Opinion ID: 2995148
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Failure to Object to Preponderance

Text: of the Evidence Standard Valenzuela was sentenced prior to the Supreme Court’s decision in Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S. Ct. 2348, 147 L. Ed. 2d 434 (2000), which held that [o]ther than the fact of a prior conviction, any fact that increases the penalty for a crime beyond the prescribed statutory maximum must be submitted to a jury and proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. at 490. Valenzuela now argues for the first time that his attorney provided ineffective assistance of counsel by failing to object to the district court’s use of a preponderance standard to determine the amount of cocaine and cocaine base./2 By failing to raise this issue in his sec. 2255 petition before the district court, however, Valenzuela has waived it. See Drake v. Clarke, 14 F.3d 351, 355 (7th Cir. 1994). At any rate, this argument is meritless because our cases provide that [t]he Sixth Amendment does not require counsel to forecast changes or advances in the law. Lilly v. Gilmore, 988 F.2d 783, 786 (7th Cir. 1993); see also United States v. Smith, 241 F.3d 546, 548 (7th Cir. 2001) (noting that an ineffective assistance of counsel argument premised on counsel’s failure to anticipate Apprendi would be untenable).