Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-96-03130/USCOURTS-caDC-96-03130-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Fred M. Glover
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 4, 1997 Decided September 4, 1998

No. 96-3130

United States of America,

Appellee

v.

Fred M. Glover,

Appellant

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 96cr00011-01)

Antoini M. Jones argued the cause for appellant, with

whom Joseph L. Gibson, Jr. was on the brief.

Helen M. Bollwerk, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the

cause for appellee, with whom Mary Lou Leary, U.S. Attorney, John R. Fisher, Thomas C. Black, and Richard L.

Edwards, Assistant U.S. Attorneys, were on the brief.

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Before: Silberman, Williams and Garland, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge Garland.

Garland, Circuit Judge: Defendant Fred Glover was convicted and sentenced on multiple charges of distributing crack

cocaine, and of doing so within 1000 feet of a school. Glover

claimed at trial that he was merely "play-acting" when he sold

crack to a government informant. But he also argued in the

alternative that, even if he were guilty of distributing crack,

he was "entrapped" by the government into committing the

crime. His principal claim on appeal is that the district court

erred by failing to give the jury an instruction on his entrapment defense. Glover also contends that: there was insufficient evidence for a jury to conclude he distributed drugs

within 1000 feet of a school; he was the victim of sentencing

entrapment because the government informant caused the

drug transactions to occur within 1000 feet of a school; his

sentencing pursuant to a statute that classified his prior

offenses as felonies violated the Ex Post Facto Clause of the

Constitution; and his counsel provided ineffective assistance

at trial. For the reasons set forth below, we reject each of

these contentions and affirm the judgment of the district

court.1

I

In August 1995, Glover was operating a restaurant on

Ninth Street, N.W. in Washington, D.C. Stepney Jones came

to see Glover at the restaurant. Jones and Glover had played

basketball together in the neighborhood in the early 1970s,

but they did not know each other well and had not seen each

other in years. Glover knew that Jones operated a convenience store in northwest Washington, called "the Corner

Store." What Glover did not know was that Jones was

working as an informant for the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) and the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA).

__________

1 Glover raises a number of additional contentions as well. We

have considered each of them, but reject them as too meritless for

further discussion.

Claiming that he had recently won some money in the

lottery, Jones asked Glover whether he could "get a buy off

him." Trial Transcript ("Tr.") at 189. Glover told Jones to

"get back with him" and gave Jones his pager number and an

identification code to use when paging him. Id. at 189, 200.

Jones tried paging Glover with the code several times, but

Glover did not initially return the pages.

On August 22, 1995, Jones succeeded in reaching Glover,

and asked whether he could purchase cocaine from him. In

another phone call later that day, Glover asked whether

Jones wanted it "hard or soft," referring to the distinction

between crack and powder cocaine. Glover stopped by Jones'

convenience store later that day to confirm what Jones wanted. The following day, August 23, Glover telephoned Jones

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and then came to his store. In the store's basement, in a

transaction recorded on videotape, Glover gave Jones 27.68

grams of crack in exchange for $800 provided to Jones by the

DEA.

On September 12, 1995, Jones again telephoned Glover and

requested drugs. Later that afternoon, Glover came to the

store, went to the basement, and sold Jones 58.66 grams of

crack for $1600. The DEA again provided the money Jones

used and videotaped the transaction.

Finally, on December 20, 1995, Jones had additional telephone conversations with Glover in which he said he wanted

to purchase more crack. On December 21, 1995, Glover

arrived at Jones' store, gave Jones 58.15 grams of crack at

the top of the stairs leading to the basement, and received

$1500 in DEA funds when they reached the basement. Id. at

237-40. The portion of the transaction that occurred in the

basement was again videotaped. Upon leaving Jones' store,

the police arrested Glover and seized the DEA money from

him.

At trial, Glover conceded that he had participated in each of

the videotaped transactions, but testified that he had done so

only as a form of "play-acting." Glover said Jones told him

he needed money and that he had a "cousin in Detroit" he

wanted to impress with his involvement in the drug trade.

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Id. at 365-66. Glover testified that he agreed to participate

in what he believed to be sham drug transactions in order to

"impress" Jones' cousin from Detroit. He said Jones always

gave him the substance to be exchanged in advance, but

outside of the video camera's range. Glover said he did not

know what the substance was, but that on one occasion Jones

told him it was soap. Glover also said that he always

returned the money to Jones after leaving the basement--

with the exception of the final transaction, when the money

was found on his person. Glover said he did not know the

transactions were being videotaped, but said he believed

Jones' cousin was watching them through a crack in the

basement wall.

In addition to asserting the "play-acting" defense, Glover

also requested that the district court give the jury an entrapment instruction, arguing that he was entitled to such an

instruction based on his testimony that Jones induced him to

participate in the charged conduct. The trial judge denied

the request, relying at first on the ground that Glover had not

acknowledged that he committed the crime. Id. at 454.

Later, after reviewing this court's decision in United States v.

McKinley, 70 F.3d 1307 (D.C. Cir. 1995), the judge rested his

denial on the ground that "the factual predicate that would

trigger the requirement that such an instruction be given is

not present in this case." Tr. at 457. The jury subsequently

convicted Glover on all charges and this appeal followed.

II

We review the district court's decision to deny Glover's

request for an entrapment instruction de novo. United

States v. Layeni, 90 F.3d 514, 517 (D.C. Cir. 1996). In so

doing, we must take Glover's "version of the facts as true."

McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1310; see United States v. Borum, 584

F.2d 424, 427 (D.C. Cir. 1978). But which version? That he

was play-acting? That he never kept any money (except the

money the government found on him) and never intended to

distribute drugs? Or that he did keep the money and did

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intend to distribute drugs, but that that intent was formed as

the result of government inducement?

In its first decision, the district court essentially assumed

the truth of the play-acting version to which Glover testified.

It therefore concluded that since Glover said he had not

intended to distribute drugs, he could not have been wrongfully induced by the government into so doing. That was a

reasonable conclusion. Indeed, it could be said that to have

taken the other view would have permitted Glover's attorney

to argue to the jury as follows: Even if you believe my client

lied to you on the stand when he said he was play-acting, you

should still find him not guilty if the government wrongfully

induced his drug dealing. And "there is respectable authority for concluding that no legitimate end of the criminal justice

system is served by requiring a trial court to entertain such

tactics, in the form of an entrapment defense which is at odds

with the defendant's own testimony." Mathews v. United

States, 485 U.S. 58, 71 (1988) (White, J., dissenting).

Respectable as such authority is, however, it was the

dissenting rather than majority view in Mathews v. United

States. In that case, the Supreme Court began with the

premise that defendants are permitted to raise inconsistent

defenses, even, the Court said, as inconsistent as arguing in a

rape case "that the act did not take place and that the victim

consented." Id. at 64 (citing Johnson v. United States, 426

F.2d 651, 656 (D.C. Cir. 1970)). It then concluded that, since

inconsistent defenses are permitted, and since "a defendant is

entitled to an instruction as to any recognized defense for

which there exists" sufficient evidence, 485 U.S. at 63, it

followed that "even if the defendant denies one or more

elements of the crime, he is entitled to an entrapment instruction whenever there is sufficient evidence from which a

reasonable jury could find entrapment," id. at 62.

It could be said that the defendant did not really present

inconsistent positions in Mathews. There, the defendant was

a Small Business Administration employee who accepted

loans from a government contractor who, unbeknownst to

him, was cooperating with law enforcement. The government

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charged that the loans were a gratuity in exchange for an

official act. Mathews contended they were personal loans

unrelated to any official action. He also contended that the

cooperator induced him to accept the loans. If that were all

Mathews had argued, the two contentions would not necessarily have constituted inconsistent defenses. Rather, they could

be regarded as two elements of a single defense of lack of

criminal intent: He did not accept the loans in exchange for

an official act; instead, the government had tricked him into

accepting loans that he thought were unrelated to his work.2

The same would be true here if Glover had argued only that

the government had tricked him into distributing what he

thought was soap.

But that was not all that either Mathews or Glover contended. Mathews wanted both to testify that he had no

intent to commit a crime, and to have the jury instructed that

even if he did have such an intent (i.e., to take the loan in

exchange for an official act), it should still find him not guilty

if it found the government had entrapped him. Id. at 65.

Similarly, Glover wanted an instruction that even if the jury

found he did intend to distribute crack (rather than soap), it

should still acquit if it found the government had wrongfully

induced him. Assuming there were sufficient evidence of

entrapment, the Supreme Court held that Mathews was

entitled to such an instruction. The same must be true for

Glover.

Moreover, the necessary corollary of Mathews is that the

version of the facts we must take as true for purposes of

analyzing the validity of Glover's entrapment defense is the

one that supports that defense ("I did it, but I was entrapped"), and not his alternative claim of innocence ("I did it,

but I was play-acting."). That means, for example, that we

must assume Glover kept the money he was seen to take on

the videotape, and that he knew the substance he gave Jones

was crack rather than soap. Otherwise, there would be no

__________

2 Mathews testified that the contractor told him that he (the

contractor) was hiding the money from his wife, and needed to get

rid of it quickly by loaning it to Mathews. See Mathews, 485 U.S.

at 61.

evidence of inducement, and no crime into which the defendant had been induced. And that would effectively deprive

the defendant of his right, under Mathews, to assert inconsistent defenses.

The government does not dispute these conclusions drawn

from Mathews, and does not support the district court's

denial of an entrapment instruction on the ground that Glover

refused to concede his intent. See Gov't Br. at 15 n.16.

Instead, the government argues that Glover has not established that "there is sufficient evidence from which a reasonable jury could find entrapment." Mathews, 485 U.S. at 886.

And it interprets the trial court as ultimately relying on that

ground in refusing to give an entrapment instruction--i.e., on

the ground that "the factual predicate that would trigger the

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requirement that such an instruction be given is not present

in this case." Tr. at 457. We interpret the district court's

refusal the same way, and agree with both the district court

and the government that Glover did not establish the prerequisites for an entrapment instruction.

The entrapment defense "has two related elements: government inducement of the crime, and a lack of predisposition

on the part of the defendant to engage in the criminal

conduct." Mathews, 485 U.S. at 63. In this circuit, the

defendant bears the initial burden of showing government

inducement; if he is successful, the burden then shifts to the

government to prove the defendant was predisposed to commit the crime. See McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1312; United States

v. Budd, 23 F.3d 442, 445 (D.C. Cir. 1994); United States v.

Whoie, 925 F.2d 1481, 1484 (D.C. Cir. 1991). Both inducement and predisposition are normally matters for the jury.

See McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1312; Budd, 23 F.3d at 445; Whoie,

925 F.2d at 1483. "However, a defendant only 'is entitled to

an entrapment instruction when[ ] there is sufficient evidence

from which a reasonable jury could find entrapment.' "

McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1309 (quoting Mathews, 485 U.S. at 62);

see United States v. Burkley, 591 F.2d 903, 914 (D.C. Cir.

1978).

The government's behavior amounts to inducement when it

was "such that a law-abiding citizen's will to obey the law

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could have been overborne." United States v. Kelly, 748 F.2d

691, 698 (D.C. Cir. 1984); see McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1313.

Glover argues that he satisfied the inducement predicate

because Jones repeatedly asked him to provide drugs.3 We

have held, however, that even repeated government solicitations do not establish inducement "unless the requests are

coupled with persuasive overtures, or unless there is evidence

of reluctance on the defendant's part demonstrating that the

repetition of the requests may have moved an otherwise

unwilling person to commit a criminal act." McKinley, 70

F.3d at 1312 (internal quotations and citations omitted).

Taking the second caveat first, Glover's best evidence of

"reluctance" is his testimony that he initially avoided Jones'

pages because he did not want to provide him with narcotics.

Glover only responded, he claims, when Jones entered a

phony code into the pager. But even accepting this testimony, it is insufficient evidence of reluctance. As soon as Jones

did reach him, Glover made clear he was willing to deal.

That same day, Glover called Jones back to confirm whether

he wanted it "hard or soft," and the very next day Glover

delivered the crack to Jones' store--on videotape. This

ready willingness to supply drugs once Jones contacted him

belies Glover's claim that his will was overborne by incessant

government overtures. To the contrary, it suggests the kind

of "acquiesce[nce] with reasonable readiness" we found insufficient to show inducement in McKinley. 70 F.3d at 1312.

Nor is there evidence of any "persuasive overtures" that go

beyond those ordinarily present in a drug transaction. Even

if we disregard Glover's testimony that he never took any

money from Jones--as Mathews indicates we must--such

__________

3 Because we are concerned here with the evidence that supports Glover's entrapment claim--i.e., that the government induced

him to form the intent to distribute crack--we consider only the

alleged inducement to engage in a drug transaction. As suggested

above, inducement to "play act" alone would not justify an entrapment instruction, although it would be relevant to defendant's

alternative defense that he never intended to do anything more

than play-act.

payments are "the typical benefit of participating in this type

of criminal enterprise." And that is a "form of reward that is

not sufficient, by itself, to establish inducement." Id. at 1314;

see United States v. Evans, 924 F.2d 714, 717 (7th Cir. 1991).

Glover also claims that at one point Jones tried to further

induce him by offering to trade Glover's crack for heroin from

Jones' "cousin" at an unusually advantageous rate. Glover

Br. at 32. Even if such a trade went well beyond the "typical

benefit" for this type of conduct, Glover's own testimony was

that this offer was not made until the first two crack transactions had already been completed. Tr. at 374-75. Hence, it

could not have been an inducement for those transactions.

See McKinley, 70 F.3d at 1313-14. Nor did Glover testify

that he would not have completed the remaining crack deal

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were it not for the heroin offer. See id. at 1313. Indeed,

since Glover testified that he declined the heroin offer, and

since no evidence was offered to the contrary, it does not

appear to have amounted to much of an inducement for

anything.

Finally, Glover contends that Jones played off his "friendship" in order to convince him to provide the drugs in

question. But even Glover concedes the evidence shows he

had not seen Jones in years, did not know him well, and that

"they were not close friends." Glover Br. at 3, 17; Tr. at 357,

360. An appeal to that kind of friendship is hardly sufficient

to overbear the will of a law-abiding citizen. If it were, the

government would never be able to use an informant who had

virtually any kind of preexisting relationship with a defendant.

In short, Glover produced no evidence of inducement beyond the ordinary opportunity to commit a crime and profit

thereby. That kind of evidence does not warrant an entrapment instruction, and the district court properly refused to

give one.

III

Glover also argues that there was insufficient evidence for

the jury to conclude he distributed cocaine within 1000 feet of

a school, in violation of 21 U.S.C. s 860(a), commonly known

as the "schoolyard statute." While sufficiency of the evidence

claims are reviewed de novo, our role is still limited. We

must "allow[ ] the government the benefit of all reasonable

inferences that may be drawn from the evidence, and permit[ ] the jury to determine the weight and credibility of the

evidence." United States v. Sutton, 801 F.2d 1346, 1358 (D.C.

Cir. 1986). And we must affirm the conviction if any reasonable juror could have found the elements of the offense

beyond a reasonable doubt. See Jackson v. Virginia, 443

U.S. 307, 319 (1979).

At trial, the government offered uncontested testimony

that the distance between Jones' store--where each of the

three drug transactions took place--and Banneker High

School was 674 feet. Tr. 315-16. Glover asserts this testimony was insufficient for two reasons. First, he claims that the

jury could not properly infer that Banneker High School "was

in fact in existence at the time of the alleged transactions" or

that it was "in fact at the same location at the time of the

alleged transactions." Glover Br. at 36. We disagree. Banneker High School is a well-known institution in the District

of Columbia. A police officer testified that he had been to the

school and had measured the distance between the school and

the convenience store. A diagram indicating the location of

"Banneker Senior High School" and Jones' store was introduced into evidence. Glover did not suggest, by crossexamination or otherwise, that Banneker was not in existence

or at the same location at the relevant time.4 Under these

circumstances, the jury could reasonably infer that the unUSCA Case #96-3130 Document #379812 Filed: 09/04/1998 Page 9 of 16
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stated premise of the testimony and diagram was that both

were accurate as of the dates at issue, and that Banneker

High School had not been built in the nine months between

the first drug transaction and defendant's trial. See United

States v. Brookins, 919 F.2d 281, 283-84 (5th Cir.1990).5

__________

4 And for good reason: even defendant's appellate counsel

concedes he "is of the belief that Banneker Senior High School has

been in the same location for over forty-five years." Glover Br. at

37 n.3.

5 For the same reason, we reject Glover's contention that,

without express testimony, the jury could not infer that the "caliSecond, Glover claims that the 674-foot measurement the

government offered at trial was insufficient to establish that

the drug transactions took place within 1000 feet of a school,

because it measured only the distance between the school and

the front door of the store, and did not include the distance

from the front door to the basement where the drug transactions actually took place. In support, Glover cites United

States v. Applewhite, 72 F.3d 140 (D.C. Cir. 1995), and United

States v. Johnson, 46 F.3d 1166 (D.C. Cir. 1995), cases in

which we held that measurements to points short of the

actual locations of the drug transactions were insufficient to

sustain convictions under the schoolyard statute.

Applewhite and Johnson do not carry the day for Glover.

In each of those cases, the distance from the school to the

property line of the location at which the drug deal took place

was itself well over 900 feet. See Applewhite, 72 F.3d at 143-

44 (distance from school to entrance of multi-unit apartment

building was 920.2 feet); Johnson, 46 F.3d at 1169-70 (distance from school "to a point five feet up the walkway to

Johnson's house" was 994 feet). In those cases, we concluded

that the jury could not reasonably infer that if the remaining,

unmeasured distance were added, the total would still be less

than 1000 feet. The leeway for error was simply too small.

In this case, by contrast, after taking account of the

distance between the school and the store's front door, the

government still had 326 feet to spare. Hence, unless the

distance between the convenience store's front door and its

basement was more than the length of a football field, the

drug transactions took place within the prohibited 1000 feet.

A reasonable juror, using ordinary common sense, could

conclude that a convenience store in a residential neighborhood is extremely unlikely to be larger than a football field.

See United States v. Harrison, 101 F.3d 984, 990 (D.C. Cir.

1997) (where distance from school to building entrance was

472 feet, jury could reasonably conclude that additional distance to apartment did not exceed 528 feet); United States v.

__________

brated measuring wheel" used to measure the 674-foot distance was

"in working order."

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Baylor, 97 F.3d 542, 546-47 (D.C. Cir. 1996) (where distance

from school to building was 534 feet, jury could reasonably

conclude additional distance to basement apartment did not

exceed 466 feet). Indeed, common sense was not all the

jurors had to rely on here. During the trial, the jury saw

several videotapes showing both the inside and outside of

Jones' store, and also had the benefit of a diagram of the

neighborhood that could be used to roughly compare the size

of the entire store to the distance between the store and the

school. See Gov't Appendix (Vol.I) at 18.

IV

Glover next contends that he was the victim of "sentencing

entrapment." He charges that his concurrent sentences under the schoolyard statute should be vacated because the

government "orchestrated" the crimes to occur within 1000

feet of a school, by luring him to Jones' store to make the

drug transactions. Because defendant did not raise this claim

below, we review it solely for plain error. See Fed R. Crim.

P. 52(b); United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 731-32 (1993).

First, we see no evidence of "orchestration" here. As

Glover himself testified, he "often went to Jones' store to play

numbers [the lottery]," Glover Br. at 17, referring specifically

to the period during which Jones asked him for drugs. That

alone made the store a logical location for the drug deal. Nor

does the government appear to have had much motive to lure

Glover to the store to take advantage of enhanced sentences

for distributing within 1000 feet of a school. Glover's recidivist history generated substantially longer sentences than did

the schoolyard provision. See Part V below.

But even if the government had chosen Jones' store to

increase Glover's sentencing exposure, that alone would not

constitute sentencing entrapment. The usual elements of the

entrapment defense--inducement and lack of predisposition--

would still have to be shown. As we have held before, even

where government agents insist that cocaine be delivered in

the form of crack rather than powder to ensure a stiffer

penalty, that does not constitute sentencing entrapment

where the defendants "showed no hesitation in committing

the crimes for which they were convicted." See United States

v. Shepherd, 102 F.3d 558, 566-67 (D.C. Cir. 1996) (quoting

United States v. Walls, 70 F.3d 1323, 1328-30 (D.C. Cir.

1995)). There is no reason for the rule to be any different

where the issue is the location of the transaction rather than

the kind of drug distributed. In this case, Glover readily

agreed to the drug transaction, and showed no hesitation

about conducting it in Jones' store. That, alone, is "enough

to destroy [his] entrapment argument." Walls, 70 F.3d at

1329.

V

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Glover also argues that the enhancement of his sentences,

based on prior convictions in Maryland and the District of

Columbia for heroin possession, violated the Ex Post Facto

Clause of the Constitution, art. I, s 9, cl. 3. Glover contends

that a 1994 statute impermissibly and retroactively "reclassified" these prior misdemeanors as felonies. We review this

legal claim de novo. See United States v. Williams-Davis, 90

F.3d 490, 511 (D.C. Cir. 1996).

At the time Glover committed the heroin offenses, Maryland and the District of Columbia considered them misdemeanors, even though each carried with it the possibility of

imprisonment for more than one year because of Glover's

prior criminal history. Moreover, until 1994, they also would

have been considered misdemeanors for the purpose of enhancing a federal sentence. See 21 U.S.C. s 841(b)(1)(A)

(1988) (defining "felony drug offense" as an offense "that is a

felony under any law of a State ... that prohibits or restricts

conduct relating to narcotic drugs...."). But on September

13, 1994, Congress changed the law to define the term "felony

drug offense" as "an offense that is punishable by imprisonment for more than one year under any law of the United

States or of a State ... that prohibits or restricts conduct

relating to narcotic drugs...." Violent Crime Control and

Law Enforcement Act of 1994, Pub. L. No. 103-322, tit. IX,

s 90105, 108 Stat. 1987-88, 2151 (codified at 21 U.S.C.

s 802(44)).

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Title 21 of the U.S. Code establishes different sentences for

distributing different amounts of crack cocaine, and provides

for enhanced sentences if the distribution occurs "after prior

conviction[s] for felony drug offense[s]." 21 U.S.C.

s 841(b)(1)(A) & (B). If his prior heroin convictions had not

been considered felony drug offenses, Glover would have

faced statutory terms of five to forty years imprisonment for

the August 23, 1995 sale of five grams or more of crack, and

ten years to life for each of the subsequent sales of fifty

grams or more. See 21 U.S.C. s 841(b)(1)(B)(iii) & (A)(iii);

see also Gov't Br. at 32 n.32. Because the prior convictions

were considered "felony drug offenses" under the statute,

however, he faced terms of ten years to life for the five-gram

charge and mandatory life imprisonment for distributing fifty

grams or more. See 21 U.S.C. s 841(b)(1)(B)(iii) & (A)(iii).

The aspect of the Ex Post Facto Clause with the most

relevance to Glover's claim is that which bars the government

from retroactively "increas[ing] the punishment for criminal

acts." California Dep't of Corrections v. Morales, 514 U.S.

499, 504 (1995) (internal quotations and citation omitted);

Collins v. Youngblood, 497 U.S. 37, 42-43 (1990). It is wellsettled, however, that a sentencing enhancement based on

past offenses is not an "additional penalty for the earlier

crimes," but rather "a stiffened penalty for the latest crime,

which is considered to be an aggravated offense because a

repetitive one." Gryger v. Burke, 334 U.S. 728, 732 (1948);

see also Nichols v. United States, 511 U.S. 738, 747 (1994)

("Enhancement statutes, whether in the nature of criminal

history provisions ... or recidivist statutes ... do not change

the penalty imposed for the earlier conviction."). For this

reason, the circuits uniformly have rejected similar Ex Post

Facto attacks on other repeat offender statutes. See United

States v. Cabrera-Sosa, 81 F.3d 998, 1001-02 (10th Cir. 1996);

United States v. Farmer, 73 F.3d 836, 841 (8th Cir. 1996);

United States v. Presley, 52 F.3d 64, 68 (4th Cir. 1995);

United States v. McCalla, 38 F.3d 675, 680 (3d Cir. 1994);

United States v. Saenz-Forero, 27 F.3d 1016, 1019-21 (5th

Cir. 1994); United States v. Arzate-Nunez, 18 F.3d 730, 733-

35 (9th Cir. 1994); United States v. Forbes, 16 F.3d 1294,

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1301-02 (1st Cir. 1994); Covington v. Sullivan, 823 F.2d 37,

39-40 (2d Cir. 1987).

Despite Glover's characterization, the 1994 "reclassification" of his prior crimes did not add a new penalty for those

crimes themselves. Like other repeat offender statutes, it

did nothing more than prospectively define new, more drastic

consequences if Glover committed a further crime in violation

of s 841(b). Because the provision expanding the category of

prior offenses that would prospectively be considered "felony

drug offenses" was passed in 1994, a year before the first

drug transaction at issue here, Glover had "fair warning," see

Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 430 (1987), that he would face

stiffer penalties as a repeat offender if he committed another

drug-related offense. Those penalties were punishments for

his 1995 crimes, not for his prior crimes, and therefore do not

violate the Ex Post Facto Clause even though the federal

statute labeled the prior convictions differently than did the

states. See Arzate-Nunez, 18 F.3d at 733.6

VI

Finally, Glover argues that he was denied effective assistance of counsel at trial. Where, as here, the defendant has

not sought to develop a factual record of ineffectiveness in the

district court, our normal practice is to remand for an evidentiary hearing. See United States v. Toms, 136 F.3d 176, 181

(D.C. Cir. 1998). However, we have recognized two exceptions to this general rule: "when the trial record alone

conclusively shows that the defendant is entitled to no relief

and when the record conclusively shows the contrary." Id.

(quoting United States v. Gaviria, 116 F.3d 1498, 1512 (D.C.

Cir. 1997)); see also United States v. Fennell, 53 F.3d 1296,

__________

6 We likewise reject Glover's one-sentence suggestion that by

reclassifying his convictions as felonies, Congress "usurped the

state's power to classify crimes committed within the state's jurisdiction" in violation of the Tenth Amendment. Congress did not

seek to reclassify any offense for purposes of state law; the 1994

statute merely defined how prior conduct by the defendant would

be treated for purposes of federal law.

1303-04 (D.C. Cir. 1995); United States v. Poston, 902 F.2d

90, 99 n.9 (D.C. Cir. 1990). Here the record conclusively

shows that Glover is entitled to no relief.

Under the familiar two-part test enunciated in Strickland

v. Washington, a defendant seeking to establish ineffective

representation must show both "that counsel's performance

was deficient," and that "the deficient performance prejudiced

the defense." 466 U.S. 668, 687 (1984). This means a

defendant must show that his counsel's performance fell

below "an objective standard of reasonableness" under prevailing professional norms, id. at 687-88, and that "there is a

reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional

errors, the result of the proceeding would have been different," id. at 694. Glover fails to satisfy either part of the

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Strickland test.

Glover's principal claim is that his trial counsel failed to

cross-examine Jones, the government informant, regarding

Jones' prior arrest for making a false statement while applying to purchase a firearm. But the record indicates that

counsel instead elicited the same information through crossexamination of a DEA agent. See Tr. 325-26. Arguably, this

strategy was more effective because it prevented Jones from

explaining away or minimizing the arrest. In any event,

there was nothing ineffective about it and we decline to

second-guess trial counsel's strategy.

Glover also complains that his counsel failed to object to

the admission of the diagram showing the location of Jones'

store and Banneker High School, because there was no

testimony that either had been in the same location at the

time of the drug transactions. Such an objection would have

been frivolous, because there is and was no dispute about the

actual location of either building at the relevant time. Glover's other allegations about his trial counsel's asserted ineffectiveness, which we have carefully reviewed, are equally

frivolous.

VII

One final detail remains. While Glover has not raised the

issue, the government notes that the forfeiture order entered

in this case was not pronounced in Glover's presence as

required by Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 43(a). See

Gov't Br. at 37 n.36. Rather than remand to the district

court for compliance with this requirement and re-sentencing,

the government requests that we vacate the forfeiture count.

If the case instead were remanded, the government advises, it

would seek dismissal rather than bear the expense of bringing Glover back to court for this purpose alone. As Glover

has not objected to this disposition, the forfeiture count is

hereby vacated. See Gaviria, 116 F.3d at 1530. In all other

respects, the judgment of the district court is affirmed.

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