Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-11-03024/USCOURTS-caDC-11-03024-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Michael P.S. Scanlon
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 14, 2011 Decided January 20, 2012

No. 11-3024

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

MICHAEL P.S. SCANLON,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:05-cr-00411-1)

Stephen L. Braga argued the cause and filed the briefs for

appellant.

Demetra Lambros, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice,

argued the cause for appellee. With her on the brief was

Nathaniel B. Edmonds, Trial Attorney. Roy W. McLeese III,

Assistant U.S. Attorney, entered an appearance.

Before: SENTELLE, Chief Judge, TATEL, Circuit Judge, and

EDWARDS, Senior Circuit Judge.

Opinion for the Court filed by Chief Judge SENTELLE.

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SENTELLE, Chief Judge: Michael Scanlon appeals the

denial by the district court of his “motion to amend or modify

his plea agreement.” Because courts are not authorized to order

modification or amendment of plea agreements, we affirm the

denial of his motion.

Background

In 2005, the appellant, Michael P.S. Scanlon, pled guilty to

a one-count information charging a conspiracy with three

objects: bribery of federal officials; money-or-property mail and

wire fraud; and honest services mail and wire fraud in violation

of, inter alia, 18 U.S.C. § 1346. The information Scanlon pled

guilty to set forth the following scenario. A Washington

lobbyist whose clients included Native American Indian tribes

interested in operating gambling casinos persuaded some of

those clients to hire a firm established by Scanlon in

Washington, D.C., purportedly to provide grass roots work,

public relations services, and election campaign support. 

Scanlon would charge these clients prices that incorporated huge

profit margins and then kick-back to the lobbyist fifty percent of

the firm’s net profits. Certain funds requested by Scanlon and

the lobbyist for specific client purposes were in fact being used

for their own personal benefit. Additionally, Scanlon and the

lobbyist would provide things of value to federal public officials

in exchange for the officials’ influence to benefit their clients.

Scanlon’s plea was the result of a plea agreement between

Scanlon and the government and accepted by the district court,

all pursuant to Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Criminal

Procedure. The plea agreement specifically stated that Scanlon

was pleading guilty to the crimes charged in the information,

including honest services mail and wire fraud in violation of 18

U.S.C. § 1346. The plea agreement set forth Scanlon’s offense

level under the United States Sentencing Guidelines; the

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government agreed, however, to seek a lower sentence if

Scanlon accepted responsibility for his actions and/or

cooperated with the government in its investigation. The plea

agreement also specified that restitution to the victims of

Scanlon’s crimes was mandatory, and that the estimated loss

was approximately 20 million dollars.

Scanlon was not then sentenced but instead, for the next

five years, cooperated with the government in its investigation

of corruption on Capitol Hill. In 2010, still before sentencing,

Scanlon filed a motion in the district court “to modify or amend

his plea agreement” in light of the holding in Skilling v. United

States, 130 S. Ct. 2896 (2010), which concerned honest services

fraud in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1346. Scanlon argued that

under the holding in Skilling the honest services fraud in

violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1346 to which he pled guilty could no

longer be maintained against him. In its opinion disposing of

Scanlon’s motion, the district court noted that if Scanlon’s

Skilling argument were correct, material consequences for

Scanlon’s sentencing and restitution would result. The district

court concluded, however, that Scanlon’s interpretation of

Skilling was erroneous and denied the motion. Scanlon was

subsequently sentenced to 20 months imprisonment and ordered

to pay approximately 20 million dollars in restitution. Scanlon

now appeals the district court’s denial of his motion to modify

or amend his plea agreement.

Discussion

On appeal Scanlon renews the Skilling argument he made

below, contending that the final judgment of conviction and

restitution against him should be reversed and remanded for

redetermination without consideration of the § 1346 honest

services fraud portion of his plea. The government responds by

arguing, for the first time on appeal, that neither we nor the

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district court are authorized to modify or amend plea

agreements. We agree. Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of

Criminal Procedure strictly limits the role of the court in plea

agreements. First, the court is prohibited from participating in

plea agreement discussions. Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(c)(1). 

Furthermore, after the plea agreement has been finalized

between the government and the defendant, the court, when

considering a plea agreement like the one at issue here, is

limited to accepting the plea, rejecting it, or deferring a decision. 

Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(c)(3)(A). Modification of the agreement by

the court is not an option. As we have noted previously, “[t]he

district court may accept or reject [the] plea, but it may not

modify it.” United States v. Goodall, 236 F.3d 700, 703 (D.C.

Cir. 2001) (citation, quotations omitted). Most importantly for

our purposes here, changing of the agreement by the court after

acceptance of the plea is also not allowed. As the Fifth Circuit

has held, “once the court has accepted the [plea] agreement, it

may not subsequently reject or modify it.” McClure v. Ashcroft,

335 F.3d 404, 413 (5th Cir. 2003). Otherwise put, “[t]here is no

provision in the [Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure] allowing

a court to reject or modify an agreement once accepted.” United

States v. Ritsema, 89 F.3d 392, 399 (7th Cir. 1996). We agree. 

The district court accepted Scanlon’s plea agreement, which

included pleading guilty to honest services fraud in violation of

18 U.S.C. § 1346. The district court is not authorized to modify

or amend Scanlon’s plea agreement. 

Scanlon argues otherwise, but he is unable to cite any case

in which a plea agreement was amended or modified by the

court at the unilateral request of one of the parties. He

nevertheless claims that the district court has the power to

modify or amend his plea agreement because striking the portion

of his plea to honest services fraud would affect only restitution,

and under the plea agreement it is within the district court

judge’s determination to set the amount of restitution. He

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further argues that since plea agreements are analogous to

contracts, if the district court had accepted his Skilling argument

then the government would have the option to opt out of the plea

agreement because a mutual misunderstanding in the making of

the plea agreement would have occurred. We hold no opinion

as to Scanlon’s Skilling argument, but even if we agreed with

Scanlon that the holding in Skilling materially affects the honest

services charges to which he pled guilty, the relief he seeks is

not available to him. Once again, we agree with the Seventh

Circuit. “If we rule that some provision of the plea agreement

is invalid, we must discard the entire agreement and require [the

defendant] and the government to begin their bargaining all over

again.” United States v. Barnes, 83 F.3d 934, 941 (7th Cir.

1996); see also United States v. Bernard, 373 F.3d 339, 345 n.7

(3rd Cir. 2004) (“If the provisions of a plea agreement are

accepted by a court, but later found to be invalid, the proper

remedy is . . . to allow the defendant to . . . either negotiate a

new agreement, or proceed to trial.”); United States v. Sandles,

80 F.3d 1145, 1148 (7th Cir. 1996) (“Where there is a mutual

misunderstanding as to the material terms of a contract, the

appropriate remedy is rescission, not unilateral modification.”).

If Scanlon believes that certain terms of his plea agreement

should have been stricken because of Skilling, then one recourse

possibly available to him was to file a motion to withdraw his

plea. Rule 11 allows a defendant to withdraw a plea which, as

in Scanlon’s case, has been accepted by the court but before

sentencing, if “the defendant can show a fair and just reason for

requesting the withdrawal.” Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(d)(2)(B). If

Scanlon had filed a motion to withdraw on the basis of the

holding in Skilling and the district court had denied his motion,

then he could have appealed the denial and the Skilling issue

might be properly before us. But the issue comes before us by

his “motion to modify or amend his plea agreement.” We can

hardly hold that the district court erred by not granting relief the

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appellant had not sought. Our role is to affirm or reverse the

district court’s denial of the motion actually made, not one the

appellant, possibly for strategic reasons, never made. As the

district court had no authority to grant the relief the appellant

actually sought, the district court did not err in denying it.

Conclusion

The district court’s denial of Scanlon’s motion to amend or

modify his plea agreement is affirmed.

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