Opinion ID: 4576560
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Kwan, Padilla, and Chaidez

Text: After Kroytor’s conviction became final, we decided United States v. Kwan, which held that affirmatively misadvising a client about his conviction’s immigration consequences could provide a basis for an ineffective assistance of counsel claim. 407 F.3d 1005, 1015 (9th Cir. 2005), abrogated by Padilla v. Kentucky, 559 U.S. 356 (2010). We did not overturn our earlier-adopted rule that “an attorney’s failure to advise a client of the immigration consequences of a conviction, without more, does not 6 UNITED STATES V. KROYTOR constitute ineffective assistance of counsel.” Id. (citing United States v. Fry, 322 F.3d 1198, 1200 (9th Cir. 2003), abrogated by Padilla, 559 U.S. at 374) (emphasis added). Five years later, in Padilla v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court went further than we did in Kwan and held that defense counsel’s failure to inform a client about his conviction’s potential immigration consequences constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel. 559 U.S. at 374. “This holding abrogated the existing rule in all ten courts of appeals that had reached this issue—including ours, Fry, 322 F.3d 1198—as the courts of appeals had uniformly concluded that the mere failure to advise regarding the possibility of deportation could not establish an [ineffective assistance of counsel] claim.” United States v. Chan, 792 F.3d 1151, 1154 (9th Cir. 2015) (citing Chaidez v. United States, 568 U.S. 342, 350 & n.7 (2013)). In 2013, approximately one year before Kroytor learned that the only way he could avoid removal was by vacating his conviction, the Supreme Court held in Chaidez v. United States that, “under the principles set out in Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989),” Padilla announced a new rule that did not apply retroactively. 568 U.S. at 344. It was not clear, however, whether Chaidez’s holding regarding Padilla’s non-retroactivity under Teague covered both failure-toadvise claims and affirmative-misadvice claims. See United States v. Bonilla, 637 F.3d 980, 983–84 (9th Cir. 2011) (characterizing Padilla as deciding that both misadvice and failure-to-advise claims constitute ineffective assistance of counsel but not deciding retroactivity).