Court Opinion

ID: 9489253
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:10:11.360396+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:25.210294
License: Public Domain

STAPLETON, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I join sections I and III of the court’s opinion, although I believe that a more detailed explanation is warranted regarding section III-B. I cannot join section II.
I.
In section II, the court concludes that Moskovits’s waiver of his right to counsel cannot be said to be knowing and intelligent because the record fails to show that he was aware at the waiver hearing that his sentence after retrial could be greater than his vacated sentence. I agree that Moskovits could not knowingly and intelligently waive the right to counsel without knowing that he had something to lose in a retrial. Further, I agree that Moskovits was not advised at the waiver hearing that he could face a greater sentence after retrial. The record does affirmatively establish, however, that this advice would not have altered Moskovits’s decision to represent himself and, accordingly, that the failure to give it had no effect on the subsequent course of events. Under these circumstances, I find no basis for disturbing Moskovits’s conviction.
When Moskovits indicated a desire to represent himself, Judge Poliak spoke at length and in depth with him about his right to counsel and the dangers of self-representation. Moskovits acknowledges that Judge Poliak “touched all the bases” save the one he now stresses. Only after Moskovits insisted that he understood the advantages of counsel and the disadvantages of self-representation did Judge Poliak agree to let Moskovits take the lead role in his own defense. In order to provide assistance to Moskovits, however, and to protect against prejudice to him in the event he should thereafter have a change of heart, Judge Poliak appointed two back-up counsel who would be prepared to consult and to take over at any point. This is of crucial importance to the issue before us because Moskovits was expressly advised a week before the retrial that he could receive a higher sentence and he chose once again to reject representation and opt for self-representation.1 Given that Moskovits had and rejected the option of effective professional representation after learning what he had at stake, it involves no speculation to conclude that Moskovits would have chosen self-representation following a flawless waiver hearing and that the deficiency to which he now points had no effect on these proceedings. Limiting Moskovits’s sentence under these circumstances would constitute a windfall, pure and simple.
I am mindful that “[s]ome constitutional violations ... by their very nature cast so much doubt on the fairness of the trial process that, as a matter of law, they can never be considered harmless.” Satterwhite v. Texas, 486 U.S. 249, 256, 108 S.Ct. 1792, 1797, 100 L.Ed.2d 284 (1988). Such is the case where “any inquiry into a claim of harmless error ... would require, unlike most cases, unguided speculation.” Id. (quoting Holloway v. Arkansas, 435 U.S. 475, 491, 98 S.Ct. 1173, 1182, 55 L.Ed.2d 426 (1978). Accordingly, this court has refused to speculate on whether representation throughout trial *1313for a criminal defendant would have produced a result different from that achieved by the defendant without representation. It is simply impossible to tell what a skilled and fully informed counsel would have been able to accomplish during the representation. See United States v. Welty, 674 F.2d 185, 194 n. 6 (3d Cir.1982). On the other hand, the general rule remains that a criminal conviction should not be overturned if there is no causal connection between the judgment and the alleged constitutional error. Even where the Sixth Amendment right to counsel has been infringed, an affirmance is in order if the “scope [of the error] is readily identifiable” and “the reviewing court can -undertake with some confidence its relatively narrow task of assessing the likelihood that the error materially affected” the outcome. Satterwhite, 486 U.S. at 256, 108 S.Ct. at 1797 (quoting Holloway, 435 U.S. at 490, 98 S.Ct. at 1181).
Determining that there was no causal connection here between the alleged constitutional error and Moskovits’s conviction involves no speculation. On the contrary, the record establishes with certainty that the district court’s failure to advise Moskovits at the waiver hearing of the range of penalties he faced did not affect Moskovits’s decision to represent himself, and hence did not in any way affect the subsequent course of events.
II.
In part III-B, the court concludes that the district court did not err when it sentenced Moskovits in part based on its finding that Moskovits committed perjury at the habeas hearing. While I believe that the court’s discussion is fully consistent with my interpretation of United States v. Dunnigan, 507 U.S. 87, 113 S.Ct. 1111, 122 L.Ed.2d 445 (1993), in my view, a more detailed explanation is warranted.
Dunnigan stands for two propositions. First, in order for a district court to enhance a sentence for perjury pursuant to United States Sentencing Guidelines (“U.S.S.G.”) § 3C1.1, the district court must review the record and find by a preponderance of the evidence that each of the elements of perjury (willfulness, falsity, and materiality) is present. The district court cannot assume that a defendant has perjured herself merely because she has testified at trial and was found guilty. Because the sentencing court must make affirmative findings with respect to each element of perjury, its conclusion is “independent” of the jury verdict. Id. Second, when a court enhances the sentence of a defendant who testified at trial in accordance with this procedure, the court does not violate the defendant’s right to testify at trial on her own behalf. Dunnigan, 507 U.S. at 95-98, 113 S.Ct. at 1117-19.
It is important to realize that while a court, under Dunnigan, must make “independent findings” with respect to each perjury element, this does not mean that the jury’s verdict may not play a role in this fact finding process. Just as a jury verdict has issue preclusive effects in subsequent proceedings with respect to facts necessarily resolved by a criminal jury, e.g., Appley v. West, 832 F.2d 1021, 1025-26 (7th Cir.1987), “a guilty verdict, not set aside, binds the sentencing court to accept the facts necessarily implicit in the verdict.” United States v. Boggi, 74 F.3d 470, 478-79 (3d Cir.1996) (quoting from United States v. Weston, 960 F.2d 212, 218 (1st Cir.1992)). Thus, if a defendant has testified that he was elsewhere at the time of a robbery, and the jury finds him guilty of that robbery, the jury’s verdict provides a sufficient basis for a finding by the court that the defendant’s testimony was false. If the record also provides support for findings that this false statement was material and willful and the court so finds, an enhancement under § 3C1.1 is clearly appropriate.
The district court here found by a preponderance of the evidence that Moskovits perjured himself at the habeas hearing:
To obtain a new trial, Moskovits had to convince the court ... that his testimony was such that it rendered the jury’s verdict suspect. [T]o sustain that heavy burden, Moskovits resorted to perjury. Moskovits’s perjury consists of his repeated denial of his involvement in specific events which occurred during the course of the conspiracy.
(A.131-2.) This finding encompasses all of the elements of perjury. Compare Boggi, 74 *1314F.3d at 479 (holding that the following finding encompassed all of the elements of perjury: “I don’t see how, in view of his flat denials and the jury’s conviction, that you can find otherwise than that he testified falsely on the stand.”).
The district court’s conclusion by a preponderance of the evidence that all of the elements of perjury are present is well supported by the record even though Judge Newcomer was not present at the habeas hearing. Regarding falsity, Moskovits testified repeatedly that he was not involved in the cocaine distributions alleged in the indictment. This is evident from the transcript of the hearing. The jury convicted Moskovits of distributing cocaine as alleged in the indictment and it necessarily resolved this factual issue when it convicted him. The district court was bound by this determination and had no choice but to conclude that Moskovits’s testimony that he was not involved in the alleged cocaine distributions was false. That Moskovits may have been able to convince the jury otherwise had he testified at trial is irrelevant.2
Moreover, it is indisputable that this testimony was material. The purpose of the habeas hearing was to determine if there was a reasonable probability that by testifying Moskovits could have convinced the jury that he was innocent. As the district court observed, Moskovits had a “heavy burden” of trying to “convince the court ... that the jury’s verdict [in the first trial] was suspect” and he “resorted to perjury” in order to carry that burden.
Finally, regarding willfulness, given Moskovits’s testimony “regarding so many facts on which [ ]he could not have been mistaken, there is ample support for the District Court’s finding [of willfulness].” Dunnigan, 507 U.S. at 95, 113 S.Ct. at 1117. The district court could make this determination by a preponderance of the evidence based on the transcript of the hearing alone. Moreover, the inference of willfulness was more compelling because Moskovits did not offer any alternative explanation. In response to the government’s argument in favor of a heavier sentence reflecting perjury, Moskovits offered no explanation suggesting that his testimony was not willful. On the contrary, he did not waiver from the version of events he recounted at the habeas hearing.
III.
I agree with the court that it was error for the district court to consider Moskovits’s rejection of the government’s plea offer as an aggravating factor in determining the appropriate sentence. Accordingly, I would reverse and remand for resentencing. I would not, however, limit the district court’s discretion to a sentence of fifteen years or less.

. While the court points out that Judge Newcomer did not specifically say anything about Moskovits’s prior fifteen year sentence, as Moskovits conceded at oral argument, Judge Newcomer's statement at the pretrial hearing "clearly implies” that Judge Newcomer could sentence Moskovits to a greater sentence after retrial.

. Moskovits argues that it was improper for Judge Newcomer to conclude that Moskovits's habeas testimony was false because Judge Newcomer was not present at the habeas hearing and Judge Poliak, who was present, made a determination that Moskovits's testimony was credible. Judge Poliak made no such determination. Judge Poliak concluded only that this is not one of those “rare cases” where he could conclude that the defendant's own testimony would not have affected the jury verdict. United States v. Moskovits, 844 F.Supp. 202, 208 (E.D.Pa.1993).