Opinion ID: 1457971
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Claim of Ineffective Assistance by Attorney Wynn

Text: Vadas's claim of ineffective assistance by Attorney Wynn involves a question of first impression: Whether the filing and later withdrawal of an Amended Second-Offender Information rendered null and void the originally filed Second-Offender Information. Vadas contends that the government's agreement to withdraw the Amended Second-Offender Notice Information filed March 15, 2001 pursuant to Title 21, United States Code, Section 851, reduces the mandatory minimum from ten years to five years. On this basis, he asserts that Attorney Wynn erred by failing to argue at sentencing that petitioner was subject to no more than a five-year mandatory-minimum sentence. To our knowledge, no court of appeals has previously addressed this precise question. [4] Section 851 establishes that a penalty enhancement of the sort involved in this case is barred unless the Second-Offender Information is filed before the trial or before the entry of a plea agreement. It is beyond dispute that a Second-Offender Information was filed before the entry of Vadas's plea agreement. The instant petition implicates the validity of that notice only insofar as we must determine, for purposes of the first prong of the Strickland test, whether Attorney Wynn's performance was outside the wide range of professionally competent assistance. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690, 104 S.Ct. 2052. We abide by a strong presumption that counsel's conduct falls within the wide range of reasonable professional assistance, as there are countless ways to provide effective assistance in any given case. United States v. Aguirre, 912 F.2d 555, 560 (2d Cir.1990) (quoting Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689, 104 S.Ct. 2052). We hold that the filing of an amended second-offender information under § 851 did not extinguish the previously filed second-offender information. The validity of a Second-Offender Information required by § 851 must be evaluated in light of the purposes of § 851, which are quite distinct from those that underlie the requirement of an indictment in a criminal offense. Section 851's notice requirement reflects, essentially, two goals, first to allow the defendant to contest the accuracy of the information, and second to allow defendant to have ample time to determine whether to enter a plea or go to trial and plan his trial strategy with full knowledge of the consequences of a potential guilty verdict. United States v. Williams, 59 F.3d 1180, 1185 (11th Cir.1995) (citing United States v. Johnson, 944 F.2d 396 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 1008, 112 S.Ct. 646, 116 L.Ed.2d 663 (1991)). Indeed, the provision was enacted to fulfill the due process requirements of reasonable notice and an opportunity to be heard with regard to the prior conviction. United States v. Mayfield, 418 F.3d 1017, 1020 (9th Cir.2005). Not surprisingly, numerous courts in analogous circumstances have held that a Second-Offender Information, once properly filed, remains valid despite events that occur later during the prosecution of a criminal case. Thus, in United States v. Williams, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals considered whether the government failed to meet its penalty-enhancement notice requirement because it did not refile the information in the retrial of a defendant after his conviction had been reversed. 59 F.3d at 1185-86. Noting that [c]learly the information was filed `before trial,' the court concluded that once the information was filed, it was not necessary that it be refiled for each consecutive trial in the same court: The same attorney represented Williams at all three trials, knew that the information had been filed, knew about the prior conviction, which was admitted, and had addressed that prior conviction at the sentencing in the first trial. The defendant knew the effect of such enhancement and knew the consequences of a guilty verdict ... ... The established purposes of the filing and service are fully met upon the first filing and service, at least where the case involves the same attorneys, the same court, and the same indictment. Williams, 59 F.3d at 1185. Similarly, in evaluating situations like superseding indictments, retrials, and multiple trials in the same case, several of our sister circuits have found that a second information is not needed. See United States v. Cooper, 461 F.3d 850, 854 (7th Cir.2006) (The two purposes of the Section 851 notice provision are: (1) to allow the defendant to contest the accuracy of the prior conviction ... and (2) to ensure the defendant has full knowledge of a potential guilty verdict.); Mayfield, 418 F.3d at 1020 ([T]he government is not required to refile a section 851(a) information and again give the required notice prior to a defendant's retrial ....); see also United States v. Lincoln, 165 Fed. Appx. 275, 277 (4th Cir.2006) (per curiam) (The purpose of the § 851 provisions is to provide notice to a defendant prior to trial... such that the defendant has the opportunity to contest the accuracy of the information and to allow the defense sufficient time to understand the full consequences of a guilty plea or verdict). The Tenth Circuit stated the point particularly well when, in United States v. Wright, it rejected defendants' contention that the district court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction to enhance their sentences because, although the government filed an information subsequent to a first indictment, the government had failed to file another information after the filing of a superseding indictment. 932 F.2d 868, 882 (10th Cir.1991), overruled on other grounds by United States v. Flowers, 464 F.3d 1127 (10th Cir.2006). Addressing that issue as one of first impression, the court concluded: Under the circumstances of this case, we hold that the filing of the information after the initial indictment was sufficient. By filing an information noting its intention to seek an enhanced sentence, the Government complied with the letter and the spirit of the law. The statute mandates that the information be filed before trial  this was done. The purpose of the statute is to give defendants an opportunity to show they had not been previously convicted of those crimes subjecting them to increased penalties. Id.; see also Cooper, 461 F.3d at 853-54. In the case before us, too, there can be no doubt that the filing of the April 2000 Second-Offender Information provided Vadas with notice that was adequate to allow him to accept (or to prepare to challenge) a sentence enhancement based on a previous conviction. It likewise fully informed the court of the need to fulfill its responsibilities under § 851(b). [5] By filing the first notice one year before Vadas's entry of a guilty plea, the government provided petitioner with ample opportunity to investigate and contest the accuracy of the information. Vadas stated that he knew that he was subject to a mandatory minimum ten-year sentence on account of a prior felony drug conviction, the validity of which he has never challenged. Similarly, the district court and the government at all times understood that Vadas's sentence under a plea agreement required no less than a ten-year term of imprisonment because of the existence of a prior felony. And the court explained that fact to the defendant. Thus, the purposes of § 851 were fulfilled through the original filing of the information, and we hold that this filing remained effective. But that is not the only reason why Vadas's petition fails. Had his lawyer, Wynn, challenged the proposed sentence, the government could have withdrawn the plea offer now under scrutiny and returned to the charges that could have carried a twenty-year minimum sentence. Under the circumstances, his failure to challenge the ten-year minimum sentence must be viewed as both strategic and wise, and as such, it certainly do[es] not show incompetence, United States v. Vegas, 27 F.3d 773, 777 (2d Cir.1994), under Strickland.