Opinion ID: 44811
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: facts

Text: In August 1994, Zuluaga pleaded guilty, and when he did not appear at his sentencing on December 2, 1994, he was sentenced in absentia. In 1998, Zuluaga 2 was re-apprehended, and he appeared in court on May 29, 1998, where he was informed of the sentence that had been imposed in 1994 and incarcerated. On June 29, 1998, Zuluaga appealed his conviction and sentence, through counsel, to a Florida District Court of Appeal. The appeal was dismissed on January 25, 2000, and Zuluaga did not seek review of the dismissal in the Supreme Court of Florida or the Supreme Court of the United States. Zuluaga represents that he then filed several motions for postconviction relief in Florida trial court. Zuluaga contends that on May 25, 2000, he filed a motion for postconviction relief under Rule 3.850 of the Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure. Ultimately, the trial court denied the motion, a Florida District Court of Appeal affirmed the denial, and a mandate issued from the appellate court on April 21, 2003. Zuluaga contends that on January 7, 2004, he filed a motion for postconviction relief under Rule 3.800 of the Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, which also was denied by the trial court. A Florida District Court of Appeal affirmed the denial and issued a mandate on May 21, 2004. Finally, Zuluaga contends that on April 26, 2004, before the mandate issued on his Rule 3.800 motion, he filed a second motion for postconviction relief under Rule 3.850. That motion was denied by the trial court, the denial was affirmed, and a mandate issued from the appellate court on January 7, 2005. Neither Zuluaga nor the Secretary has 3 offered into the record any documents that support these contentions by Zuluaga, but the Secretary also has not denied Zuluaga’s contentions. On February 17, 2005, Zuluaga filed his petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court. The district court referred the petition to a magistrate judge for a report and recommendation. The Secretary argued to the magistrate judge that Zuluaga’s petition was untimely, because Zuluaga’s conviction became final 30 days after Zuluaga was sentenced in absentia on December 2, 1994. Zuluaga countered that his petition was timely, because his conviction did not become final until after he was re-apprehended in 1998. The magistrate judge recommended to the district court that Zuluaga’s petition be dismissed as untimely. The magistrate judge reasoned that, even under Zuluaga’s timeline, Zuluaga’s conviction became final on January 25, 2000, the date on which Zuluaga’s direct appeal was dismissed, and the applicable tolling was insufficient to render timely Zuluaga’s petition of February 17, 2005. The magistrate judge concluded that he need not definitively determine the date on which Zuluaga’s conviction became final but assumed, for purposes of his decision, that Zuluaga’s conviction became final on the date on which Zuluaga’s direct appeal was dismissed. The magistrate judge did not consider whether Zuluaga was entitled to the additional time in which he could have sought review 4 of the dismissal of his direct appeal. Zuluaga objected to the report and recommendation of the magistrate judge. He asserted that a conviction ordinarily does not become final until the time for seeking review from the Supreme Court of the United States expires. The district court adopted the report and recommendation of the magistrate judge over Zuluaga’s objection. We granted a certificate of appealability on one issue: “[w]hether the district court erred by dismissing appellant’s 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition as barred by 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1)’s one-year statute of limitations?”