Court Opinion

ID: 9493308
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:04:31.070168+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:59.620236
License: Public Domain

KLEINFELD, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I concur in all parts of the disposition except for Parts VII and VIII. As to those parts, I respectfully dissent.
The most fundamental distinction in criminal law is between those who committed the crime charged and those who did not. Most defendants plead guilty before trial to the crime charged or some lesser offense. That makes the change of plea proceeding the occasion when we do most of the sorting between the guilty and those who are innocent or not proved guilty. The point of the change of plea colloquy is not merely to close the case. We are not a machine for closing cases, like a bottle capper in a brewery. The point, like the point of most procedural safeguards, is to assure that only the guilty are convicted of crimes. The procedure has to be a reliable means of assuring accuracy, or else it is worse than useless. Where the proceeding was conducted in a manner that does not offer reasonable assurance in a particular case that the defendant is guilty, then we must vacate the conviction. Most Rule 11 cases are about whether the defendant was sufficiently advised of some procedural right he was giving up or sufficiently *709understood some detail of sentencing. This one is about the even more fundamental question of whether he committed the crime.
How could the district judge know whether Timbana did it? Ordinarily it is enough that the defendant said he did it. But in this case we have a problem. Tim-bana signed the written plea agreement with an “X” instead of a signature. That suggests to any reasonable person that he is not much of a reader. Nor does Timba-na look as though he could do the crime. Timbana is paralyzed on one side of his body, brain damaged, and spends most of his time in a wheelchair. Yet he is supposed to have repeatedly stabbed the victim to death with a knife, flipping the victim over and wrestling with him on the floor, while simultaneously fending off his wife, who was trying to get Timbana off the victim. Timbana was never asked how he accomplished this athletic miracle. In the change of plea proceeding, the judge asked the prosecutor what Timbana did, and the prosecutor answered with a lengthy description, supplying all the elements of the crime and the prosecution’s theory of what happened. Then the judge asked Timbana if he agreed with what the prosecutor had said, and Timbana said “yes.” The physical implausibility was left unexplained. The judge never asked Tim-bana what he did or how, in light of his physical limitations, he did it. Though in most cases there would be no reason to doubt the reliability of a “yes” answer to the question of whether the defendant agreed with what the prosecutor said he djd, in this one there was so much reason to doubt it that the change of plea should not stand.
What distinguishes this case is that the judge knew, from Timbana’s competency examination, that he was brain-damaged and of very low intelligence. The likelihood that Timbana actually understood what the prosecutor said was not especially high. The judge also knew that Timba-na’s physical limitations made it unlikely that he could have committed the crime as it had been described by the prosecutor, and that Timbana had told the examining psychologist that he had been “set up” for the murder. Also, by sentencing, the judge had before him two inconsistent accounts, one from the prosecutor and the other from the probation officer, of the circumstances under which Timbana was supposed to have killed the victim. Despite all of this, the judge never asked Timbana to say in his own words what he did or how he did it. Though in most cases that would not be necessary, in this one it was. Where a person’s understanding of his plea is questionable ■ and there are substantial reasons to doubt that the person committed the crime, a district judge ought to inquire sufficiently to assure that he did, before convicting him. Without such an inquiry, the plea violates Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11. It did here, and we should reverse.
Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(f) says that “the court should not enter a judgment upon such plea without making such inquiry as shall satisfy it that there is a factual basis for the plea.” The district court can perform this duty of inquiry in various ways. A good way to get a reliable plea is to ask the defendant, under oath pursuant to Rule 11(c)(5), what he did. The Supreme Court has endorsed this technique: “the sentencing judge must develop, on the record, the factual basis for the plea, as, for example, by having the accused describe the conduct that gave rise to the charge.”1 This makes it easy to dispose of the frequent subsequent claims by defendants that they did not commit their crimes, but them lawyers made them plead guilty.
Another kind of colloquy is to ask the prosecutor what the defendant did, and *710then ask the defendant whether what the prosecutor says is true. That, obviously is less searching, though as the Advisory Committee Note relating to the 1966 amendment indicates, it is often sufficient. This form of inquiry was used in this case. All Timbana had to say and did say was “yes.” He never had to state, under oath, what he did.
While the short form colloquy used would suffice in many or most eases, in this one, it was in my judgment an abuse of discretion. The judge had reason to know two things that required a more searching inquiry. One was that Timbana was brain damaged and of very low intelligence, so a simple “yes” could be unreliable on account of Timbana not understanding what he was saying “yes” to. The second was that the circumstances made it implausible that Timbana had committed the crime. These two factors give rise to a real concern about whether an innocent man was pleading guilty to a murder that he did not commit. The district court should have conducted a more searching inquiry to find out.
The judge had previously ordered that a competency examination be performed on Timbana. The court learned from the report that although Timbana was competent to stand trial, he was brain damaged and of very low intelligence. I agree with the majority that the competency finding was adequately supported. My dissent does not go to the competency issue. The information the judge gained from the competency examination, however, should have given rise to a concern by the district court whether a simple “yes” was adequate for this man, in this case, to establish the truth of what he was saying “yes” to. The prosecutor explained what the elements of the crime were and what his- theory of the facts was, and then Timbana was asked whether he agreed with what the prosecutor had said.2 When Timbana said “yes,” did he understand what he was saying “yes” to? Did he recollect accurately what he had done? Did he recollect accurately what the prosecutor had just said he did, all 29 lines of it? Did he intend to say that he had done what the prosecutor described? Considering his brain damage and low intelligence, known to the judge, a simple “yes” was a little too simple to give a judge confidence that he did.
One of the psychologists who gave the court the competency report prior to the *711change of plea, Mark D. Corgiat, Ph.D., wrote in his report to the court that Tim-bana was “a very poor historian.” He had “a marked indentation in the left skull,” “speech problems were notable,” and “concentration is impaired.” His “auditory attention skills” (those that he would need to listen to what the prosecutor said he did) “were also markedly impaired.” He tested in the 3rd percentile on tasks measuring brief auditory attention (three standard deviations below normal), tested in the 3rd percentile on tasks measuring immediate recall of auditorially presented paragraph information, and tested in the “very seriously impaired” range for tasks measuring complex attention skills. His intelligence was in the “borderline retarded range.” When Dr. Corgiat examined him, Timbana “incorrectly identified the month, day of month, and day of week,” misidentified where he was, and misidentified the president (in 1996 when he was examined) as Ford and the preceding president as Eisenhower. Dr. Corgiat advised the court that although Timbana was competent to stand trial, “other overlying neurocognitive and neurobehavioral difficulties will clearly reduce the quality of his ability to participate.”
Linda Berberoglu, Ph.D., at the Federal Medical Center at Rochester Minnesota, advised the court that “although Timbana currently suffers from a mental disease or defect,” he was competent to stand trial. Dr. Berberoglu described Timbana as slightly more competent than Dr. Corgiat had, but she too said he had “borderline intellectual functioning and moderate cognitive impairments,” and she diagnosed “dementia due to head trauma.” She reported that Timbana had said that what he was charged with was “a set-up.” She said that “[b]ecause of Mr. Timbana’s cognitive deficits, it will be critical for his attorney to devote sufficient time to carefully explain legal options and clarify his level of understanding during the proceedings.”
The judge knew all this. These were reports the district court had obtained to make the competency determination.
Nor was this all. Besides being brain damaged and of very low intelligence, Tim-bana was partially paralyzed and generally stayed in a wheelchair. Dr. Corgiat described significant paralysis of one side of the body:
Gross motor movements are markedly impaired.- He has significant left-sided paralysis. There is also evidence of right hemiparesis. Apparently, he is able to walk with a cane but most frequently uses a wheelchair. He seems to have moderately impaired gross motor control on his right side. He had difficulty controlling his hand for finer movements such as putting the blocks together on the WAIS-R testing. He has a brace on his left forearm. Fine motor movements are similarly impaired severely on the left and moderately on the right. He is barely able to write his name. He has very poor control for fine motor skills although he does have only mild impairment of his grip strength on the right.
This physical impairment might not matter much if Timbana were accused of shooting the victim. A disabled individual in a wheelchair can easily commit murder with a gun. But Timbana was accused of stabbing to death an able-bodied man. As the prosecutor described his theory of the crime at the change of plea proceeding, the victim was passed out on the floor on his stomach. Alvina Phelps, who was Timba-na’s common-law wife but was having a sexual relationship with Eldredge, came out of the bathroom and saw Timbana “on top of Eldridge, stabbing him in the back.” Eldredge rolled over and kicked Timbana. Then Timbana stabbed Eldridge seven more times in the chest.
Even with Timbana admitting to all this, the inescapable question for anyone contemplating this partially paralyzed defendant in a wheelchair would be “how did you manage to do that?” No question like *712that was asked when Timbana changed his plea. It should have been.
The change of plea proceeding was not the last chance to inquire, nor was this the last information the district court had. Rule 11(f) says that the court “should not enter a judgment” on a guilty plea “without making such inquiry as shall satisfy it that there is a factual basis for the plea.” That means that the district court’s duty to inquire into the factual basis does not end when the plea is taken. It continues until judgment is entered. It is rarely necessary to inquire further into the factual basis at the time of sentencing, but occasionally the additional details then put before the court give rise to a serious question of whether the defendant committed the crime to which he pleaded guilty. That happened in this case.
The presentence report said that Alvina Phelps, Timbana’s common law wife, reported that Timbana was angry because “she was having a relationship” with the victim. The victim had passed out. Phelps came out of the bathroom and saw Timbana stabbing the victim. She struggled with him for the knife, but he overcame her and again stabbed the victim. But Timbana told the police that Phelps and the victim had attacked him, had beaten him, “and were attempting to strike him on the metal plate which is in his head.” He confessed to stabbing the victim several times while the victim was unconscious, but explained that “it was self-defense.” The presentence report says that Timbana had knife wounds on his hands and a stab wound on his right leg, which he said he got while grabbing the knife as Phelps wielded it. The probation officer noted that Timbana “has difficulty in communicating and expressing himself.”
This account in the presentence report differs from the one the prosecutor gave at the change of plea proceeding and raises serious questions about the factual basis for the plea, despite Timbana’s confession. How did Timbana get knife wounds on his hands, typically defense wounds, unless someone else was wielding the knife against him? If, as the new account says, the victim was passed out, how could the partially paralyzed Timbana roll him over, as he would have to in order to stab him in the chest? If, as the change of plea account says, the victim and Phelps were both fighting Timbana, how could he defeat them? Phelps said that Timbana had needed help getting back into his wheelchair when he fell out, because he was drunk. All this raises serious additional questions about Timbana’s ability to fight off two people and kill one of them. The defendant had no adult criminal convictions and no juvenile adjudications, so there was nothing in his history to suggest a capability and inclination toward violent crime or any other sort of crime.
The physical condition of the defendant, apparent to the judge, made the crime implausible (though perhaps not impossible). Detailed questions such as I have raised are easier to formulate on appeal, with the advantage of the briefs that we have, than in the district court. But the more general question, “how did you do that?” would inescapably occur to anyone, without extended deliberation, based on the defendant’s physical condition and the nature of the crime. Following the procedure the Supreme Court suggested in San-tobello, the district judge could have asked it.
Timbana’s pro se brief on appeal says that he told his lawyer he did not commit the murder. Timbana also filed an affidavit with his brief saying that Alvina Phelps killed the victim and then tried to stab him. That would explain the wounds on his hand and leg that the police observed. Timbana says, “I was told that I should take responsibility for this crime as my children were raised and that Alvina had small children [who] needed to be with their mother.” That would explain the “set up” remark that Dr. Berberoglu had reported to the court. The affidavit is signed with a fingerprint rather than a signature and appears to be prepared, like *713his other pro se papers, by some highly capable individual in prison with him. It was not part of the record before the district court and cannot be considered as a basis for holding that the district judge abused his discretion. I mention it for two reasons. Had the judge placed Timbana under oath and asked him what he did, Timbana might have told this story, leading to further inquiry, or he might have admitted committing the murder and described how he managed to do it despite his infirmities, eliminating doubts about his guilt and his understanding of his plea. The affidavit and pro se brief tell a story of Timbana “taking the fall” for Phelps, his common law wife, by a false plea of guilty. Prevention of a false plea whereby an innocent person “takes the fall” for a guilty one is one of the reasons why Rule 11(f) requires independent inquiry by the judge to assure that there is a factual basis for the plea.
The panel majority says that Timbana’s plea agreement and answers during the hearing showed that the plea was voluntary and knowing, and that Timbana’s agreement with the prosecutor’s recitation of facts was enough to establish a factual basis. I cannot agree.
The first problem is that the recitations of the written plea agreement are not a reliable indicator of what Timbana intended to say because he is illiterate and could not have read and understood it. Timbana signed the plea agreement with an “X,” not a signature. Dr. Corgiat described Timbana’s reading ability as “markedly impaired.” Timbana tested right at “the baseline level for literacy in the United States” for reading comprehension, and his spelling and word recognition skills fell significantly below that level. This hardly instills confidence that Timbana understood what he was signing.
The second problem is that a careful reading of the hearing transcript casts serious doubt as to whether Timbana truly knew what was going on. Almost all of Timbana’s answers were a simple “Yes,” even to questions asking him if he understood difficult legal concepts such as malice aforethought.3 If a person says “yes” when the true answer is almost certainly “no,” that throws doubt on his other “yes” *714answers. When the judge asked Timbana why he was there, he twice answered that he was waiting for the judge’s decision, and only on being pressed said that he was “going to decide to take second-degree murder, change it.”
On two occasions, Timbana said “Yes” he understood things that it later became clear he did not understand. During the discussion of reasonable doubt, the judge asked Timbana if he understood the Government’s burden of proof. Timbana answered “Yes.” The judge then asked the same question in a slightly different form, and Timbana did not respond. It was only after the judge specifically asked Timbana if he wanted him to explain it that Timba-na asked for further explanation, and only after seven attempts to explain it, that Timbana said that he “roughly” (and incorrectly) understood the Government’s burden to be that of “perfect evidence.”4 During the discussion of sentencing recommendations, the judge asked whether Tim-bana understood that the judge was not bound by the prosecution’s recommendations. Timbana said he understood. When the judge asked the same question again, Timbana asked, “What do you mean?”5 The record also shows that, at *715one point and presumably throughout the hearing, the judge knew that his explanations might be inadequate and were being supplemented by off-the-record communications between Timbana and his attorney.6 The reports of Timbana’s mental limitations and the judge’s experience with Timbana during the hearing gave him more than enough reason to believe that a simple “Yes” from him was unreliable.
The third problem is, even if Timbana understood what was being said in the hearing and what he was pleading guilty to, the judge still had an independent duty under Rule 11(f) to satisfy himself of the factual basis for the plea. For example, if a paraplegic tried to plead guilty to killing five professional wrestlers with his bare hands, the judge could not accept the plea simply because the paraplegic said that it happened. He would be obligated to inquire into how the paraplegic had managed so unlikely a feat. That Timbana may have understood his rights does not satisfy the judge’s duty under Rule 11(f). The judge has an independent duty, even where the defendant fully understands his rights and wishes to plead guilty, to satisfy himself that there is “a factual basis” for the plea.
The First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Eleventh and District of Columbia Circuits have spoken on analogous facts and held that where the particular circumstances made the defendant’s plea suspect, an otherwise adequate Rule 11 colloquy had to be broadened, requiring reversal. Our case here is even more compelling than those, and so the majority opinion puts us at odds with those seven circuits. No other circuit has taken the majority’s view.
The District of Columbia Circuit in United States v. Masthers7 held that the standard Rule 11 colloquy given by the District Court was inadequate for a defendant with significant mental limitations, vacated the plea, and ordered a hearing on the defendant’s competency. The court explained that the district court could not rely on the defendant’s simple “Yes, Ma’am,” and “No, Ma’am” answers to its questions to sustain the plea.8 “[Although the district court addressed appellant before accepting his plea, it is apparent that the standard Rule 11 colloquy may prove an inadequate measure of the validity of a plea proffered by a defendant of questionable mental competence.”9
In Monroe v. United States,10 the Fifth Circuit also held that a defendant’s mental limitations made a Rule 11 colloquy inadequate even though it would ordinarily have been sufficient. As in the case at bar, the defendant was of quite low intelligence, *716and as in the case at bar, the form of the colloquy was that the judge had the Assistant United States Attorney recite the factual basis for the plea, and then obtained the defendant’s confirmation that the prosecutor’s recitation was correct.
The Eleventh Circuit in Gaddy v. Linahan11 held that the plea of a defendant with notable mental limitations violated due process where the only explanation of the crime charged at the plea colloquy consisted of the prosecutor reading the indictment to the defendant. “Though a rote reading of the indictment or charging document may be sufficient to put a defendant on notice of the elements of the charge in some circumstances, it is inadequate when the defendant has minimal intelligence, the charge is complex, and the sentence to be imposed is substantial.” 12 The court explained that the defendant’s affirmative responses that he understood did not show that he actually grasped the difficult legal concepts involved. “[C]on-clusory responses by a defendant and his counsel to a court’s inquiry into whether the defendant ‘understands’ the charge is not sufficient to establish that the defendant actually has knowledge and understanding, particularly when he possesses minimal intelligence.”13 The court concluded that
[t]he terms “murder” and “malice aforethought,” as they appear in the indictment, are not readily understandable by a layman, particularly one of minimal intelligence. They are complex legal terms, the discussion of which consumes pages of Georgia case law. Considering the petitioner’s lack of intelligence, his expressed confusion, the complexity of the case, and the extraordinary consequences of pleading guilty to malice murder, a more thorough explanation of the nature of the crime and its elements was required to satisfy the tenets of due process.14
Other circuits have held that a district court must make further inquiries about a defendant’s understanding in the analogous situation of when it has reason to suspect that a defendant’s thought processes are impaired by the influence of drugs or alcohol. In United States v. Parra-Ibanez,15 the First Circuit held that where “the district court had reason to suspect” that tranquilizing medications prescribed for defendant by the physicians who examined him for his competency determination “might impinge” on his capacity, a standard Rule 11 colloquy “did not probe deeply enough.” When the district court has information before it suggesting impairment, it “must broaden its inquiry.” This obligation of further inquiry “was not ameliorated” by the competency determination.16
The Second Circuit reached the same conclusion in United States v. Rossillo.17 There, the court held that the district court should have “inquired further into defendant’s state of mind once the court was alerted that defendant might be under the influence of medication.”18 “We believe that if there is any indication, as there was in this case, that defendant is under the influence of any medication, drug or intoxicant, it is incumbent upon the district court to explore on the record defendant’s ability to understand the nature and consequences of his decision to plead guilty.”19 '
*717The Third Circuit likewise held that a district court must “make further inquiry,” despite a “lengthy” Rule 11 colloquy, where a defendant’s answer to one of the routine questions is that he had recently ingested drugs that would affect his thinking, and the district court did not broaden the inquiry in response to the answer.20
The Fourth Circuit has joined these other circuits and held that the district court erred by continuing with a routine Rule 11 colloquy after a defendant’s answers about current drug use had raised a “red flag” as to his “competence to plead guilty.”21 “[W]hen an answer raises questions about the defendant’s state of mind, the court must broaden its inquiry to satisfy itself that the plea is being made knowingly and voluntarily.”22
In all of these cases, the district courts had conducted Rule 11 colloquies that would in most cases be adequate. But these colloquies were inadequate, requiring the judgments to be reversed and the pleas to be vacated, where circumstances known to the judge gave reason to suspect that the defendants might not be acting with adequate capacity.
The majority attempts to distinguish the cases I have cited, and they are all distinguishable on one ground or another (as cases usually are), but the distinctions do not make a difference. It does not matter that in some of the other circuit’s cases, a record had been developed in habeas corpus proceedings while our case comes up on direct review, because a sufficient record was developed in our case in the competency proceedings. Nor does it matter that in some of the other circuit’s cases, there had been no competency examination at the time of the plea, while in ours Timbana had been adjudicated competent, because the record presented to the court in the competency adjudication itself established doubts both as to whether Tim-bana had committed the crime charged and whether he could understand the routine change of plea script.
The majority reads our sister circuits’ cases to establish merely that “where a district court is made aware during a Rule 11 proceeding that a defendant’s competency to enter a plea may be impaired, it must conduct an inquiry before accepting a guilty plea.” I assume that what the majority means by “an inquiry” is an inquiry into competency. I read our sister circuits’ cases to establish that a Rule 11 colloquy that would suffice in most cases is not adequate where the circumstances cast doubt on the defendant’s ability in the particular circumstances to understand what he is doing and make a voluntary choice to plead guilty. The cases I have cited go to whether the plea was voluntary and intelligent, without reaching the question whether there was a factual basis for the plea, but that makes them stronger rather than weaker authority for my view. If a man is not only of such low intelligence to cast doubt on the reliability of his simple “yes” answer to a complex question, but also appears to be physically unable to have done what he appears to be admitting, that establishes more reason, not less, to inquire further.
That a defendant has been adjudicated competent to stand trial does not eliminate the need for a more extensive inquiry than usual in a change of plea proceeding. One of our sister circuits has spoken to precisely this issue, in the case of a person adjudicated competent to stand trial, but disabled mentally by drugs at the time of the chapge of plea proceeding, and held that the prior competency adjudication heightened the district court’s obligation to conduct further inquiry because it made the judge aware of the defendant’s past histo*718ry of drug use.23 Just as a person may be competent to stand trial but need a non-routine colloquy because he speaks only a foreign language and needs an interpreter,24 he may be competent to stand trial but need a more searching inquiry to assure that there is a substantial basis in fact for a voluntary and intelligent plea. All a competency adjudication establishes is that the defendant is able “to understand the nature and consequences of the proceedings against him [and] to assist properly in his defense.”25 A guilty plea requires “such inquiry as shall satisfy [the court] that there is a factual basis for the plea.”26 They differ. Competency to enter a plea does not establish that a routine inquiry suffices where the very reports establishing competency also establish a need for more thorough inquiry.
The colloquy here did not establish a substantial basis in fact for the plea. Tim-bana was only barely competent, and knowing that and the physical implausibility of his guilt, the district court had a responsibility to conduct a more thorough Rule 11 colloquy to ensure an adequate factual basis in the record. This case is an even stronger one for vacating the plea than those in the seven other circuits, because the adequacy of the plea is undermined by the physical implausibility of the crime in addition to the defendant’s limited ability to understand the change of plea agreement.
We should hold, consistently with the law established in the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Eleventh, and D.C. Circuits, that where the factual circumstances or the defendant’s condition make the guilty plea suspect, the district court must broaden what would otherwise be a satisfactory Rule 11 colloquy to address those circumstances. By the time Timbana was to be sentenced, the district court had eonsidera-ble reason to suspect both that the plea was false and that Timbana did not fully comprehend the change of plea proceedings. All the judge had to do .in order to obviate these doubts was to ask Timbana to state what he did in his own words. Of course, there was the risk that the plea bargain would fall apart, because his story would make it inappropriate to accept his plea. He might have said that he did not do it but agreed to accept the blame, or that he did but it was self-defense. But if that occurred, it would be appropriate to try the case in order to find out whether he stabbed Eldredge to death. What usually occurs when a defendant is asked under oath what he did is that he furnishes an iron-clad factual basis for the plea and an aid for sentencing.
The Rule 11 colloquy is not a mere exercise in script reading. It has a purpose. Innocent people may plead guilty, for various reasons. An innocent person may want to take advantage of a discounted sentence in a plea bargain, rather than gamble on a far greater sentence if a mistaken verdict is returned. Or a person may not know what he is admitting and accept his attorney’s advice that a guilty plea is prudent. Or a person may be under some pressure to accept responsibility for something he did not do, in order to protect someone else, whom he loves or fears. When a district judge has reason to suspect that a defendant is not guilty of what he is admitting at his colloquy' or does not understand what he is admitting, the judge has a duty to broaden the inquiry. In this case, Timbana’s .brain damage and physical infirmity gave reason to suspect that he had not committed the murder and did not understand the colloquy. When a brain damaged, illiterate man says “yes” to the question whether he understands what “malice aforethought” means, *719a sensible person would have to be skeptical of all his other simple “yes” responses. And if he further admitted to having accomplished a physical feat of which he looked incapable, even more skepticism would ineluctably motivate most people to ask “how?”

. Santobello v. New York, 404 U.S. 257, 261, 92 S.Ct. 495, 30 L.Ed.2d 427 (1971) (emphasis added).

. Here is the part of the colloquy establishing the factual basis for the plea. Ms. Rodriguez is the Assistant United States Attorney.
THE COURT: Ms. Rodriguez, would you set forth the elements of the offense and what the evidence would show.
MS. RODRIGUEZ: Your Honor, the elements of second-degree murder are that the Defendant killed a human being with malice aforethought; meaning either deliberately and intentionally or recklessly with extreme disregard for human life and that those actions occurred on the reservation, with the Defendant being an Indian. Our evidence would show that John Timbana lived on the Fort Hall Indian Reservation in February of this year. On February the lltli-of 1996, he, Verdick Eldredge and Alvina Phelps spent the afternoon at his home drinking beer. Timba-na and Phelps, excuse me. It was Alvina Phelps. Timbana and Phelps had been common-law married, but she was then, as she described it, with Eldredge and had a baby with him.
Eventually that afternoon Eldredge passed out on the floor lying on his stomach. Alvina Phelps went into the bathroom and when she returned, she saw the Defendant on top of Eldredge, stabbing him in the back. El-dredge rolled over, kicking the Defendant and the Defendant then stabbed Eldredge seven more times in the chest, killing him. Phelps wrestled the knife away from Mr. Timbana, threw it into the other room and called for help. The Defendant was then arrested.
The next morning the Defendant waived his Miranda rights and gave a statement to the Fort Hall Police. He told them that he stabbed Eldredge in the back while Eldredge was asleep on the floor and then stabbed him in the chest with the kitchen knife because he was angry at Eldredge for, quote, "intruding in his marriage life.”
Defendant John Timbana is an Indian.
BY THE COURT:
Q Mr. Timbana, do you agree with what
Ms. Rodriguez has said about what you did?
A Yes.

. Here are some examples:
BY THE COURT:
Q Do you understand that to kill with malice aforethought means to kill deliberately and intentionally or to kill recklessly with disregard for human life; do you understand that?
A Yes.
Q And do you understand that I would instruct the jury that if you chose not to testify, that they are not to draw any conclusions from that fact concerning your guilt?
A Yes.
Q If, however, your case presents unusual, features, the law permits the judge to depart from the guidelines and impose a sentence either above or below the recommended range, but that would be only if your case has unusual or unique features; do you understand that?
A Yes.
Q Now, our local rules here in the District of Idaho require that you file your objections in writing to the presentence report prior to the hearing. Mr. Whittier is aware of this and he will make sure that those objections are filed. If Counsel fails to communicate with the probation officer any objections which he may have on your behalf as to any material information, sentencing classifications, Sentencing Guideline ranges and policy statements contained in or omitted from the report, the Court may accept the report as accurate because of your failure to file any objections.
So, Mr. Whittier, I guess, is put on notice that he must file those objections and he will visit with you, go over the report with you in detail, determine what objections you may have and then notify Mr. Bradley of those objections; do you understand that?
A Yes.

. Here is the discussion of reasonable doubt:
Q Do you understand that at the trial you would be presumed to be innocent and the Government would be required to prove you guilty by competent evidence and beyond a reasonable doubt before you could be found guilty?
A Yes.
Q Do you understand that you would never have the burden to prove yourself innocent, the burden is always with the Government to prove you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt; do you understand that?
A (No audible response.)
Q All right. Let me try to explain it a little better. Do you understand that a defendant in a criminal case does not have to prove that he or she is innocent; the burden is always on the Government to prove you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt; do you understand that? Do you want me to explain it to you or—
A Yeah.
MR. WHITTIER: Your Honor, I think the language he’s having trouble with is the "reasonable doubt” language.
THE COURT: Okay.
BY THE COURT:
Q We put a real high burden on the Government in a criminal case, Mr. Timba-na, they don't just have to prove that it probably happened, they have to prove that you committed the crime with a great deal of certainty, beyond a reasonable doubt, so that a jury has to be very convinced that you would commit the crime. That’s the burden that the Government would have in a criminal case; do you understand that?
A Not really.
Q Okay. Well, it’s for your protection and it’s true in every criminal case in the United States, that the Government, the Prosecutor or the U.S. Attorney, has to prove you guilty to a high degree of evidence, with real certainty, that we are absolutely sure or quite sure — very sure, I should say, that you committed the crime before you could be convicted; do you understand that?
A Well, roughly, yeah.
Q Okay. I don’t know how to explain it any different than the way I have. Is there a specific question you have about that right?
A No.
Q Okay.
MR. WHITTIER: Your Honor, if I might. Again, how I explained it to Mr. Timbana was that the U.S. Government, in proving their case, would have to convince all 12 of the jurors, every one of them, unanimously the fact that he committed the crime. That is how it was explained to him by me.
THE COURT: That’s another very good .point.
BY THE COURT:
Q Do you understand that, Mr. Timbana? That all 12 jurors would have to agree that the Government has proved you guilty?
A Not really. They have to have perfect evidence though for me doing that.
Q Okay. Now, you're understanding the notion. I don’t know if "perfect evidence” is the right word. But you understand that they have to have very strong evidence before you could be convicted; is that your understanding?
A (Witness nodding head.)
Mr. WHITTIER: You have to answer out loud.
THE WITNESS: Yeah.

. Here is the discussion of sentencing recommendations:
*715BY THE COURT:
Q Mr. Timbana, do you understand that I would not be bound by any recommendation made by the Government in the plea agreement? They may recommend what sentence.
THE COURT: I believe they may have recommended acceptance of responsibility; is that correct?
MS. RODRIGUEZ: Yes, Your Honor. BY THE COURT:
Q Do you understand that, Mr. Timbana?
A Yeah.
Q And I'm not bound by that; do you understand that?
A What do you mean?

.Here is the reference to the off-the-record communications. Mr. Whittier is Timbana's attorney.
BY THE COURT:
Q In addition, there is what we call a second sentence if I impose a sentence of incarceration, after you have completed that sentence, you’ll be put on supervised release for a term of up to five years; do you understand that?
A Yes.
Q I guess I overheard Mr. Whittier’s comment. It is very much like probation in State Court or parole in State Court; do you understand that?
A Yes.

. United States v. Masthers, 539 F.2d 721 (D.C.Cir.1976).

. Id. at 723, 728.

. Id. at 728.

. Monroe v. United States, 463 F.2d 1032 (5th Cir.1972).

. Gaddy v. Linahan, 780 F.2d 935 (11th Cir.1986).

. Mat 945.

. Id.

. Id. at 946.

. United States v. Parra-Ibanez, 936 F.2d 588, 595-96 (1st Cir.1991).

. Mat 596, n. 16.

. United States v. Rossillo, 853 F.2d 1062 (2d Cir.1988).

. Id. at 1067.

. Id. at 1066.

. United States v. Cole, 813 F.2d 43 (3d Cir.1987).

. United States v. Damon, 191 F.3d 561, 565 (4th Cir.1999).

.Id.

. Parra-Ibanez, 936 F.2d at 596 n. 16.

. Cf. Masthers, 539 F.2d at 730 (Hastie, J., concurring).

. 42 U.S.C. § 4241(a); see Godinez v. Moran, 509 U.S. 389, 402, 113 S.Ct. 2680, 125 L.Ed.2d 321 (1993); Spikes v. United States, 633 F.2d 144, 146 (9th Cir.1980).

. Fed. R.Crim. Proc. 11(0-