Court Opinion

ID: 9484000
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:37:30.252342+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:57.389956
License: Public Domain

WIDENER, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
The majority today holds that a defendant’s plea of guilty to an indictment alleging participation in a conspiracy to distribute at least thirty kilograms of cocaine constitutes insufficient evidence that the defendant in fact was involved with and responsible for that amount of cocaine. Because I am of opinion that this rule is contrary to logic and is not required by law, I respectfully dissent.
I.
Crucial to the majority’s position is its premise that a plea of guilty may not, on its own, constitute proof of any fact alleged in the indictment. I find nothing to authorize such a per se rule. That a plea of guilty admits all formal elements of a criminal charge is clear; however, it is not true that the effect of a guilty plea is limited, as a matter of law to such formal elements. The United States Supreme Court appears never to have decided the precise issue before us in the present context. The Court has, however, spoken to the nature of the factual admission embodied in a plea of guilty. First, in McCarthy v. United States, 394 U.S. 459, 89 S.Ct. 1166, 22 L.Ed.2d 418 (1969), the Court stated that “because a guilty plea is an admission of all the elements of a formal criminal charge, it cannot be truly voluntary unless the defendant possesses an understanding of the law in relation to the facts.” McCarthy, 394 U.S. at 466, 89 S.Ct. at 1171 (footnote omitted). McCarthy did not involve the issue of the extent to which a guilty plea constitutes a factual admission; indeed the foregoing statement was the only mention of the issue. This language in no way suggests that the evidentiary effect of a guilty plea is limited to the formal elements of the charge.
More recently, in United States v. Broce, 488 U.S. 563, 109 S.Ct. 757, 102 L.Ed.2d 927 (1989), the Court examined the preclusive effect of a guilty plea in a later, collateral (Rule 35) challenge to a sentence. Although, again, the facts in Broce are not precisely the same as those of the instant case, the wording of Broce rather plainly states that the factual admissions worked by entry of a guilty plea may indeed extend beyond the text of the relevant criminal statute:
In holding that the admissions inherent in a guilty plea “go only to the acts constituting the conspiracy,” the Court of Appeals misapprehended the nature and effect of the plea. A guilty plea “is more than a confession which admits that the accused did various acts.” It is an “admission that he committed the crime charged against him.” By entering a plea of guilty, the accused is not simply stating that he did the discrete acts described in the indictment; he is admitting guilt of a substantive crime.
Broce, 488 U.S. at 570, 109 S.Ct. at 762 (citations omitted) (emphasis added). In light of this language I am of opinion that today’s result is not only not required by precedent; rather, the contrary is true if we follow the language in Broce. Indeed, even with the italicized language aside, Broce held that two defendants were not permitted to prove there was one conspiracy when they had pleaded guilty to two. While Broce may not be precisely on point, *1016I suggest it is so nearly so that a departure from it is unsound.
This is not a case in which the district court held the defendant responsible for quantities of drugs derived from charges in the indictment on which he was not convicted. And it is not a case in which the defendant has reserved in a plea agreement or otherwise the right to contest the amount of drugs involved. Neither of such set of facts applies here. Rather this is a case in which the district court attributed to the defendant the amount of drugs that was clearly shown in the charge of the indictment to which the defendant in fact pleaded guilty.* The Third Circuit had a case on facts indistinguishable from those here in United States v. Parker, 874 F.2d 174 (3rd Cir.1989). In that case the defendant argued that the evidence derived from the indictment of the value of stolen items that the district court used to calculate his base offense level was insufficient. The defendant pleaded guilty to stealing 122 pieces of mail valued at approximately $22,-500.00, as stated in his indictment and plea agreement. Parker, 874 F.2d at 175. He argued, however, that he was responsible only for stealing forty-five pieces of mail that were valued much less, thereby lowering his base offense level. Parker, 874 F.2d at 175-76. The court, rejecting his argument, stated, “[i]t is well recognized that by pleading guilty a defendant admits the material facts alleged in the charge,” and held that “[the defendant’s] plea of guilty admitted the value for purposes of his sentence and no further proof or stipulation was required.” Parker, 874 F.2d at 178 (citations omitted). To the same effect is United States v. Johnson, 888 F.2d 1255 (8th Cir.1989) which follows Parker and holding that defendant’s guilty plea admitted “the material facts alleged in the charge.” 888 F.2d at 1256.
II.
In summary and so that my position will not be misunderstood, the indictment provides in pertinent part as follows:
COUNT I
The Grand Jury charges:
A. From the end of 1985 and continuing through October, 1988, in the Western Judicial District of Virginia and elsewhere, ... Edward B. Gilliam, Jr., ... [and others named] knowingly combined, conspired and agreed together and along with unindicted co-conspirators ... [naming them] to distribute or to possess with intent to distribute at least thirty (30) kilograms or more of a mixture of substance containing a detectible amount of cocaine, a Schedule II narcotic controlled substance, in violation of Title 21, United States Code.... (italics added)
To this charge in the indictment, the defendant, Gilliam pleaded guilty.
The district judge found that Gilliam should be charged in sentencing with the thirty kilograms specifically charged in the indictment to which Gilliam had pleaded guilty.
To hold, as the majority does, that “... there was no basis to support the conclusion of the district court that [Gilliam] ... should be held accountable, for sentencing purposes, for 30 kilograms of cocaine” (at 1010), I think is error.

 This distinguishes the Smith line of cases in the Sixth Circuit, which holds that conduct relating to dismissed charges may not be attributed to the defendant in sentencing without "some evi-dentiary basis beyond mere allegation in an indictment." United States v. Smith, 887 F.2d 104, 108 (6th Cir.1989). The evidentiary requirement the majority believes is indispensable for attributing relevant conduct to a defendant is not necessary where, as here, the facts used at the sentencing of the defendant were derived from the charges in the indictment to which he actually pleaded guilty.