Court Opinion

ID: 9478269
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 06:44:26.488981+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:46:19.802404
License: Public Domain

FARRIS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
Contrary to the majority’s assertion, the distinction between the district court’s power to rescind a plea agreement and its power to vacate a guilty plea is pivotal. The district court had power to rescind the agreement. After the court exercised that power, but before it vacated the plea, the defendant was subject to sentencing on the misdemeanor count and prosecution on the felony counts in the original indictment. The Double Jeopardy Clause did not bar the prosecution. Therefore, the district court’s decision to vacate the guilty plea to the misdemeanor count, if error, was harmless since the defendant’s situation was improved by the act.
A. Power to Rescind Plea Agreement
Several circuits have recognized that the government can be freed from its obligations under a plea agreement after a defendant has entered a guilty plea pursuant to the agreement. See United States v. Verrusio, 803 F.2d 885, 887-89 (7th Cir.1986); United States v. Reardon, 787 F.2d 512, 515-16 (10th Cir.1986); United States v. Simmons, 537 F.2d 1260, 1261-62 (4th Cir.1976); United States v. Nathan, 476 F.2d 456, 459 (2d Cir.1973); United States v. McCarthy, 445 F.2d 587, 591 (7th Cir.1971). Although the government’s contract defense in these cases was based on the defendant’s breach of the agreement, the cases never discussed or indicated that *636the government is limited in the type of contract defense it can use to free itself from a plea agreement. Here, the government’s contract theory is based on a unilateral mistake, a defense not yet addressed by any court.
We have recognized as a general principle, however, that plea agreements are contractual in nature and that any dispute over their terms will be determined by contract-law standards. See, e.g., United States v. Read, 778 F.2d 1437, 1441 (9th Cir.1985); United States v. Krasn, 614 F.2d 1229, 1233 (9th Cir.1980). In resolving disputes, we have also stated that courts must first determine “what the parties to the plea bargain reasonably understood to be the terms of agreement.” United States v. Read, 778 F.2d at 1441 (quoting United States v. Arnett, 628 F.2d 1162, 1164 (9th Cir.1979)). Although these principles presuppose the existence of a plea agreement, the overarching principle from which these principles are derived is that plea agreements are contractual in nature. Any contract defense should be available to the government or defendant, including a defense based on a unilateral mistake. The idea that plea agreements should be governed by the standards of contract law is not simply an “analogy” which the majority may dismiss as “imperfect” when it does not support the result they desire to reach, but rather a principle of law that must be confronted.
Consider a case in which the government agrees to recommend a five-year sentence in exchange for the defendant’s guilty plea. The defendant’s lawyer then negligently drafts an agreement which states that the government will recommend a ten-year sentence in exchange for the defendant’s guilty plea. Pursuant to the agreement, the defendant enters a guilty plea and the court unconditionally accepts it. Prior to sentencing, the defendant’s attorney discovers the mistake and asks the court to rescind the agreement. Under these circumstances, the court would allow the defendant to show that the agreement presented to the court should be nullified because it did not reflect the agreement reached with the government.
Likewise, if the government is the party that has made the unilateral mistake, reason requires that it also be able to have the agreement nullified.1 Here, the government asked the district court to rescind the plea agreement. The government explained that it had entered a plea agreement with the defendant under which the government would drop three felony counts in exchange for the defendant’s guilty plea to a felony count of possession of heroin with intent to distribute. The government later prepared documents for the proceeding in which the defendant would enter his plea. In doing so, the government made an error and charged the defendant with a misdemeanor count of possession under 21 U.S.C. § 844 instead of a felony count of possession with intent to distribute under 21 U.S.C. § 841. The defendant immediately pled guilty to the misdemeanor. Prior to sentencing, the government detected the mistake and notified defendant’s counsel and the court.
On the basis of the government's explanation, the district court concluded that a “mistake of fact” had occurred. This finding was not clearly erroneous. See Read, 778 F.2d at 1441 (what the parties agreed to is a question of fact to be resolved by the district court). I would uphold the district court’s decision to rescind the agreement.
B. District Court’s Decision to Vacate Guilty Plea was Harmless Error
After the district court concluded that a “mistake of fact” had been made, it vacated the defendant’s guilty plea. As the *637majority points out, the Federal Criminal Procedure do not expressly authorize the district court to vacate a guilty plea on its own initiative or upon the government’s motion. After rescinding the agreement, the court should have asked the defendant if he wanted to withdraw his guilty plea to the misdemeanor, see United States v. Reardon, 787 F.2d 512, 513 (10th Cir.1986), or the defendant should have moved on his own initiative to withdraw the plea pursuant to Rule 32(d).
Although the district court erred by vacating the plea upon the government’s motion, we must determine whether the error was harmless. See 28 U.S.C. § 2111; Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 22, 87 S.Ct. 824, 827, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 (1967). Because the district court determined that the government was no longer bound to the plea agreement, the government could still prosecute the defendant on the felony counts in the original indictment. Prosecution of these counts would not have violated the Double Jeopardy Clause’s prohibition on successive prosecutions for the same offense. For purposes of the Clause, a greater-included offense is the “same” as a lesser-included offense. Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 168, 97 S.Ct. 2221, 2226-27, 53 L.Ed.2d 187 (1977). The government’s prosecution of the count under 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1) (possession with intent to distribute) was for the "same” offense as the misdemeanor possession count to which the defendant had entered a guilty plea. A double jeopardy problem, however, did not arise as to this count. Jeopardy did not attach when the district court accepted the defendant’s guilty plea and later vacated it before sentencing. United States v. Santiago Soto, 825 F.2d 616, 617-20 (1st Cir.1987) (also noting that contrary holding in United States v. Cruz, 709- F.2d 111 (1st Cir.1983) overruled by Ohio v. Johnson, 467 U.S. 493, 104 S.Ct. 2536, 81 L.Ed.2d 425 (1984)). The Double Jeopardy Clause did not bar prosecution of the count under 21 U.S.C. § 846 (conspiracy to possess heroin with intent to distribute). The Clause bars only successive prosecutions of the same offense. “The commission of a substantive offense and a conspiracy to commit it are separate a double jeopardy is no defense to a conviction for both.” Pereira v. United States, 347 U.S. 1, 11, 74 S.Ct. 358, 364, 98 L.Ed. 435 (1954); United States v. Thompson, 814 F.2d 1472, 1476 (10th Cir.1987). The Clause also did not bar prosecution of the third count under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) (use of a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking offense). A conviction on this count could have arisen from either a conviction on the count for possession with intent to distribute or the count for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute, see United States v. Pietri, 683 F.2d 877, 880 (5th Cir.1982) (offense can be based on conspiracy conviction).
Since the later prosecutions were not barred, the district court’s decision to vacate the guilty plea to the misdemeanor only worked to the defendant’s advantage. The district court’s “error” allowed the defendant to escape a misdemeanor conviction. The error was harmless.
The majority holds that the error warrants reversal not only of the district court’s decision to vacate the plea, but of all felony convictions resulting from the later prosecution of the defendant. This holding has no legal foundation. It stems from the majority’s failure to distinguish between the district court’s power to rescind a plea agreement and the court’s power to vacate a guilty plea on the government’s motion. The court’s power to rescind the agreement is beyond dispute. See supra. The court’s decision to rescind the agreement was based on a finding of a “mistake of fact.” This finding was not clearly erroneous.
The majority assumes that because the district court lacked power to vacate the plea, the proper remedy is to reinstate the guilty plea and the plea agreement which would have prohibited prosecution of all but one of the felony counts in the original indictment. The district court had power to rescind the plea agreement. When it exercised that power, the government was free to prosecute the defendant on the felony counts in the original indictment, and the Double Jeopardy Clause did not bar the *638prosecution. The majority offers no rationale, and can provide none, for reversing the felony convictions. At most, the majority can reinstate the guilty plea to the misdemeanor charge if it believes that the district court’s error was not harmless. Any conviction on the misdemeanor possession charge would be barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause because the defendant has already been properly convicted of the greater-included offense under 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). I respectfully dissent.

. The majority accuses the dissent of disingenu-ousness in arguing that district courts possess common law authority to rescind plea agreements when either the defendant or the government raises a valid contract defense. The majority argues that in reality this common law authority arises only when the government seeks recision because Rule 32(d) permits defendants to withdraw a guilty plea after demonstrating "fair and just reason.” However, the fact that Congress has chosen to provide defendants the protection found in Rule 32(d) does not alter or impinge upon defenses that may exist at common law for the benefit of either party.