Opinion ID: 4536574
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Plea Breach

Text: If the government materially breached Carter’s plea agreement, the waiver in it would be unenforceable. See Swanberg, 370 F.3d at 626–29; see also United States v. Munoz, 430 F. App’x 495, 498 (6th Cir. 2011). This, then, becomes the main argument in this appeal. Analyzing the government’s actions at Carter’s sentencing hearing involves two lines of precedent that courts recognize as being in tension with one another. First, the government is held to exacting standards at a sentencing hearing. Ever since Santobello v. New York, it has been the rule that “when a plea rests in any significant degree on a promise or agreement of the prosecutor, so that it can be said to be part of the inducement or consideration, such promise must be fulfilled.” 404 U.S. 257, 262 (1971). Moreover, there is no “harmless error” exception to this rule: At the