Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-05-04289/USCOURTS-ca8-05-04289-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Matias Leanos-Marquez
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

___________

No. 05-4289

___________

United States of America, *

*

Plaintiff-Appellee, *

* Appeal from the United States

v. * District Court for the 

* Southern District of Iowa.

Matias Leanos-Marquez, *

* [UNPUBLISHED]

Defendant-Appellant. *

___________

Submitted: September 25, 2006

Filed: November 22, 2006 

___________

Before WOLLMAN, BRIGHT, and BOWMAN, Circuit Judges.

___________

PER CURIAM.

A jury convicted Matias Leanos-Marquez of conspiring to distribute

methamphetamine and marijuana, 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1) (Count 1), distributing more

than fifty grams of methamphetamine, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) (Count 8), and

distributing methamphetamine to an individual under twenty-one years of age, 21

U.S.C. § 859 (Count 9). The district court sentenced Leanos-Marquez to 224 months’

imprisonment and we affirmed his convictions and sentence. United States v. LeanosMarquez, 323 F.3d 679 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 540 U.S. 916 (2003).

In his present 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion, Leanos-Marquez asserted a right to

relief on four claims: (1) the government’s use of a minor to record incriminating

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The Honorable Ronald E. Longstaff, United States District Judge for the

Southern District of Iowa.

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conversations violated his Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights, (2) the jury foreman’s

failure to sign the line beneath Count 9 (distributing methamphetamine to an

individual under twenty-one years of age) on the verdict form demonstrated a lack of

unanimity, (3) counsel was ineffective for failing to poll the jury to discover the lack

of unanimity, and (4) his sentence violated Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466

(2000), and United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220 (2005). The district court1

 denied

his motion, but granted him a certificate of appealability on all four claims. He

presses the first three claims in this court and we affirm the district court’s denial of

relief on each claim.

We recount only the facts necessary to address Leanos-Marquez’s claims. The

evidence of Leanos-Marquez’s guilt included two tape-recorded conversations

between him and Jose Ramirez, who was seventeen-years-old at the time. Ramirez

obtained drugs from Leanos-Marquez and owed him approximately $33,000. After

the police arrested Ramirez for possessing one pound of methamphetamine, he agreed

to record two meetings with Leanos-Marquez. Ramirez testified at trial and the

prosecution introduced the two tape-recorded conversations. The jury returned guilty

verdicts against Leanos-Marquez on Counts 1, 8, and 9, and acquitted him on Count

2, which alleged that he possessed a firearm in furtherance of a drug crime, 18 U.S.C.

§ 924. The jury foreman did not, however, sign the line—one of eighteen—on the

verdict form that accompanied the finding of guilt on Count 9. The omission went

unnoticed, counsel did not poll the jury, and the court sentenced Leanos-Marquez. 

As to the first claim—that agents’ use of a cooperative seventeen-year-old to

obtain tape recordings violated Leanos-Marquez’s Fifth Amendment right to due

process—Leanos-Marquez argues that agents’ use of “a 17 year-old to further their

investigation is outrageous and contravenes the Constitutional edict that no person be

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‘deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.’” He is entitled to

relief only if the “conduct of law enforcement agents is so outrageous that due process

principles would absolutely bar the government from invoking judicial processes to

obtain a conviction[.]” United States v. Russell, 411 U.S. 423, 431-32 (1973). But

here, the agent’s use of a cooperative seventeen-year-old to investigate the individual

suspected of selling him drugs is not outrageous, despite his age, and thus does not

rise to the level of a due process violation. 

Leanos-Marquez’s argument also fails as a Fourth Amendment claim. He

cannot assert Ramirez’s personal right to challenge his consent to the tape recording.

See Alderman v. United States, 394 U.S. 165, 174 (1969) (“Fourth Amendment rights

are personal [and] . . . may not be vicariously asserted.”). 

We also reject Leanos-Marquez’s claim that the jury did not reach a unanimous

verdict on Count 9. He argues that the absence of the jury foreman’s signature on the

line accompanying the finding of guilt on Count 9 constitutes conclusive proof that

the jury did not reach unanimity. The government, however, asserts that the missing

signature was simply an oversight and, without more, does not demonstrate a lack of

unanimity.

The Sixth Amendment guarantees a defendant’s right to a unanimous jury

verdict. United States v. Hiland, 909 F.2d 1114, 1136 (8th Cir. 1990). By entering

a guilty verdict on Count 9, the trial court made the implicit factual finding that the

jury reached a unanimous verdict. See United States v. Alarcon-Simi, 300 F.3d 1172,

1177 (9th Cir. 2002). The habeas court, reviewing the record, reached the same

factual finding, which we review for clear error. See Williams v. United States, 452

F.3d 1009, 1012 (8th Cir. 2006) (habeas court’s factual findings reviewed for clear

error). The only evidence supporting Leanos-Marquez’s argument is the missing

signature, but without more he has not demonstrated a lack of unanimity sufficient to

overcome the district court’s finding. He cannot, moreover, successfully argue that

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he received ineffective assistance of counsel because he has not shown he was

prejudiced by counsel’s failure to poll the jury. See United States v. Jones, 403 F.3d

604, 605 (8th Cir. 2005) (habeas petitioner alleging ineffective assistance of counsel

must demonstrate both deficient performance and “a reasonable probability that, but

for this deficiency in performance, the result of the proceeding would have been

different”).

Finally, though Leanos-Marqez does not pursue the argument here, the district

court did not err by rejecting his Booker argument. We have held that Booker does

not apply retroactively to cases on collateral review. See Lefkowitz v. United States,

446 F.3d 788, 791 (8th Cir. 2006); Never Misses A Shot v. United States, 413 F.3d

781, 783 (8th Cir. 2005). 

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s denial of relief.

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