Opinion ID: 4537855
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Decision on Habeas Review

Text: In discussing Bartolomeo's claim, the habeas court began by addressing the merits of the issue we did not definitively resolve in Moore: whether the pre-Booker residual clause had the same constitutional flaw as the ACCA's identical clause. The court accepted the view adopted by several other judges within the District of Massachusetts that petitioners sentenced under the residual clause of the mandatory, pre-Booker career offender guideline may be entitled to resentencing under Johnson II. Bartolomeo v. United States, 316 F. Supp. 3d 539, 546 (D. Mass. 2018); see also, e.g., Boria v. United States, 427 F. Supp. 3d 143, 149 (D. Mass. 2019); United States v. Roy, 282 F. Supp. 3d 421, 425-28 (D. Mass. 2017); Reid v. United States, 252 F. Supp. 3d 63, 66-68 (D. Mass. 2017). Therefore, because Bartolomeo's predicate crimes no longer qualified for career-offender status, the court went on to consider whether Bartolomeo satisfied the requirements for habeas relief. Relying on earlier precedent in the District, the court readily concluded that Bartolomeo had shown cause for his procedural default in failing to previously raise the careeroffender claim. See 316 F. Supp. 3d at 546. The court quoted multiple decisions opining that the cause requirement was plainly - 21 - met, including the observation in United States v. Lattanzio that, [i]n 1995, when Defendant here was sentenced, any argument based on the rationales approved twenty years later in the Johnson cases would have been not only novel, but practically unimaginable. 232 F. Supp. 3d 220, 223 (D. Mass. 2017); see also, e.g., United States v. Webb, 217 F. Supp. 3d 381, 390 (D. Mass. 2016) (referring to the monumental shift that Johnson II created in sentencing). However, the court found that Bartolomeo's circumstances differed from the ordinary Johnson [II] case, [in which] cause and prejudice are the twinned results of sentencing for offenses that no longer qualify as career offender predicates. Bartolomeo, 316 F. Supp. 3d at 546. Based on its review of the record, the court concluded that, although Bartolomeo's career-offender status was factored into the sentencing judge's calculation of the applicable Guidelines range, the judge did not rely on the GSR calculation in sentencing Bartolomeo. See id. at 546-47. Rather, it was the joint motion for upward departure that ultimately determined the sentence. Id. at 547. The court further found that the plea agreement indicated petitioner's assent [to the thirty-five-year term] irrespective of any career offender designation. Id. Hence, the court held, because Bartolomeo failed to show that his sentence was affected by his career-offender status, he has not shown a reasonable probability that, but for his career - 22 - offender designation, he would have received a different sentence. Id. The court therefore denied the petition for habeas relief for failure to show actual prejudice. Id. at 548.