Source: http://openjurist.org/288/f3d/644/united-states-v-emmanuel
Timestamp: 2013-12-13 22:24:58
Document Index: 241138417

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 111', '§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 2255', '§ 2255']

288 F3d 644 United States v. Emmanuel | OpenJurist
288 F. 3d 644 - United States v. Emmanuel	Home288 f3d 644 united states v. emmanuel
288 F3d 644 United States v. Emmanuel 288 F.3d 644
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee,v.Shahborn EMMANUEL, Defendant-Appellant.
No. 00-7578.
ARGUED: James Richard Glover, Glover & Petersen, P.A., Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for Appellant. Brian Lee Whisler, Assistant United States Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellee. ON BRIEF: Robert J. Conrad, Jr., United States Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellee.
Vacated and remanded by published opinion. Judge TRAXLER wrote the majority opinion, in which Judge NIEMEYER joined. Judge WIDENER wrote a concurring opinion.
In this appeal, we are asked to decide what procedures a district court should follow prior to converting a prisoner's mislabeled or unlabeled post-conviction motion into the movant's first § 2255 motion, see 28 U.S.C.A. § 2255 (West Supp.2001). We hold that a district court should give the movant notice of its intent to so construe the motion and an opportunity to supplement or amend the motion to the extent permitted by law to reflect all grounds for post-conviction relief that the movant wishes to raise. Because the district court in this case sua sponte construed Appellant Shahborn Emmanuel's post-conviction Rule 35 motion as his first § 2255 motion without these protections, we vacate the district court's orders denying Emmanuel relief and remand for further proceedings.
Emmanuel was convicted by a jury of one count of assault inflicting bodily injury on a protected government employee. See 18 U.S.C.A. §§ 111(a)(1), (b), 1114 (West 2000). He was sentenced to the maximum ten-year term of imprisonment, and this court affirmed his conviction and sentence. See United States v. Emmanuel, No. 98-4763, 1999 WL 1020548 (4th Cir.1999) (per curiam) (unpublished), cert. denied, 529 U.S. 1029, 120 S.Ct. 1442, 146 L.Ed.2d 329 (2000).
In August 2000, Emmanuel filed a motion to vacate his sentence. He labeled it a Rule 35 motion, see Fed.R.Crim.P. 35, and cited Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 119 S.Ct. 1215, 143 L.Ed.2d 311 (1999), in support of his contention that his sentence had been unlawfully enhanced. Emmanuel had never filed a § 2255 motion for relief from his sentence. The district court apparently understood Emmanuel to argue that his sentence was invalid because the district court had treated bodily injury as a sentencing factor rather than an element of the charged offense. The district court, sua sponte and without notice to Emmanuel, construed the motion as a § 2255 motion and summarily dismissed the motion under Rule 4 of the Rules Governing Section 2255 Proceedings.
Emmanuel then filed a motion for reconsideration in which he attempted to clarify his motion to vacate and essentially argued that the district court misapplied Jones in denying him relief. Emmanuel stated that the district court had misunderstood his original motion and that he meant to challenge the fact that use of a deadly weapon was neither charged in the indictment nor submitted to the jury. Emmanuel directed the court's attention to Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000), as further authority for his contention that his sentence was unlawful. The district court denied Emmanuel's motion to reconsider, finding that use of a deadly weapon was not an element of the charged offense.
Emmanuel then filed a second motion to reconsider and argued that the court erred by construing his original motion, styled as a Rule 35 motion, as a § 2255 motion. He also attached a proposed § 2255 motion reasserting the ground for relief raised in his Rule 35 motion to vacate and listing several additional claims he wished to pursue in a collateral proceeding. Emmanuel requested that his original motion to reconsider be withdrawn, that the court consider the attached § 2255 motion, and that the court reconsider its order denying relief. In the alternative, Emmanuel requested that the court treat the second motion to reconsider as a notice of appeal from the prior orders. In ruling on the second motion, the district court found that it properly construed Emmanuel's Rule 35 motion as a § 2255 motion and declined the invitation to treat the motion for reconsideration as a notice of appeal. Accordingly, the district court again denied all requested relief.
Emmanuel noted a timely appeal from all of the district court's orders. On appeal, Emmanuel argues that, in light of the strict limitations on second or successive motions and the fact that he had additional grounds he wi