Opinion ID: 526038
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: pellerito's reasons

Text: 12 The district court concluded that Pellerito's guilty plea was fully informed and competently made; that his claims of ineffective assistance were meritless; and consequently, that he had failed to evince a fair and just reason for retraction. See Pellerito, 701 F.Supp. at 296. We treat independently with two issues which appellant hawks with especial fervor, and then assay the balance of relevant situational factors. 13
14 Pellerito claims that his trial attorney, Emanuel Moore, led him to believe that, as part of the plea agreement, he would receive immunity from threatened prosecutions in New York and Florida. He contends alternatively that, for whatever reason, he thought (erroneously) that further prosecutions in other jurisdictions would be barred, thus rendering his guilty plea involuntary. 2 The district court found defendant's claim that Moore misled him to be not credible. Id. at 294. Among other things, the court pointed to testimony by Pellerito's local counsel, attorney Julio Morales-Sanchez, that it had been explained to Pellerito that the plea agreement was not binding on other jurisdictions. Id. The decision to believe Morales-Sanchez on this point, rather than appellant, was the trial judge's to make and should not be disturbed. 15 Defendant's professed belief that, regardless of what he was told, he would be held harmless from prosecutions in other jurisdictions, is material only to the extent it was objectively reasonable. United States v. Hogan, 862 F.2d 386, 388 (1st Cir.1988). Here, it was not. First, Pellerito had ample incentive to plead wholly apart from fear of mushrooming prosecutions. Because the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, 21 U.S.C. Sec. 960, did not apply to the plea as structured, and the plea agreement obligated the prosecutor to recommend a maximum sentence of 18 years (a recommendation that the trial court followed), appellant's potential exposure was lowered materially. 3 16 Second, during the change-of-plea hearing, defendant assured the district judge that no other promises had been made, no other terms negotiated. There was no suggestion that immunity from prosecution elsewhere had been considered, let alone guaranteed. As the court below perspicaciously observed, it strains credibility to suggest that [defendant's supposed] misconception as to the grant of immunity would not have come to light in the lengthy, detailed Rule 11 colloquy. Pellerito, 701 F.Supp. at 295. We will not permit a defendant to turn his back on his own representations to the court merely because it would suit his convenience to do so. 17 It is true that, at one point during the Rule 11 proceedings, defendant stated that he was pleading to conspiracy enterprise in Puerto Rico, New York, New Jersey and Florida. Counsel seizes upon this single locution and claims it proves that Pellerito believed his plea was intended to foreclose prosecution in other venues. It is possible that such an inference might be drawn from Pellerito's response--but it is certainly not the only permissible inference, nor even the most plausible one. The defendant was pleading guilty to participation in a multistate conspiracy. He could simply have been describing the places where, in his view, the drug-trafficking combine operated. At any rate, we are reluctant to place the weight of decision on an isolated reference in a long and thorough Rule 11 inquiry, in the process overruling the contrary determination of the judge who presided at both the plea-tendering and plea-withdrawal hearings, and who saw and heard the principals. Having read the entire record, we believe there was ample support for the district court's finding that defendant's claimed failure to understand the terms of his plea agreement was imaginary rather than real. 4 Pellerito, 701 F.Supp. at 295. 18
19 Pellerito shuttled lawyers in and out as he readied his defense. He was represented initially by attorney Segal, then by attorneys Fisher and Bronson, then by attorney Moore, and finally by his present counsel. He was also represented by local counsel in the person of Morales-Sanchez, a former United States Attorney. At the time of the plea-withdrawal hearing, Pellerito asserted that the majority of these lawyers represented him inexpertly. Most of these claims were so conclusively resolved by the district court, e.g., id. at 291-92 (discussing allegedly ineffective assistance of Messrs. Fisher, Bronson, and Morales-Sanchez) that adding an appellate gloss would be carrying coals to Newcastle. In our view, only two aspects of the jeremiad warrant further comment. 20 1. The Tapes. Telephone interceptions formed a centerpiece of the prosecution's case against many of the defendants, Pellerito included. Appellant now says that his attorneys should have tried to suppress the tape recordings commemorating these conversations. The argument, tonitruously phrased in emphatic terms, contains abundant sound and fury, but signifies precious little. In the first place, Pellerito has shown no prejudice attributable to the absence of a suppression motion. Although present counsel, in a rote recital, lists numerous ways in which the fruits of electronic surveillance can be challenged, he offers not a scintilla of evidence to indicate that the particular tapes which incriminated Pellerito were vulnerable in any respect. 21 In the second place, reality debunks the suggestion. The record on appeal does not reflect that any of the other defendants in this thirty-five defendant case were successful in quashing the telephone intercepts. Attorney Fisher testified that he and his staff expended enormous time and effort searching for a plausible way to block the tapes (and the damning evidence they contained). Fisher ultimately concluded that there was no legitimate shot at achieving suppression. The district court credited this evidence. Pellerito, 701 F.Supp. at 287. It was entitled to do so. Fisher's decision not to seek suppression was reasonable. Effectiveness does not require that counsel jump through every conceivable hoop, or engage in futile exercises. See United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 656 n. 19, 104 S.Ct. 2039, 2045 n. 19, 80 L.Ed.2d 657 (1984) (useless charade not required); United States v. Levy, 870 F.2d 37, 38 (1st Cir.1989) (counsel need not advocate meritless defense) (citing Cronic ). That another lawyer might have taken a different slant is beside the point; as the Court has taught, strategic choices made after thorough investigation of law and facts relevant to plausible options are virtually unchallengeable in ineffective assistance litigation. Strickland, 466 U.S. at 690, 104 S.Ct. at 2066. 22 2. Preparation Time. Pellerito also asserted that Moore, his trial counsel, did not have adequate time to prepare a solid defense. Pellerito discharged Fisher and hired Moore on Thursday, June 2, knowing that trial was scheduled to start on June 6. The district court found that, notwithstanding his late entry into the case, Moore was ready for trial. Pellerito, 701 F.Supp. at 292-93. The finding, we think, is sustainable. 23 Moore had been an attorney for 22 years, specializing for much of that time in criminal defense. Earlier in his career, he had been both a federal and state prosecutor. He had tried hundreds of matters. And, he was a stranger neither to the client nor to the cause: Moore had known Pellerito for six years and was familiar with many details of the case by reason of his association with Mario Malerba, a codefendant's lawyer. In addition, Moore had, and diligently utilized, many resources. Attorney Gonzalez, an associate, worked with him. Fisher, Bronson, Malerba, and Morales-Sanchez made themselves available and briefed Moore on various aspects of the case. Bronson and Fisher provided all the discovery material obtained from the government (including transcripts of the taped telephone calls). The district judge allowed Moore, Pellerito, Malerba, and Morales-Sanchez to listen to the tapes before trial began. 24 Certainly, available preparation time was in relatively short supply and the timing less than ideal. Yet Moore, at least, harbored no doubt that by Monday he was fully prepared. He testified: 25 I came ready to go to trial. There was no doubt about that.... I felt very comfortable with going to trial on that day. 26 When a trial date has been set, a defendant who elects to change counsel at the eleventh hour is deemed to be aware of the need for, and rigors of, proper preparation. Counsel who chooses to accept the engagement is equally on notice. Lawyers with different backgrounds, work habits, experience, and skill require differing amounts of time properly to ready a case for trial. In this instance, Moore appears to have responded to the exigencies of the moment in a thoroughly professional manner. Particularly given the lawyer's long experience and unquestioned expertise in criminal law, the district court was entitled to conclude that Moore's trial preparation, though pressured, fell comfortably within the boundaries of reasonably effective representation. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687, 104 S.Ct. at 2064; see also Cronic, 466 U.S. at 665-66, 104 S.Ct. at 2050-51 (absent showing of some specific error, ineffective assistance cannot be presumed from, inter alia, brevity of preparation period). 27
28 Having determined that Pellerito's principal points lack merit, review of the district court's handling of relevant situational factors need not detain us long. The opinion below is a model of the careful, balanced inquiry that plea-withdrawal attempts demand: it limns the circumstances of the plea; fully addresses defendant's arguments; sets out explicit findings of fact; and meticulously documents those findings. We endorse the findings and conclusions unreservedly. 29 In Pellerito's case, when the record is read fully and in context, the scales tip markedly in the prosecution's favor. For one thing, Pellerito never asserted that he was innocent of the charges to which he pled. For another thing, even though one of his current lawyers was present at the Rule 11 hearing, he did not move for withdrawal until approximately eight weeks had elapsed. The prosecution, laboriously assembled over time, was by then dismantled. Third, the plea was part of a quid pro quo, explicitly articulated and fully achieved. In light of the totality of the circumstances, including the facts to which we have referred, the district court cannot be said to have misused its discretion in concluding that Pellerito's plea was voluntary, sentient, and intelligently given, and in discerning no fair and just reason for retraction.