Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-14-02641/USCOURTS-ca7-14-02641-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Daniel Haslam
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________

No. 14-2641

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

DANIEL HASLAM,

Defendant-Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the

Northern District of Indiana, South Bend Division.

Nos. 3:13-CR-013 & 3:13-CR-109 — Jon E. DeGuilio, Judge.

____________________

ARGUED SEPTEMBER 21, 2015 — DECIDED AUGUST 17, 2016

____________________

Before WOOD, Chief Judge, POSNER and SYKES, Circuit 

Judges.

SYKES, Circuit Judge. Daniel Haslam pleaded guilty under

a written plea agreement to manufacturing methamphetamine, possessing unregistered silencers, and possessing a 

firearm in connection with a drug offense. His presentence 

report included as relevant conduct an incident in which 

Haslam held a woman hostage in his apartment on the 

mistaken belief that she was an undercover police officer.

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Haslam thinks the government breached the plea agreement 

by giving this hostage-taking information to the probation 

office and the court; he moved to withdraw his pleas. The 

district judge denied the motion and imposed a sentence of 

181 months in prison.

Haslam appealed, challenging the denial of his pleawithdrawal motion. We affirm. Haslam’s plea agreement did 

not limit the information the government could give the 

court about the offense or his background. To the contrary,

the agreement explicitly reserved the government’s right to 

fully inform the court, so there was no breach. And the judge 

properly rejected Haslam’s alternative claim that he pleaded 

guilty unknowingly based on a misunderstanding that the 

plea agreement contained such a limitation.

I. Background

In August 2012 Haslam manufactured, used, and trafficked methamphetamine in his apartment in Converse, 

Indiana. He also manufactured firearm silencers and possessed numerous illegally modified firearms in furtherance 

of his drug trafficking.

On August 25, 2012, Haslam invited Laci Sample to his 

apartment. The two had been dating for a few weeks, and 

they both used methamphetamine while she was there that 

day. Things turned violent when Sample received a text 

message saying she had to “get ready for training day 

tomorrow.” Haslam mistakenly interpreted this message as 

a sign that she was an undercover police officer. He pushed 

her down on the bed and began beating her, inflicting

injuries to her head, face, arms, legs, and torso. Over the next 

day and a half, Haslam prevented Sample from leaving his 

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No. 14-2641 3

apartment, threatening her with a gun and more beatings. 

He released her only after she said she had to pick up her 

daughter from the child’s father and people would start 

looking for her if she didn’t show up.

On August 30 police performed a traffic stop on a vehicle 

Haslam was riding in and found him in possession of a 

loaded pistol modified for a silencer. That same day the 

police executed a search warrant on Haslam’s apartment and 

found several firearms, silencers in various stages of production, ammunition, and methamphetamine. A grand jury 

indicted Haslam on four counts: (1) possessing an unregistered firearm or silencer, 26 U.S.C. §§ 5845(a), 5861(d), and 

5871; (2) manufacturing methamphetamine, 21 U.S.C. 

§ 841(a)(1); (3) possessing a firearm equipped with a silencer 

in furtherance of drug trafficking, 18 U.S.C. § 924(c); and 

(4) possessing a firearm while using a controlled substance, 

id. § 922(g)(3). Count 3 carried a mandatory 30-year minimum sentence.

Plea negotiations followed. As relevant here, the prosecutor sent Haslam’s counsel a proposed plea agreement that 

required Haslam to admit to the beating and confinement of 

Laci Sample as relevant conduct. Haslam would not admit to 

this conduct and wanted this section of the agreement

deleted. The government complied. Haslam eventually 

agreed to plead guilty to counts 1, 2, and 4 in exchange for 

the dismissal of count 3. At Haslam’s request the factualbasis section of the final version of the plea agreement did 

not contain the Sample incident.

Three provisions of the plea agreement are particularly 

relevant here:

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9. (d) ... I expressly waive my right to appeal my 

conviction, my sentence and any restitution order

to any Court on any ground, including any 

claim of ineffective assistance of counsel.

...

(g) The defendant fully understands that the

United States of America has reserved the right to 

tell the Sentencing Court the good things about 

him, and the bad things about him, and has reserved 

the right to fully inform the Court of the nature and 

extent of his offense(s);

...

(l) Other than what is contained in this plea 

agreement, no predictions, promises, or representations have been made to me as to the specific sentence that will be imposed or any other 

matter.

(Emphases added.)

A magistrate judge presiding at the change-of-plea hearing placed Haslam under oath and confirmed on the record 

that he had read the plea agreement, understood it, and 

discussed it with his attorney. The magistrate judge also 

specifically asked Haslam if the government had made any

promises that were not contained in the plea agreement. 

Haslam responded, “no.” The magistrate judge found that 

Haslam’s guilty pleas were knowing and voluntary and 

recommended that the district court accept them.

Immediately after the change-of-plea hearing, the government sent a memorandum to the probation office and

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No. 14-2641 5

Haslam’s counsel detailing Haslam’s offense conduct, 

including a lengthy description of the Sample incident.

About six weeks later Haslam wrote a letter to his attorney 

accusing him of failing to obtain “vital” defense evidence

and complaining that “[a]fter speaking with the probation 

department[,] I have found that there are many details you 

failed to inform me of which definitely would have influenced my decision on signing this plea.” Nonetheless, 

Haslam said, “what’s done is done.” Haslam exhorted his 

attorney to obtain additional evidence to discredit Sample.

Ten days later the probation office filed its draft presentence report recommending several upward adjustments to 

the offense level under the Sentencing Guidelines based on 

Haslam’s battery and confinement of Sample. Haslam’s 

attorney objected to these adjustments, contesting the facts 

surrounding the Sample incident. The adjustments remained 

in the final presentence report. Haslam’s attorney again 

objected, contesting the facts and questioning the relevance 

of the Sample incident to the drug and weapons offenses. 

At sentencing the district judge adopted the magistrate 

judge’s findings and recommendations, accepted Haslam’s

guilty pleas, and found him guilty. Before the government

began its evidentiary presentation, Haslam’s attorney 

lodged this objection to any testimony from Laci Sample:

The plea agreement that was entered was 

based on what my client admitted that he did, 

and he’s taken full responsibility for the things 

that he did. When the very first plea offer that 

was offered to us had statements relating to 

crimes of violence and different things of that 

nature, we were ready to go to trial on those 

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if ... those were not taken out. ... [W]e ultimately got a plea that was entered that takes 

out any mention of violence or any restraint or 

any battery on this person. If, in fact, those had 

not been taken out, we would not have entered 

a plea and would have gone to trial. 

The circumstances here is that what my client 

has pled to, there’s nothing ... related to any 

crime of violence as related to the alleged conduct against Ms. Sample. ... [W]e don’t see that 

that evidence is relevant to the crimes that he 

admitted to committing and, therefore, we 

would ask that the Court would find that those 

are not relevant.

The judge allowed Sample to testify and then called a recess, 

continuing the sentencing to another day.

When the proceedings resumed, Haslam insisted that his 

attorney read the following question to the court:

Why are we having a hearing on an issue that 

was completely removed from my plea in order for me to accept it? It was agreed that [the

prosecutor would] remove everything pertaining to Laci Sample from my plea, never to be 

heard of again, so wouldn't throwing her back 

into the equation be a breach of his own plea 

agreement offer?

The judge allowed the prosecutor to complete his evidentiary presentation and ordered briefing on whether the 

government had breached the plea agreement.

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No. 14-2641 7

In his brief Haslam’s counsel asked the court to set aside 

his client’s guilty pleas because the government had 

breached the plea agreement by presenting evidence about 

the Sample incident. Alternatively, counsel argued that 

Haslam had pleaded guilty based on a misunderstanding 

that the Sample incident was completely off the table. Haslam sent his own letter to the judge claiming that his attorney had convinced him that “Laci Sample and thirty to life 

were removed and never to be heard of ever again!”

At the next hearing, Haslam’s attorney told the judge that

he was “livid” when he saw the government’s sentencing 

memorandum and “could not believe that all of a sudden 

what we had bargained for was now taken out.” He accused 

the government of breaching an implied promise to not 

introduce this evidence. At the very least, counsel argued, 

Haslam did not truly understand the plea agreement and 

should be allowed to withdraw his guilty pleas.

The judge rejected these arguments and denied the pleawithdrawal motion. The judge later made factual findings to 

support the adjustments relating to the Sample incident. 

After additional proceedings, the judge imposed a sentence

of 181 months.

II. Discussion

Haslam’s appeal challenges only the denial of his motion 

to withdraw his guilty pleas. Because he filed his pleawithdrawal motion after the court accepted the pleas, it was 

his burden to show “a fair and just reason for requesting the 

withdrawal.” FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(d)(2)(B). A material breach 

of a plea agreement is a “fair and just reason” for withdrawing a guilty plea. See United States v. O'Doherty, 643 F.3d 209, 

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217 (7th Cir. 2011) (“The remedy for breach of a plea agreement is specific performance and a remand for resentencing 

before a different judge, or a remand to permit the defendant 

to withdraw his plea.”). And of course a guilty plea is valid 

only if it is entered knowingly and voluntarily. Bradshaw v. 

Stumpf, 545 U.S. 175, 183 (2005) (“A guilty plea operates as a 

waiver of important rights, and is valid only if done voluntarily, knowingly, and intelligently ... .”). We review the

denial of a plea-withdrawal motion for abuse of discretion;

the district court’s factual findings “as to whether the defendant has presented a ‘fair and just reason’ are reviewed 

for clear error.” United States v. Fard, 775 F.3d 939, 943 (7th 

Cir. 2015).

Before proceeding, we note that Haslam’s appeal waiver 

doesn’t affect our review, at least in the circumstances of this 

case. An appeal waiver is valid and enforceable if its “terms 

are express and unambiguous[] and the record shows that 

the defendant knowingly and voluntarily entered into the 

[plea] agreement.” United States v. Sakellarion, 649 F.3d 634, 

639 (7th Cir. 2011) (quotation marks omitted). An appeal 

waiver stands or falls with the plea agreement itself, so if the 

agreement is valid and enforceable, the waiver is too. Id.

The government agrees that the appeal waiver does not 

block our review of Haslam’s claim that the plea agreement 

is invalid because he signed it based on a misunderstanding

about its terms. See Hurlow v. United States, 726 F.3d 958, 965 

(7th Cir. 2013). But the government does invoke the waiver as 

a bar to Haslam’s claim of breach. This latter argument rests 

on United States v. Whitlow, 287 F.3d 638 (7th Cir. 2002), and 

United States v. Hare, 269 F.3d 859 (7th Cir. 2001). Both cases

suggest that a defendant’s appeal waiver prevents us from 

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No. 14-2641 9

considering his contention that the government breached the

plea agreement. Whitlow, 287 F.3d at 640 (citing Hare, 

269 F.3d at 860–61). On the other hand, we have routinely 

considered a defendant’s claim of breach, appeal waivers 

notwithstanding. See, e.g., United States v. Cieslowski, 410 F.3d 

353, 361–62 (7th Cir. 2005); United States v. Matchopatow, 

259 F.3d 847, 853 (7th Cir. 2001) (“We hold that the government did not breach the terms of the plea agreement and 

that Matchopatow’s waiver of his right to appeal is therefore

binding and valid.”); United States v. Feichtinger, 105 F.3d 

1188, 1190–91 (7th Cir. 1997).

We don’t need to resolve this apparent tension in our 

caselaw today. As we’ve noted, the government does not 

contest our authority to address Haslam’s claim that his plea 

agreement is invalid because it was not knowingly made. 

That question is tightly bound with the question of breach.

Here, both questions turn on whether the agreement included a promise that the government would not inform the 

court of the Sample incident at sentencing. If there was no 

such promise, as the government contends, then the agreement is enforceable and it also necessarily follows that the 

government did not commit a breach.

We’ll begin with the question of breach. Plea agreements 

are interpreted “according to principles of contract law.” 

United States v. Hernandez, 544 F.3d 743, 750–51 (7th Cir. 

2008). Haslam’s claim runs into trouble right away: Nothing 

in the plea agreement expressly obligated the government to 

refrain from introducing evidence of the Sample incident for 

sentencing purposes. Quite the opposite: The agreement

explicitly reserved the government’s “right to tell the Sentencing Court the good things about [Haslam], and the bad 

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things about [Haslam], and ... the right to fully inform the 

Court of the nature and extent of his offense.”

Haslam is left to argue, in effect, that the government 

was implicitly prohibited from doing something that the 

agreement explicitly permitted it to do. That makes little sense. 

Moreover, the agreement explicitly states that the government made “no predictions, promises, or representations” 

outside the four corners of the document. The text of the 

plea agreement conclusively defeats Haslam’s claim of 

breach. 

We confronted a similar claim in United States v. Schilling, 

142 F.3d 388 (7th Cir. 1998). The defendants in that case 

admitted in their plea agreements that they defrauded the 

government of excise taxes on 300,000 gallons of diesel fuel. 

There, as here, the plea agreements also “explicitly reserved

[to the government] its right to apprise the court of the 

totality of the [defendants’] conduct.” Id. at 396 (internal 

quotation marks omitted). The defendants nonetheless 

insisted that the plea agreement implicitly prohibited the 

government from introducing at sentencing evidence supporting an amount in excess of 300,000 gallons. We rejected 

this argument based on the government’s express reservation of its right to advise the court of all relevant conduct. If 

the defendants’ argument was correct, we said, then “it is 

difficult to fathom what good th[is] language did.” Id. at 397.

We noted as well that the government cannot withhold 

relevant information from the court. Id. at 395 n.11 (“[T]he 

Government does not have a right to withhold from the

sentencing judge all the salient facts of the defendant’s 

conduct.”).

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Because the plea agreement unambiguously forecloses

Haslam’s claim, we could end our discussion here. “[W]hen 

a plea agreement is unambiguous on its face, this court 

generally interprets the agreement according to its plain 

meaning.” O'Doherty, 643 F.3d at 217 (quoting United States 

v. Monroe, 580 F.3d 552, 556 (7th Cir. 2009)). Haslam contends, however, that his is one of the rare cases in which 

evidence extrinsic to the plea agreement is so overwhelming 

that it’s sufficient to overcome the agreement’s unambiguous terms. Assuming for the sake of argument that Haslam’s 

premise is correct, the extrinsic evidence he relies on to 

establish an implied promise comes nowhere close to doing 

so.

Haslam reminds us that the government acquiesced in 

his demand to remove the Sample incident from the factualbasis section of the plea agreement. He thinks this is evidence of an implied promise not to present this evidence to 

the court. We don’t see why. The government’s acquiescence 

demonstrates only that it acknowledged Haslam’s refusal to 

admit to the Sample incident as relevant conduct.

Haslam also notes that he and his attorney persistently 

challenged the truth of Sample’s allegations throughout the 

sentencing process. Relatedly, he identifies several points 

along the way where he or his attorney attempted to advance an argument that the plea agreement prevented the 

government from introducing this evidence. These occasions 

include the initial sentencing hearing before the district 

judge when his attorney objected to Sample’s testimony and 

Haslam’s own letter to his counsel complaining that the 

“probation department” had “many details ... which defiCase: 14-2641 Document: 43 Filed: 08/17/2016 Pages: 13
12 No. 14-2641

nitely would have influenced” his decision to sign the plea 

agreement.

As the district judge saw it, this evidence showed only

that Haslam vigorously contested the truth of Sample’s 

allegations, not that the government made an implied promise to forego presenting this evidence to the court. That 

conclusion was eminently reasonable, and it’s also bolstered 

by Haslam’s failure to formally accuse the government of 

breach until well into the sentencing process. Haslam says 

he didn’t move to withdraw his pleas earlier in the proceedings because he was “trying to get the district court to 

enforce what he believed to be the government’s obligation 

rather than rushing to withdraw his guilty plea,” which

would have risked reinstatement of the count carrying the 

30-year mandatory minimum. But of course there was no 

such obligation, and Haslam never tried to “enforce” a 

supposed promise by the government until well after the 

district court accepted Sample’s testimony. Instead, he 

challenged her testimony as a factual matter and also argued

that the evidence was irrelevant. The judge properly rejected 

Haslam’s claim of breach.

Haslam’s second argument doesn’t fare any better. He 

contends that he didn’t knowingly enter into the plea 

agreement because he mistakenly thought that it prevented 

the government from introducing the Sample evidence. The 

judge summarily rejected this argument, and rightly so.

In his plea colloquy, Haslam told the magistrate judge 

under oath that he understood the plea agreement and that 

no promises were made to induce him to plead guilty other 

than those contained in the written plea agreement itself.

These sworn statements directly contradict Haslam’s claim 

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that he proceeded on the understanding that the government had made an extrinsic promise to refrain from presenting evidence of the Sample incident at sentencing. Haslam’s 

argument necessarily entails an assertion that he lied to the 

magistrate judge. The district judge was entitled to reject this

assertion out of hand unless Haslam presented a compelling 

explanation for his perjury. United States v. Peterson, 414 F.3d 

825, 827 (7th Cir. 2005) (“[A] motion that can succeed only if 

the defendant committed perjury at the plea proceedings 

may be rejected out of hand unless the defendant has a 

compelling explanation for the contradiction.”). He did not 

do so.

AFFIRMED.

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