Opinion ID: 539884
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Pollak's Alleged Plea Agreement

Text: 16 Pollak contends the district court erred by not enforcing an alleged plea agreement between him and the government, or, at least, holding an evidentiary hearing to determine whether the alleged agreement existed. Before trial, Pollak moved the district court to enforce the alleged plea agreement, or alternatively, to hold an evidentiary hearing. The district court did not grant the motion. Pollak filed a similar motion after trial, adding the claim that the government deprived him of counsel of his choice by reneging on the agreement. The district court denied this motion. 17 According to Pollak, in April 1987, shortly after his arrest, he had what he termed a casual meeting with the Assistant United States Attorney (AUSA) in charge of his case. Pollak's attorney was present at that meeting. At that meeting, the AUSA allegedly told Pollak that if [Pollak] did not cooperate, he was looking at 10 years. Pollak asked his attorney whether he could trust the AUSA; his counsel told him the AUSA was a man of his word. Based on what happened at the first meeting, Pollak agreed to cooperate with the government. 18 Pollak met twice with the AUSA and other government agents in the following three to four weeks and gave them information about himself and others. At one of those meetings, a Customs agent told Pollak that if he withheld information, he [was] looking at five years. Pollak says that he took the AUSA's and agent's statements together to mean that if he cooperated with the government, the government would recommend a sentence less than five years. Pollak cooperated; but after the AUSA checked with his superiors, he told Pollak the government could not recommend less than a 10-year sentence if Pollak pleaded guilty. This proposed recommendation, which Pollak considered to be a breach of his agreement with the government, caused him to lose faith in his attorney who had told him he could trust the AUSA. Because of this lost faith, Pollak fired his attorney and went to trial with a new attorney. 19 Pollak asserts that in exchange for his cooperation, the government promised that it would not use any statements he made against him (the immunity agreement) and that if he pleaded guilty, the government would recommend a sentence less than five years (the sentence agreement). (As do the parties, we shall refer to these alleged agreements together as the plea agreement.) Pollak asserts that the government violated the fifth amendment's due process and self-incrimination clauses by reneging on the plea agreement and using his immunized statements against him. Pollak also asserts that the government violated his sixth amendment right to counsel of his choice by causing him to lose faith in, and subsequently fire, his original attorney. Pollak suggests the proper remedies for the government's alleged underhandedness would be specific performance of the plea agreement (i.e., a reduction of his seven-year sentence to less than five years), or possibly dismissal of the charges against him. 20 We need not examine the legal bases for Pollak's claims or his proposed remedies. Pollak's claims all rest on the common factual premise that in exchange for his cooperation, the government agreed it would not use his statements against him and that it would recommend a sentence less than five years if he pleaded guilty. Without hearing evidence, the district court concluded there was no agreement; therefore, Pollak's claims failed. Pollak contends that at the very least the district court should have held an evidentiary hearing to determine if any agreements existed and if the government violated them. We disagree. 21 A district court does not have to hold an evidentiary hearing on a motion just because a party asks for one. An evidentiary hearing is necessary only if the party requesting the hearing raises a significant, disputed factual issue. See United States v. Fountain, 777 F.2d 351, 358 (7th Cir.1985). The question in this case is whether Pollak's submissions to the district court were adequate to raise a disputed factual issue that was necessary to decide his motion; if not, no evidentiary hearing was necessary. 22 Pollak had to show that he and the government had made a plea agreement. Pollak's submissions to the district court, however, fatally undercut his position. Along with his pretrial motion, which included an affidavit from his original attorney, Pollak included a letter he had written to his attorney. In that letter, Pollak admitted that at their first meeting, the AUSA told him, In exchange for your complete candor ... I'll see what we can do. ... (Emphasis added.) Similarly, Pollak's letter stated that at the second meeting the AUSA told him, I cannot promise anything to you but I'll see what can be done in light of your cooperation and candor, but I cannot promise you, of course. (Emphasis added.) 1 23 The statements in Pollak's letter indicate that he did not actually receive any promises from the government (and that he probably did not believe there were any promises). More importantly, even if Pollak did believe the government had made promises, the statements in his letter show that any such belief was not reasonable. Plea agreements--and, logically, the sentence and immunity agreements that make up the alleged plea agreement in this case--are contracts, see United States v. Ataya, 864 F.2d 1324, 1329 (7th Cir.1988), and determining the existence and meaning of such contracts is governed by ordinary contract principles of offer and acceptance, United States v. Delegal, 678 F.2d 47, 50 (7th Cir.1982). Those principles in turn require that we examine the parties' reasonable expectations--an objective standard. United States v. Fields, 766 F.2d 1161, 1168 (7th Cir.1985). 24 Pollak cannot plausibly argue that he reasonably thought the AUSA's and Customs agent's general references to sentence length (i.e., ten or five years without cooperation) represented specific promises to recommend a certain sentence, given the statements in his own letter. Nor can he reasonably argue that the AUSA promised him immunity; in fact, aside from his bald assertion of such a promise, Pollak presented nothing to the district court from which the court could have inferred such a promise. Moreover, given the statements in Pollak's letter, Pollak could not reasonably believe that the AUSA or the agent had the authority to make any specific promise. Despite what might have been Pollak's subjective belief, Pollak's submission to the district court, judged objectively, leads to only one conclusion: no agreement existed. 25 Besides undercutting his own position, Pollak's letter to his attorney also supports the AUSA's account of his meetings with Pollak. While the district court did not hold an evidentiary hearing on the plea agreement issue, the court did hear the parties' positions before trial. At that hearing, the AUSA stated that he had discussed a possible agreement with Pollak but that he and Pollak had not reached any agreement. The reference to ten years related to the possibility of a CCE charge against Pollak: if Pollak did not cooperate, he could face a CCE charge and minimum 10-year sentence. According to the AUSA, it was his standard procedure to tell a defendant about what charges and possible sentence the defendant might be facing without cooperation, and to tell the defendant that with cooperation he would see what he could do. 26 Given that Pollak's submission undermined his own position and supported the AUSA's version of events, it was proper for the district court to conclude there were no important disputed facts and that no evidentiary hearing was necessary. It was also proper to conclude that no plea agreement existed. Without the agreement, Pollak's fifth amendment claims fail; the government could not breach an agreement that did not exist. Pollak's sixth amendment claim also fails. If the government breached no agreement, Pollak could not impute to the government his loss of faith in, and his decision to fire, his attorney. Pollak very well may have had his hopes dashed, and may have blamed that on his attorney, but that was a matter strictly between him and the attorney.