Court Opinion

ID: 9556632
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-18 00:00:39.025121+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:01:22.261248
License: Public Domain

Case: 18-30694      Document: 00516862523          Page: 1     Date Filed: 08/17/2023

            United States Court of Appeals
                 for the Fifth Circuit
                                                                            United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                     Fifth Circuit

                                 ____________                                      FILED
                                                                             August 17, 2023
                                   No. 18-30694                               Lyle W. Cayce
                                 ____________                                      Clerk

   United States of America,

                                                               Plaintiff—Appellee,

                                        versus

   Robert Cuff,

                                            Defendant—Appellant.
                   ______________________________

                   Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Western District of Louisiana
                            USDC No. 5:14-CV-3384
                   ______________________________

   Before Higginbotham, Jones, and Oldham, Circuit Judges.
   Edith H. Jones, Circuit Judge:
          Robert Cuff, a federal prisoner, appeals the denial of this 28 U.S.C.
   § 2255 motion alleging breach of his plea agreement based on serious
   allegations against Assistant U.S. Attorneys and ineffective assistance of
   counsel. We disagree with the district court’s application of the procedural
   bar to the breach-of-plea agreement claim and must reverse and remand but
   affirm its disposition of the ineffective assistance of counsel claim.
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                                      No. 18-30694

                                  I. Background
            In 2011, a federal grand jury in Louisiana indicted Robert Cuff with
   three counts relating to his participation in an internet bulletin board
   dedicated to the distribution of child pornography. Cuff was arrested and his
   house in El Paso, Texas was searched. While searching Cuff’s residence, law
   enforcement found videos of Cuff sexually abusing his girlfriend’s five-year-
   old daughter. There was no evidence that these videos had been shared on
   the bulletin board. The videos were recorded in the Western District of
   Texas.
            Cuff began negotiating a plea deal with the government after his arrest.
   According to his affidavit, Cuff’s defense attorney, Stephen Karns, inquired
   whether charges would be brought against Cuff for the abuse of the five-year-
   old.     He told the prosecutor for the Western District of Louisiana,
   AUSA Walker, that Karns “would need to know if [Cuff] was going to be
   prosecuted in Texas” before Cuff pled guilty to the charges involving the
   bulletin board in Louisiana.        In response, Walker referred Karns to
   AUSA Brandy Gardes from the United States Attorney’s Office in the
   Western District of Texas.          Karns described his conversation with
   AUSA Gardes as follows:
            My conversation with AUSA Gardes was consistent with my
            conversation with AUSA Walker. From my conversation with
            AUSA Gardes, I understood that the Government would use
            the videos in the Western District of Louisiana proceedings to
            avoid having to use the victim as a witness. It was my
            understanding from my conversation with AUSA Walker
            and/or AUSA Gardes that the victim and/or her family were
            reluctant to be involved and that the Government believed that
            using the videos in Western Louisiana would permit the
            Government to avoid using the victim as a witness, but still
            cause Mr. Cuff to be sentenced in Western Louisiana for the

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          offenses which occurred in Texas because the offenses were on
          the videos. I also learned from AUSA Gardes that the state of
          Texas would not be prosecuting Mr. Cuff.
          Cuff reached a plea deal with prosecutors in the Western District of
   Louisiana, and the district court accepted the agreement on December 1,
   2011. In return for Cuff’s guilty plea, the government dropped two of the
   charges it had brought against him, leaving only the charge for engaging in a
   child exploitation enterprise in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(g). The
   agreement also stated that “the Government . . . will not prosecute the
   Defendant for any other offense known to the United States Attorney’s
   Office, based on the investigation which forms the basis of [Cuff’s
   indictment].”
          In spite of the plea agreement, a grand jury in the Western District of
   Texas indicted Cuff for sexually abusing the five-year-old. This transpired
   on December 14, 2011, two weeks after the judge in the Louisiana case
   accepted the plea agreement. The government moved to seal this new
   indictment, claiming that the “disclosure of the existence of the Indictment
   would seriously jeopardize the ability of law enforcement officers to locate
   the Defendant and apprehend him without incident.” This was certainly
   false; Cuff had been in custody since July. The district judge in the Western
   District of Texas granted the motion.
          The Order to Seal stipulated that the indictment would be made
   public when Cuff “was arrested.” Yet it is unclear whether Cuff was actually
   arrested at this juncture. Because Cuff was already in custody, the United
   States Marshals Service lodged a detainer with the facility where he was being
   held on January 9, 2012. This notified the facility of the charges pending
   against Cuff, but by itself would not necessarily have notified Cuff of the
   charges. The document from the Marshals Service refers to the event both

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   as an “arrest” and a “detainer.” The district court treated the event as an
   arrest and unsealed the indictment the next day.
          Karns and Cuff claim that Cuff was never arrested and that they were
   unaware of the detainer. In fact, they assert that they were entirely unaware
   of the charges in the Western District of Texas until after Cuff had already
   been sentenced in the Western District of Louisiana in July 2012. Cuff also
   presents a Naval Criminal Investigative Service report indicating that the
   Texas U.S. Attorney’s Office knew of the Louisiana prosecution as of
   December 2011 and intended to keep the indictment sealed until Cuff’s
   sentencing. The judge in the Louisiana case and the United States Probation
   Office in Western Louisiana were also seemingly left unaware.
          Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the Louisiana prosecution continued
   apace. Pursuant to the plea agreement, evidence of Cuff’s abuse of the five-
   year-old was introduced for purposes of sentencing. The probation office
   made no mention of the Texas prosecution in its presentence report (PSR) in
   July 2012. Indeed, it erroneously stated that there were no additional pending
   charges against Cuff. The PSR recommended a sentencing enhancement
   based on Cuff’s child abuse. With the enhancement, Cuff’s sentencing range
   was life imprisonment. Cuff moved to withdraw his guilty plea on the
   grounds that an anti-malarial drug he was prescribed while serving in the U.S.
   Navy had driven him insane at the time he pled guilty. The district court
   denied the motion, adopted the PSR’s analysis, and sentenced Cuff to life in
   July 2012. Cuff appealed.
          In August 2012, while his appeal was pending, Cuff was arrested for
   the Texas charges. Now formally apprised of the Texas prosecution, Cuff

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   argued that it supported his motion to withdraw the guilty plea. 1 However,
   he did not raise the breach-of-plea agreement claim that is the gravamen of
   his § 2255 motion here. Instead, he alleged misconduct only as an aspect of
   whether the district court erred in not vacating the plea agreement pursuant
   to the factors outlined in United States v. Carr, 740 F.2d 339, 343–44 (5th Cir.
   1984). This court affirmed the conviction. The court held that the district
   court did not abuse its discretion under Carr and specifically noted that Cuff
   did not develop a prosecutorial misconduct claim. United States v. Cuff,
   538 F. App’x 411, 414 (5th Cir. 2013).
           In December 2014, Cuff sought to vacate his sentence under § 2255,
   arguing among other things that the government breached his plea
   agreement. After Cuff filed but before the district court ruled on the motion,
   the Texas USAO dismissed its case against Cuff. The district court then held
   that the breach-of-plea agreement claim was procedurally defaulted because
   Cuff had not raised it in his direct appeal. Cuff timely appealed, and this
   court granted a Certificate of Appealability on the issues related to the
   breach-of-plea claim.
                                     II. Discussion
           Cuff raises three issues: first, whether the breach-of-plea agreement
   claim was procedurally defaulted; second, whether the plea agreement was
   breached; and third, whether the government’s actions deprived his counsel
   of essential information so as to give rise to an ineffective-assistance-of-
           _____________________
           1
             For example, Cuff’s brief on direct appeal from his conviction stated that “if Cuff
   and his counsel had known that he was to be prosecuted in Texas for this offense, it would
   have had a tremendous impact on the decisions that he made in the Western District of
   Louisiana. Moreover, if Cuff had known that the United States Attorney in the Western
   District of Texas not only intended to prosecute him, but that the prosecutor intended to
   use his federal conviction in Louisiana to enhance his potential sentence in Texas, his
   decisionmaking process would have been very different indeed.”

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   counsel claim. We remand the first two issues to the district court and affirm
   on the third issue.
          When assessing a denial of a § 2255 motion, this court reviews legal
   conclusions de novo and factual findings for clear error. United States v.
   Cavitt, 550 F.3d 430, 435 (5th Cir. 2008).
                               A. Procedural Default
          When a defendant fails to raise a claim on direct review, that claim is
   usually procedurally barred in collateral proceedings. Bousley v. United
   States, 523 U.S. 614, 622, 118 S. Ct. 1604, 1611 (1998). Such claims may be
   raised on collateral review “only if the defendant can first demonstrate either
   ‘cause’ and actual prejudice . . . or that he is ‘actually innocent.’” Id. “The
   procedural-default rule is neither a statutory nor a constitutional
   requirement, but it is a doctrine adhered to by the courts to conserve judicial
   resources and to respect the law’s important interest in the finality of
   judgments.” Massaro v. United States, 538 U.S. 500, 504, 123 S. Ct. 1690,
   1693 (2003).
          There are instances where the procedural default rule does not
   advance the interests that justify its existence. Accordingly, some claims can
   be raised for the first time in a collateral proceeding—the prime example
   being ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims. Id. This exception exists
   because defendants otherwise would be compelled to “raise the issue before
   there has been an opportunity fully to develop the factual predicate for the
   claim” and litigate “in a forum not best suited to assess those facts.” Id. at
   504, 1694.
          Cuff argues that his breach-of-plea agreement claim, like one for
   ineffective assistance of counsel, should be exempt from procedural default
   analysis. He avers that he could not have raised his claim because he did not
   learn of the second indictment until after he had been sentenced. Thus, this

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   § 2255 motion provided his first opportunity to raise the issue. He points to
   several cases where this court has not applied the usual procedural default
   rules to support this argument. The most relevant are two instances where
   the court considered breach-of-plea agreement claims even though the
   defendant apparently did not raise the issue on appeal. 2 See United States v.
   Borders, 992 F.2d 563, 566 (5th Cir. 1993), United States v. Cates, 952 F.2d
   149, 151 (5th Cir. 1992).
           If Cuff was not on notice of the indictment, it is unclear whether
   procedural default analysis should apply at all. The breach-of-plea agreement
   cases cited by Cuff are outliers. In cases where the issue has been considered,
   procedural default is applied to such claims. See, e.g., United States v. Allen,
   918 F.3d 457, 460 (5th Cir. 2019); United States v. Sullivan, 241 F. App’x 217,
   218 (5th Cir. 2007). Yet in cases like Allen, the relevant facts arose at or
   before sentencing, and the defendants could have raised their complaints in
   Rule 11(d) motions before the sentencing courts. See Allen, 918 F.3d at 458–
   59; Sullivan, 241 F. App’x at 218–19. The parties do not identify, and this
   court has not found, any cases where the defendant claims to have been put
   on notice of the factual basis for his claim after appeal.
           Cuff could not have returned to the sentencing court for relief on the
   alleged facts. This court has held that when the government breaches its plea
   agreement with the defendant, that defendant “may seek one of two
   remedies: (1) specific performance, requiring that the sentence be vacated
   and that a different judge sentence the defendant; or (2) withdrawal of the
           _____________________
           2
             Cuff also cites United States v. Casiano, 929 F.2d 1046, 1051 (5th Cir. 1991) and
   United States v. Harper, 901 F.2d 471, 472–73 (5th Cir. 1990). But neither case is analogous,
   and both involved established exceptions to procedural default. Casiano dealt with an
   ineffective assistance of counsel claim and Harper dealt with a scenario where the court of
   conviction lacked jurisdiction over the defendant. Casiano, 929 F.2d at 1051; Harper,
   901 F.2d at 472.

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   guilty plea.” United States v. Williams, 821 F.3d 656, 658 (5th Cir. 2016)
   (quoting United States v. Gonzalez, 309 F.3d 882, 886 (5th Cir. 2002)). Cuff
   seeks to withdraw his guilty plea in this case. Yet the Federal Rules of
   Criminal Procedure prevents the district court from granting this remedy:
          Finality of a Guilty or Nolo Contendere Plea. After the court
          imposes sentence, the defendant may not withdraw a plea of
          guilty or nolo contendere, and the plea may be set aside only on
          direct appeal or collateral attack.
   Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(e).
          This court’s guidance makes clear that Cuff’s claim was also
   inappropriate for direct appeal because it requires factual development by a
   district court. As the Fifth Circuit has repeatedly found, “[a]rguments not
   raised in district court will not be considered absent ‘extraordinary
   circumstances,’ and ‘[e]xtraordinary circumstances exist when the issue
   involved is a pure question of law and a miscarriage of justice would result
   from our failure to consider it.’” Chevron USA, Inc. v. Aker Mar. Inc.,
   689 F.3d 497, 503 (5th Cir. 2012) (quoting N. Alamo Water Supply Corp. v.
   City of San Juan, Tex., 90 F.3d 910, 916 (5th Cir. 1996)). Cuff’s breach of
   plea agreement claim did not raise a pure question of law, as the sentencing
   court had no opportunity to make factual findings regarding exactly when the
   plea agreement would have been breached or when Cuff or Karns gained
   knowledge of breach. This court does not make findings in the first instance.
   Pickett v. Tex. Tech Univ. Health Scis. Ctr., 37 F.4th 1013, 1019 (5th Cir.
   2022). And as the government notes, when Cuff raised prosecutorial
   misconduct in his direct appeal, this court concluded that “he did not
   develop the facts supporting this claim, so we are not able to review it on
   appeal.” Cuff, 538 F. App’x at 414. Because Cuff’s claim was not cognizable
   on appeal, § 2255 represented the only remaining avenue of potential relief.

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          Cuff presents a defensible argument that the procedural bar should
   not apply on his version of the facts, but even if the procedural bar applies,
   Cuff’s allegations can satisfy the cause-and-prejudice standard.
          “A showing of cause requires that ‘some objective factor external to
   the defense impeded counsel’s efforts to comply with the State’s procedural
   rule,’ such as ‘the factual or legal basis for a claim was not reasonably
   available to counsel, or that some interference by officials made compliance
   impracticable.’” Smith v. Quarterman, 515 F.3d 392, 403 (5th Cir. 2008)
   (quoting Murray v. Carrier, 477 U.S. 478, 488 (1986)). The “mere fact that
   counsel failed to recognize the factual or legal basis for a claim . . . does not
   constitute cause for a procedural default.” Murray v. Carrier, 477 U.S. 478,
   486, 106 S. Ct. 2639, 2644 (1986). But to be barred from relief, a petitioner
   must have at least “constructive knowledge” of the basis for the claim.
   Herbst v. Scott, 42 F.3d 902, 906 (5th Cir. 1995); see also Malone v. Johnson,
   252 F.3d 1356 (5th Cir. 2001).
          If the underlying allegations are proven, Cuff can meet this standard.
   He has presented evidence that an AUSA in the Western District of Texas
   misled him about being prosecuted there, and government officials sealed the
   indictment against him on the false premise that he was still at large. He has
   also presented evidence that the government planned to keep the indictment
   a secret until after his sentencing. Moreover, even when the indictment was
   unsealed, it was allegedly not made “reasonably available to counsel,” Smith,
   515 F.3d at 403, and Cuff consequently did not have “constructive
   knowledge” of the indictment. Herbst, 42 F.3d at 906. Citizens do not bear
   the burden of searching PACER in all 94 federal judicial districts to
   determine whether or not the government has indicted them recently. Cf.
   Doggett v. United States, 505 U.S. 647, 653–54, 112 S. Ct. 2686, 2691 (1992)
   (finding, in the Speedy Trial Clause context, that a defendant is not on notice

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   to discover his own indictment). These allegations facially support a finding
   of cause.
          As this discussion demonstrates, Cuff’s argument relies on the
   proposition that he was not put on notice of the Texas indictment before his
   direct appeal. The parties dispute whether this is true, but the district court
   only addressed whether Cuff was aware of the indictment during his appeal.
   We may not resolve this disputed issue on appeal. It is fundamental that
   “factfinding is the basic responsibility of district courts, rather than appellate
   courts.” DeMarco v. United States, 415 U.S. 449, 450, 94 S. Ct. 1185, 1186,
   n. (1974); see also 28 U.S.C. § 2255(b) (“Unless the motion and the files and
   records of the case conclusively show that the prisoner is entitled to no relief,
   the court [which imposed the sentence] shall cause notice thereof to be
   served upon the United States attorney, grant a prompt hearing thereon,
   determine the issues and make findings of fact and conclusions of law with
   respect thereto.”).
          This is particularly true here where the record does not supply clear
   answers. The Marshals filed a detainer with the Bossier Parish Medical
   Facility in January of 2012, six months before Cuff’s sentencing. The
   government appears to conflate “detainer” with “arrest,” and it confusingly
   alleges that Cuff was “arrested” for a second time in August after it filed a
   motion to detain on the Texas charge. A detainer is not the same as arrest,
   but rather “a request filed by a criminal justice agency with the institution in
   which a prisoner is incarcerated, asking that the prisoner be held for the
   agency, or that the agency be advised when the prisoner's release is
   imminent.” Fex v. Michigan, 507 U.S. 43, 44, 113 S. Ct. 1085, 1087 (1993).
   The record contains no information indicating whether Bossier Parish
   Medical Facility notifies a prisoner that a detainer has been lodged, or
   whether it followed any such policy in this case. It is also not crystal clear
   that the word “arrested” in the government’s motion to seal, cannot also

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   refer to a detainer, or that the government in fact unsealed the indictment in
   response to notifying Cuff or his counsel. These issues must be addressed by
   the district court.
          Further factfinding is also necessary to decide whether Cuff was
   prejudiced. To show prejudice, “the petition must show ‘not merely that the
   errors . . . created a possibility of prejudice, but that they worked to his actual
   and substantial disadvantage, infecting his entire trial with error of
   constitutional dimensions.’” Quarterman, 515 F.3d at 403 (quoting Murray,
   477 U.S. at 493).     The government argues that Cuff cannot establish
   prejudice because the Louisiana USAO did not breach the plea agreement
   and because Cuff would have pled guilty even if he knew of the second
   indictment. As explained above, the district court is in the best position to
   determine the veracity of these claims. But the district court grounded its
   ruling on cause and never addressed the arguments regarding prejudice.
          Therefore, we must remand to the district court with instructions to
   determine (1) whether Cuff or his counsel knew or should have known of the
   Texas indictment before Cuff’s sentencing and (2) if not, whether Cuff was
   prejudiced.
                                       B. Breach
          Until the question of procedural default is resolved, we are not in a
   position to decide whether Cuff’s plea agreement was breached. The district
   court did not reach the issue after it held the claim procedurally barred. The
   district court will be best equipped to determine whether a breach occurred
   as part and parcel of its factfinding on remand.
                          C. Ineffective Assistance of Counsel
          Cuff’s ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claim, however, cannot
   succeed. He argues that the government’s failure to notify his attorney of the

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   second indictment resulted in a violation of his Sixth Amendment right to
   effective assistance of counsel. But as the district court noted, none of the
   four ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims that he raised in his § 2255
   motion relate to the plea agreement. The argument is therefore forfeit, and
   “[w]e do not ordinarily consider issues that are forfeited because they are
   raised for the first time on appeal.” Rollins v. Home Depot USA, 8 F.4th 393,
   398 (5th Cir. 2021). We already expressly denied a certificate of appealability
   on the issue for this reason. Moreover, the claim lacks merit. Cuff contends
   that his attorney—Karns—provided him “patently erroneous advice”
   regarding the guilty plea because Karns did not know about the second
   indictment, and that this amounted to ineffective assistance. But, as all
   parties agree, the Texas USAO had not yet indicted Cuff at the time he
   entered his guilty plea. Karns could not have known the indictment at that
   time, and he therefore could not have fallen below the “objective standard of
   reasonableness” Strickland requires. Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668,
   688 (1984).
                               III. Conclusion
          For the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM IN PART, REVERSE IN
   PART and REMAND to determine whether Cuff can overcome the
   procedural bar and, if so, whether the plea agreement was breached.

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   Andrew S. Oldham, Circuit Judge, dissenting:
          This is a straightforward case. Robert Cuff procedurally defaulted his
   claim that the Government breached his plea agreement, and he cannot show
   cause and prejudice to overcome that default. No fact-finding by the district
   court alters that result. Accordingly, I would affirm the district court’s order
   in its entirety.
                                          I.
          Robert Cuff, also known by the username “slapalot,” was part of an
   online bulletin board where he disseminated child pornography. To become
   a member, he had to submit an advertisement for child pornography as well
   as a certain amount of child pornography. As a member, he posted 43
   pornographic files to the board—most of which depicted young children
   forced to engage in sexual acts with adults. The other board members
   elevated him to “VIP” status. When law enforcement arrested him and
   searched his residence in Texas, they discovered multiple videos of Cuff
   sexually abusing his girlfriend’s five-year-old daughter.
          Cuff was indicted in the Western District of Louisiana for engaging in
   a child exploitation enterprise, conspiracy to advertise the distribution of
   child pornography, and conspiracy to distribute child pornography. He was
   arrested in the Western District of Texas, and the U.S. Marshals Service
   transported him to the Western District of Louisiana. On December 1, 2011,
   he entered a plea agreement with the Western District of Louisiana U.S.
   Attorney’s Office and pled guilty to the child exploitation charge. As part of
   the plea agreement, the Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s Office stated: “[T]he
   Government agrees to dismiss the remaining Counts of the Second
   Superceding Indictment after sentencing and it will not prosecute the
   Defendant for any other offense known to the United States Attorney’s
   Office, based on the investigation which forms the basis of the Second

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   Superceding Indictment.” ROA.976–77. Cuff was then held in the Bossier
   Parish Medical Facility while he awaited sentencing.
          On December 14, 2011, a grand jury in the Western District of Texas
   issued a sealed indictment, charging Cuff with aggravated sexual abuse,
   sexual exploitation of children, and sexual exploitation of minors. The
   magistrate judge ordered the indictment to be unsealed when the defendant
   was arrested. And the judge issued a warrant for Cuff’s arrest that same day.
          On January 9, 2012, a detainer was filed with the Bossier Parish
   Medical Facility by the U.S. Marshals Service on behalf of the Western
   District of Texas. It specified that Cuff had been arrested. The notice was
   sent to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, U.S. District Clerk, U.S. Magistrate, U.S.
   Pre-Trial Services, and U.S. Marshals Service. The docket for the Western
   District of Texas case reflected that Cuff was arrested that day, and Cuff’s
   indictment was unsealed the next day.
          In July 2012, Cuff was sentenced in the Western District of Louisiana.
   At the time of Cuff’s sentencing on the Louisiana charges, Cuff’s Texas
   arrest was six months old. But he did not say to the district judge in Louisiana,
   “wait a minute, I don’t want this Louisiana plea deal because the
   Government breached its promise in Texas.” Rather he did not mention the
   arrest. The federal district court accepted the Louisiana plea agreement. And
   the court sentenced Cuff to life imprisonment and supervised release for life.
   He appealed his Louisiana conviction and sentence.
          A few weeks later, while his Louisiana appeal was still pending, the
   Western District of Texas U.S. Attorney’s Office filed an application for writ
   of habeas corpus in the Bossier Parish Medical Facility demanding Cuff’s
   appearance in the Texas court. He was again arrested on August 29, 2012.
   Cuff’s first attorney entered an appearance in the Texas case on August 30,
   2012. And Cuff waived the right of personal appearance at his Texas

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   arraignment on September 4, 2012. Cuff’s second attorney entered an
   appearance on October 12, 2012. And Cuff filed a series of motions to
   continue the Texas docket call between September 19, 2012, and August 1,
   2013.
           He filed his brief in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals challenging his
   Louisiana conviction on November 28, 2012. At that point, Cuff had known
   about the Texas proceedings for eleven months—ever since he was arrested
   on the Texas charges in January 2012. But at no point in his direct-appeal
   proceeding did Cuff ever complain that the Government breached his
   Louisiana plea agreement by indicting him in Texas. On August 7, 2013, a
   panel of this court affirmed Cuff’s Louisiana sentence. Subsequently, the
   Western District of Texas dismissed the criminal charges against him.
           Cuff now seeks to vindicate his breach-of-plea-agreement claim in
   federal habeas. This avenue is plainly foreclosed. I would affirm the district
   court because (I) Cuff procedurally defaulted this claim by failing to raise it
   on direct appeal and (II) Cuff cannot show cause and prejudice to overcome
   the default.
                                          II.
           First, Cuff defaulted his breach claim. Courts must abide by the
   “general rule that claims not raised on direct appeal may not be raised on
   collateral review unless the petitioner shows cause and prejudice.” Massaro
   v. United States, 538 U.S. 500, 504 (2003); see also Reed v. Farley, 512 U.S.
   339, 354 (1994). The rule applies equally to claims a defendant discovers for
   the first time after his sentence. See Massaro, 538 U.S. at 504; 3 Charles
   Alan Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and
   Procedure Criminal § 631 (5th ed.). That is because § 2255 relief is
   reserved for “a narrow range of injuries that could not have been raised on

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   direct appeal.” United States v. Vaughn, 955 F.2d 367, 368 (5th Cir. 1992)
   (mem.) (per curiam) (emphasis added).
          The “only” exception to the general procedural default rule is the
   “narrow exception [for] claims of ineffective assistance of counsel at trial and
   only when, under state law, those claims must be raised in an initial-review
   collateral proceeding.” Davila v. Davis, 582 U.S. 521, 530 (2017) (emphasis
   added) (quotation omitted); see also United States v. Frady, 456 U.S. 152, 167
   (1982) (procedural default rules apply to federal habeas petitions under
   § 2255). Only means only: We cannot “extend[] [this] narrow exception [for
   IAC claims] to new categories of procedurally defaulted claims.” Davila, 582
   U.S. at 529–30. As the leading treatise on Federal Courts puts it:
          In a collateral attack under § 2255, the district court may not
          consider any matter that the petitioner should have raised at
          trial or on direct appeal and did not. The Supreme Court has
          recognized an exception to this general rule for claims of
          ineffective assistance of counsel, which need not be raised until
          collateral review. Outside the context of ineffective assistance
          claims, the district court is barred from considering claims not
          previously raised unless the petitioner can show both cause for
          not raising the claim and prejudice.
   3 Wright & Miller, supra, § 631 (emphasis added). There’s no
   exception for breach of plea agreement claims.
          This circuit has also held on multiple occasions that the procedural
   default bar applies to breach of plea agreement claims. See United States v.
   Allen, 918 F.3d 457, 460 (5th Cir. 2019); United States v. Sullivan, 241 F.
   App’x 217, 218 (5th Cir. 2007) (per curiam); United States v. Young, 77 F.
   App’x 708, 709 (5th Cir. 2003) (per curiam); United States v. Townley, 114

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   F.3d 1182, 1182 (5th Cir. 1997) (unpublished) (per curiam); United States v.
   Suddeth, 26 F.3d 1118, 1118 (5th Cir. 1994) (unpublished) (per curiam). 1
           All agree that Cuff knew about the alleged breach before he filed his
   appellate brief to challenge the conviction and sentence in the Louisiana case.
   But he said nothing about the alleged breach in his brief. Therefore, he
   defaulted the breach claim. The majority does not dispute this point.
                                               III.
           Because Cuff procedurally defaulted his claim by failing to raise it on
   direct review, he can raise this claim “in habeas only if [he] can first
   demonstrate either cause and actual prejudice, or that he is actually
   innocent.” Bousley v. United States, 523 U.S. 614, 622 (1998) (quotation
   omitted) (emphasis added). Cuff never argues that he is actually innocent.
   That means Cuff can only overcome his default if he can show both cause and
   prejudice. But Cuff cannot prove either (A) cause or (B) prejudice, (C) the
   majority’s counterarguments notwithstanding.
                                                A.
           First, Cuff cannot show cause. The Supreme Court has “explained
   clearly that ‘cause’ under the cause and prejudice test must be something
   external to the petitioner, something that cannot fairly be attributed to him.”
   Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 753 (1991). And a lawyer’s choices—so
   long as they do not constitute unconstitutionally ineffective assistance of
   counsel—are attributable to the prisoner. See id. at 752. That is why the
   Supreme Court has determined on multiple occasions that counsel’s failure

           _____________________
           1
              Neither United States v. Cates, 952 F.2d 149 (5th Cir. 1992), nor United States v.
   Borders, 992 F.2d 563 (5th Cir. 1993), is to the contrary. Neither discussed the procedural
   bar at all. And these cases pre-date Davila, holding that the only exception to procedural
   default is for ineffective assistance of counsel claims.

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   to pursue an objection, for whatever reason, does not establish cause to
   excuse a procedural default. See, e.g., id. at 753; Smith v. Murray, 477 U.S.
   527, 535 (1986); Murray v. Carrier, 477 U.S. 478, 492 (1986); Wainwright v.
   Sykes, 433 U.S. 72, 91 n.14 (1977).
           For example, in Murray v. Carrier, the question presented was
   “whether a federal habeas petitioner can show cause for a procedural default
   by establishing that competent defense counsel inadvertently failed to raise
   the substantive claim of error.” 477 U.S. at 481. The Court held that any
   failure on the part of the attorney to raise a claim—whether deliberate or
   inadvertent—does not amount to cause. Id. at 487–88; see also id. at 486
   (“[T]he mere fact that counsel failed to recognize the factual or legal basis
   for a claim, or failed to raise the claim despite recognizing it, does not
   constitute cause for a procedural default.”). So long as the default was within
   defense counsel’s control, and counsel was not ineffective, 2 a prisoner cannot
   show cause for the default. See id. at 487; see also Coleman, 501 U.S. at 753;
   Wainwright, 433 U.S. at 91 n.14.
           Instead, cause requires a showing of some “objective factor external
   to the defense imped[ing] counsel’s efforts to comply” with the default rules.
   Carrier, 477 U.S. at 488; accord Coleman, 501 U.S. at 753. In other words, the
   prisoner must demonstrate that the “legal basis of the claim [he] now presses
   on federal habeas was unavailable to counsel at the time of the direct appeal.”
   Smith, 477 U.S. at 537; see also Carrier, 477 U.S. at 486.
           And these rules apply equally to procedural defaults on appeal as well
   as to those at trial. See Smith, 477 U.S. at 533; see also Carrier, 477 U.S. at 489.
           _____________________
           2
              A constitutionally ineffective counsel is the equivalent of “no counsel at all.”
   Evitts v. Lucey, 469 U.S. 387, 396 (1985); see also Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668,
   685 (1984). So long as the counsel was acting as a counsel, his choices are attributable to
   the prisoner and cannot constitute cause for a default.

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   The prisoner in Carrier urged the Supreme Court to adopt a different
   standard for procedural defaults on appeal. 477 U.S. at 490. The prisoner
   contended that “the concerns that underlie the cause and prejudice test are
   not present in the case of defaults on appeal.” Ibid. But the Supreme Court
   found this argument “unpersuasive.” Ibid. The Court held “that the cause
   and prejudice test applies to defaults on appeal as well as to those at trial”;
   simply put, “the standard for cause should not vary depending on the timing
   of a procedural default.” Id. at 491. That’s because “[f]ailure to raise a claim
   on appeal” likewise “reduces the finality of appellate proceedings” and
   “deprives the appellate court of an opportunity to review trial error.” Ibid.
   As the Court summarized its holding,
          counsel’s failure to raise a particular claim on appeal is to be
          scrutinized under the cause and prejudice standard . . . .
          Attorney error short of ineffective assistance of counsel does
          not constitute cause for a procedural default even when that
          default occurs on appeal rather than at trial. To the contrary,
          cause for a procedural default on appeal ordinarily requires a
          showing of some external impediment preventing counsel from
          constructing or raising the claim.
   Id. at 492 (emphasis added). These rules apply with equal force in the federal
   habeas context. See Frady, 456 U.S. at 167–68.
          And these rules make especially good sense here, where Cuff had the
   opportunity to raise his breach claim on direct appeal and obtain the exact
   remedy he now seeks. The Supreme Court and this court have repeatedly
   examined breach of plea agreement claims never presented in the district court
   for plain error. See, e.g., Puckett v. United States, 556 U.S. 129 (2009); United
   States v. Cluff, 857 F.3d 292 (5th Cir. 2017); United States v. Kirkland, 851
   F.3d 499 (5th Cir. 2017); United States v. Williams, 821 F.3d 656 (5th Cir.
   2016); United States v. Hebron, 684 F.3d 554 (5th Cir. 2012); United States v.
   Puckett, 505 F.3d 377, 383 (5th Cir. 2007); United States v. Munoz, 408 F.3d

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   222 (5th Cir. 2005); United States v. Brown, 328 F.3d 787 (5th Cir. 2003);
   United States v. Reeves, 255 F.3d 208 (5th Cir. 2001); United States v. Branam,
   231 F.3d 931 (5th Cir. 2000). And this court has awarded defendants who
   pursue their breach claims for the first time on direct appeal the remedy Cuff
   seeks—i.e., a choice between resentencing before a different judge or
   withdrawal of the plea. See, e.g., Williams, 821 F.3d at 658; Munoz, 408 F.3d
   at 226, 229.
          These rules leave no room for Cuff’s claim in federal habeas. Even if
   he can show that he did not have notice of the breach prior to his sentencing,
   he plainly had notice on appeal. Nothing prohibited, or even hindered his
   counsel, from presenting this claim to the court of appeals and attaining the
   remedy he now seeks. See Carrier, 477 U.S. at 492. As the majority agrees,
   his counsel was not ineffective. Thus, any “ignorance,” “inadvertence,” or
   “deliberate decision” on their part in failing to raise this claim on direct
   appeal does not amount to cause. Id. at 487.
          Cuff’s counterargument is that he did not know about the Western
   District of Texas indictment until his arrest in August 2012, so the external
   factor of ignorance prevented him from raising the breach claim before he
   was sentenced in the Western District of Louisiana in July 2012. He cites his
   Louisiana pre-sentence report that did not include this pending charge. And
   he offers a statement from his attorney that he did not know about the breach
   prior to his sentencing.
          But as noted above, the record shows that Cuff had notice in January
   2012. First, a detainer was lodged against him for the Texas case while he was
   in the Bossier Parish Medical Facility on January 9, 2012. The U.S. District
   Clerk, U.S. Magistrate Judge, U.S. Pre-Trial, and U.S. Marshals Service
   were all notified. Second, the Texas sealing order said the indictment would
   remain sealed until Cuff was arrested. And the day after the detainer was

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   lodged, January 10, 2012, the Texas indictment was unsealed. He had notice
   then—six months before his sentencing in the Louisiana case. Accordingly,
   Cuff cannot meet his burden to show cause. Cf. Kutzner v. Cockrell, 303 F.3d
   333, 336 (5th Cir. 2002) (“When evidence is equally available to both the
   defense and the prosecution, the defendant must bear the responsibility of
   failing to conduct a diligent investigation.”).
          And even if Cuff could show that he did not know about the breach
   prior to his Louisiana sentencing, that would not excuse his failure to raise
   his breach claim on direct appeal. He concedes that he knew of the breach on
   August 29, 2012, just a few weeks after he appealed his Louisiana conviction,
   three months before he filed his appellate brief, and almost a year before a
   panel of this court issued a decision. He had plenty of time and notice to raise
   this issue on appeal. And he admits:
          Upon direct appeal, Cuff’s new counsel were aware of the
          Texas prosecution. They determined, however, not to pursue
          the breach of plea agreement claim given this Circuit’s caselaw
          holding that matters not raised before the trial court are not
          appropriate for appeal, that is, no record below existed on this
          question for the court of appeals to review.
   Blue Brief at 10 (emphasis added). Even though his attorneys had the relevant
   information to make this claim on direct appeal, they concededly knew and
   made a deliberate decision not to raise it. That is an obvious, conscious choice
   by constitutionally effective counsel; it is attributable to Cuff; and it prevents
   him from showing cause for the default. See, e.g., Carrier, 477 U.S. at 488–
   89.
                                          B.

          Cuff also cannot show prejudice for two, independent reasons, each of
   which is sufficient to deny his breach of agreement claim.

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           First, there was no prejudice because there was no breach of the plea
   agreement. The non-prosecution clause did not apply to other districts—
   only the Western District of Louisiana. As we have held:
           It is well established that the federal government will not be
           bound by a contract or agreement entered into by one of its
           agents unless such agent is acting within the limits of his actual
           authority. . . . [N]ot even a United States Attorney can bind his
           counterpart in another district to dismiss an indictment . . . .
   United States v. D’Apice, 664 F.2d 75, 78 (5th Cir. 1981) (quoting Dresser
   Indus., Inc. v. United States, 596 F.2d 1231 (5th Cir. 1979)). The Western
   District of Louisiana did not have the power to constrain prosecutors in other
   districts. See ibid.
           And even if the Western District of Louisiana U.S. Attorney’s Office
   did have the power to bind other districts, the terms of the agreement did not
   suggest that it did so. Its mere use of the term “Government” in the
   agreement does not prove otherwise. See United States v. Johnston, 199 F.3d
   1015, 1021, 1021 n.4 (9th Cir. 1999); United States v. Salameh, 152 F.2d 88,
   120 (2d Cir. 1998); United States v. Robison, 924 F.2d 612, 613–14 (6th Cir.
   1991). Cuff relies on his attorney’s affidavit, where his attorney said, “It is
   my opinion that the Government breached its plea agreement with Mr.
   Cuff.” ROA.319. But as this court has previously held, “A defense counsel’s
   subjective belief that a defendant’s plea will preclude future prosecution
   related to an ongoing investigation, even if the defendant relied upon it, does
   not, without more, immunize him from prosecution.” United States v.
   McClure, 854 F.3d 789, 796 (5th Cir. 2017).
           Second, Cuff was not prejudiced because he obtained the benefits
   contemplated by the plea agreement when the Western District of Texas
   dismissed the indictment. See United States v. Castaneda, 162 F.3d 832, 837
   (5th Cir. 1998). As the Supreme Court held in Puckett v. United States, when

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                                     No. 18-30694

   evaluating whether a defendant was prejudiced under the third prong of plain
   error review, “[t]he defendant whose plea agreement has been broken by the
   Government will not always be able to show prejudice, either because he
   obtained the benefits contemplated by the deal . . . or because he likely would
   not have obtained those benefits in any event.” 556 U.S. at 141–42. If that is
   true in the plain-error context, how much truer is it in the federal habeas
   context, where prejudice requires an exponentially greater showing. See, e.g.,
   Engle v. Isaac, 456 U.S. 107, 134–35 (1982) (holding burden to demonstrate
   cause and prejudice is far “greater than the showing required to establish
   plain error on direct appeal” (quotation omitted)); Frady, 456 U.S. at 164
   (“Because it was intended for use on direct appeal, however, the ‘plain error’
   standard is out of place when a prisoner launches a collateral attack . . . .”).
          What was the benefit of Cuff’s Louisiana plea deal? It was dismissal of
   the Texas indictment, which cured the Government’s breach of the non-
   prosecution promise. We have previously held that dismissal of a second
   indictment “adequately cure[s]” such a breach. United States v. Purser, 747
   F.3d 284, 293 (5th Cir. 2014). And that is exactly what the Government did
   here even before today’s decision.
          Cuff never argues that dismissal of the Texas indictment was too
   little—just that it was too late. Specifically, Cuff contends that he suffered
   prejudice in that the late-discovered facts delayed victory on his breach claim
   (from direct appeal to this § 2255 proceeding). That is wrong because, even
   on Cuff’s version of the facts, he could have prevailed on his breach claim on
   direct appeal without saying anything about it in the district court. See, e.g.,
   Williams, 821 F.3d 656. And in any event, Cuff did not have to wait until this
   § 2255 proceeding to win all of the relief he could possibly hope to win
   because he got total victory when the Government dismissed the Texas
   indictment. That dismissal was the benefit of the bargain he made in
   Louisiana. The Government has already honored it. So I do not understand

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   why Cuff should get the full benefit of the Louisiana plea agreement and then
   also get to walk away from the deal before paying its costs.
                                         C.
          Against the weight of all of this, the majority argues that Cuff may be
   able to show cause and prejudice because Cuff may not have had the relevant
   facts before sentencing and therefore could not have raised his breach claim
   in a Rule 11(d) motion before the sentencing court, like the defendant in
   Allen. With all respect to my learned colleagues in the majority, this is
   incorrect for seven reasons.
          First, the procedural default occurred on November 28, 2012—when
   Cuff filed his blue brief in the direct appeal from his conviction and sentence
   in the Louisiana case. Massaro, Wright & Miller, and the other
   authorities cited in the preceding section make clear that the failure to object
   on direct appeal constitutes the default. And when Cuff filed his direct appeal
   brief in November 2012, he undisputedly knew about the alleged breach. He
   undisputedly could have objected to it. He said nothing and thus defaulted
   the claim. It would not matter whether other defendants (as in Allen) could
   have objected earlier, because Cuff could have objected before the direct-
   appeal deadline in November 2012.
          Second, in any event, Cuff could have objected in the district court
   just as the defendant could have in Allen. The Western District of Louisiana
   sentenced Cuff in July 2012—at which point Cuff’s first arrest on the Texas
   charges was six months old. Recall that the federal grand jury in Texas indicted
   Cuff in December 2011, and the federal court in Texas ordered that
   indictment to remain sealed until Cuff was arrested. He was arrested in
   January of 2012, and that indictment was unsealed at that time. Yet at no
   point between January and July 2012—between the arrest on the Texas

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                                    No. 18-30694

   charge and the sentencing on the Louisiana charge—did Cuff object to the
   breach.
          Third, it is no answer to say that Cuff could not object to the alleged
   breach in his November 2012 blue brief because his claim “require[d] factual
   development by a district court.” Ante, at 8. Cuff could have objected as early
   as January 2012, when he was arrested on the Texas charges and the Texas
   indictment was unsealed. But even if one thinks that Cuff did not get the
   relevant facts until his second arrest in August 2012, he still could have
   objected in his November 2012 blue brief. And the only fact he needed for
   that alleged breach was the existence of the Texas docket—a fact that he
   could establish simply by pointing to the docket number.
          Fourth, the majority’s reliance on prior decisions from this court,
   where we have not considered issues raised for the first time on appeal, does
   not support its theory. See ante, at 8 (citing Chevron USA, Inc. v. Aker Mar.
   Inc., 689 F.3d 497, 503 (5th Cir. 2012) and N. Alamo Water Supply Corp. v.
   City of San Juan, Tex., 90 F.3d 910, 916 (5th Cir. 1996)). These are civil, not
   criminal, cases. And again, in the criminal context, the Supreme Court and
   this court have repeatedly entertained breach claims never raised in the
   district court under our plain error standard of review. See, e.g., Puckett, 556
   U.S. 129; Cluff, 857 F.3d 292; Kirkland, 851 F.3d 499; Williams, 821 F.3d
   656; Hebron, 684 F.3d 554; Puckett, 505 F.3d 377; Munoz, 408 F.3d 222;
   Brown, 328 F.3d 787; Reeves, 255 F.3d 208; Branam, 231 F.3d 931. Given this
   long, nonexhaustive list of precedents, Cuff’s counsel had ample notice that
   relief was available to him on direct appeal. There was no “external
   impediment preventing counsel from constructing or raising the claim.”
   Carrier, 477 U.S. at 492. Any “ignorance” or mistaken reliance on civil cases
   by Cuff’s counsel provide no excuse. Id. at 490.

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                                      No. 18-30694

          Fifth, it is particularly odd to say that Cuff’s counsel reasonably chose
   not to raise his breach claim on direct appeal given the other claims that same
   direct-appeal counsel did raise. For example, Cuff contended on direct appeal
   that the district court failed to admonish him that he would have to register
   as a sex offender. We pointed out that Cuff could have raised that claim in
   the district court at his rearraignment, so we could only review it for plain
   error. ROA.215. Cuff also objected to the factual basis for his plea agreement.
   Again, we pointed out that Cuff could have raised that claim in the district
   court and failed to do so. Ibid. Cuff attempted to raise a claim of prosecutorial
   misconduct, but “he did not develop the facts supporting this claim, so we
   [were] not able to review on appeal.” ROA.217. And Cuff’s direct-appeal
   brief even attempted to raise the one claim—ineffective assistance of
   counsel—that is not defaulted by failure to raise it on direct appeal. Ibid. With
   all respect, it blinks reality that Cuff attempted to raise all these claims for the
   first time on direct appeal but had a “defensible” belief that he could not raise
   his breach claim. Ante, at 9.
          Sixth, the majority’s contrary rule encourages prisoners to sleep on
   their rights. It is a bedrock principle of procedural-default doctrine that
   prisoners should raise their claims at the first conceivable opportunity. See
   Frady, 456 U.S. at 167–68; Wainwright, 433 U.S. at 88–90; Francis v.
   Henderson, 425 U.S. 536, 540–42 (1976); Davis v. United States, 411 U.S. 233,
   239–42 (1973); Michel v. State of Louisiana, 350 U.S. 91, 99 (1955); cf. Engle,
   456 U.S. at 134 (applying procedural default rule even where defense counsel
   was unaware of constitutional claim at time of trial). But the majority allows
   Cuff to raise his breach claim after sleeping on it at his July 2012 sentencing
   and during his subsequent direct-appeal proceeding.
          Seventh, the majority’s rule encourages courts to make unnecessary
   constitutional pronouncements. It is a well-settled principle of federal law
   that we have an obligation to avoid resolving unnecessary constitutional

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                                        No. 18-30694

   questions. See, e.g., Jennings v. Rodriguez, 138 S. Ct. 830, 842 (2018); Crowell
   v. Benson, 285 U.S. 22, 62 (1932). Yet our decision in Cuff’s direct appeal
   resolved a constitutional question regarding his mental competency,
   ROA.214 (citing Godinez v. Moran, 509 U.S. 389 (1993)), that would have
   been completely unnecessary if we had a non-constitutional basis for vacating
   the plea agreement.
                                    *        *         *
          I respectfully dissent.

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