Opinion ID: 2995177
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Proceedings Against Luis and David

Text: Carrera On September 22, 1999, David and Luis Carrera were each charged with one count of conspiring to possess with intent to distribute at least five kilograms of mixtures containing cocaine in violation of 21 U.S.C. sec. 846 and 18 U.S.C. sec. 2, and one count of possession with intent to distribute approximately five kilograms in violation of 21 U.S.C. sec. 846 and 18 U.S.C. sec. 2. On October 26, 1999, one week before defendants’ joint trial was scheduled to begin, Luis’s court appointed attorneys, John A. Meyer and Timothy O’Connor,/2 filed an emergency motion to withdraw as counsel for Luis. The motion offered two reasons necessitating withdrawal: Luis Carrera’s family had retained private counsel, and the rules of professional responsibility required withdrawal as a result of matters that arose for the first time on October 25, 1999. The court considered the motion the next day during a pretrial hearing. Luis’s proposed new counsel was not present. Meyer explained to the court that Luis had informed him the previous day that his family had retained a new attorney, and that he no longer wished to have Meyer and O’Connor represent him. Meyer stated that he had contacted Luis’s family and was told that the new counsel would be in court for the start of trial on November 1. He told the court that he had advised Luis and Luis’s family that this was unacceptable, and that the new attorney needed to be in court that day to ask the court’s permission to substitute. Meyer did not know the name of Luis’s new attorney, and neither he nor the government had been contacted by anyone claiming to be Luis’s new attorney. After listening to this explanation, the district judge stated, [a]ll right, then, I’m going to have to deny your motion. Meyer then reminded the court that the motion to withdraw was based not only on Luis’s desire for new counsel but also on professional responsibility considerations. At that point, the following colloquy took place: The Court: Well, that presents a problem. I’ll think about that problem. But has Mr. Carrera disclosed to you who this attorney is? Mr. Meyer: No he hasn’t Judge. And perhaps he could, if he knows the name. Luis Carrera: Your Honor, I spoke to my attorney and stuff and, ah, things aren’t--things aren’t working the way, you know that I--you know that I assume they would have been and I’m just not happy with the stuff that is going on. So I requested, you know, to get some other attorneys. The Court: Well,-- Luis Carrera: And my family is looking into it. I just-- I just told him yesterday that I didn’t want them to represent me. The Court: Well they are appointed by the court to represent you. And they weren’t just appointed yesterday, they were appointed quite some time ago. And Mr. Meyer has done quite a bit of trial preparation, we had a pretrial conference, we’re ready to try the case on Monday. And absent some kind of compelling good reason for a substitute of counsel, I cannot authorize them to withdraw at this point. If you had counsel here ready to go to trial, or would be ready to go to trial by next week, and somebody who’s admitted to the bar, qualified to do so, of course I would grant the motion. But that’s not the case. So the motion is denied. Luis Carrera: Well, your honor, like I said, I just advised them yesterday that I was going to have an attorney come to speak to me today. But, you know, I was rushed over here. I was barely arraigned less than a month ago, I don’t know if you can take that into consideration. The Court: . . . The motion is denied. Tr. of Emergency Mot. Hr’g. at 5-6. The joint trial of Luis and David began six days later, on November 2, 1999, with Meyer and O’Connor serving as counsel for Luis. On the morning of the first day of trial, Victor Ciardelli, the attorney retained by Luis’s family, attempted to file some sort of emergency motion to postpone the trial. The exact sequence of events is a bit unclear, but Ciardelli was not permitted to enter his appearance on behalf of Luis at that time. The court proceeded with the trial, and the government completed its case-in-chief that afternoon. The next morning, Ciardelli informed the court that he had spoken to Luis over the weekend, and that Luis wished to change his plea to guilty. The district court allowed Ciardelli to enter his appearance as additional counsel for the purposes of the plea hearing. Warning Luis that there are no economies to either the government or to the Court . . . for a guilty plea at this stage, the district court proceeded to conduct the guilty plea hearing. The district court proceeded with David’s trial, and it ended in a mistrial when the jury was unable to reach a verdict on either count. A few days later, David was tried again, and this time, the jury found him guilty on both counts.