 538 U.S. 500, 508-09 (2003), even though our court would

permit him to raise the claim in his direct appeal, United States v.

Weaver, 281 F.3d 228, 233-34 (D.C. Cir. 2002); United States v.

Geraldo, 271 F.3d 1112, 1115-16 (D.C. Cir. 2001).

F.2d 39, 40 (3d Cir. 1992). The Third Circuit remanded to

determine whether the alleged plea offer existed. Id. at 44, 48.

In both cases, the court of appeal recognized that the

government’s negotiating strategy was a question of fact for the

district court. Here, the district court held an evidentiary hearing

and found that the government was not willing to offer Mathis

a more favorable plea. That finding was not clearly erroneous.

Because Mathis failed to show prejudice, the district court

correctly refused to set aside his convictions. 

Mathis also claims that his convictions should be vacated

in view of the prosecution’s introduction of perjured testimony.

Eugene Matthews testified for the government that Mathis sold

him drugs regularly from late 1987 to 1989. This could not have

been accurate. Mathis was incarcerated from January 1987 to

April 1988. On cross-examination, Mathis’s attorney

challenged Matthews’s testimony on this basis and got him to

admit that he might have been “mistaken about the time frame.”

Mathis should have raised his perjured testimony claim on

direct appeal. See Bousley v. United States, 523 U.S. 614, 621

(1998). To overcome his default,1

 he must show cause for, and

prejudice from, his failure to raise the claim earlier. Id. at 622.

Mathis does neither. Although ineffective assistance of counsel

constitutes cause, Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 753-54

(1991), Mathis’s appellate attorney was not constitutionally

ineffective. The attorney reviewed the record with care and

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decided that the issue was not worth pursuing because Matthews

may simply have been mistaken and because the record did not

suggest that the government had intentionally offered false

testimony. Since Mathis’s claim lacked evidentiary support and

since his trial attorney effectively countered Matthews’s

testimony, appellate counsel’s failure to raise the claim did not

prejudice Mathis.

Affirmed.

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