Justia U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

This case involved convictions for two Hobbs Act, 18 U.S.C. 1951(a), conspiracies and related to substantive offenses: the first conspiracy Count 1, charged two appellants, Rene Gonzalez Perez and Amilka Del Monte, with conspiring to rob a check-cashing store; the second conspiracy, Count 5, grew out of the first conspiracy and charged all four appellants - Perez, Del Monte, Roberto Davila, and Luis Fernandez - and Reinier Pereier with conspiring to rob a fictional cocaine stash house. The related offenses were charged in Counts 6, 7, and 8. Count 6 alleged that all appellants attempted to rob the cocaine stash house; Count 7 alleged that they carried firearms in connection with such attempt; and Count 8 charged Del Monte with being a felon in possession of a firearm. On appeal, all appellants challenged the sufficiency of the evidence; in the alternative, appellants argued that a new trial should be granted because of several prejudicial errors that the district court made both pretrial and at trial; and Perez and Del Monte challenged their sentences. The convictions of Perez, Del Monte, Fernandez, and Davila were affirmed; Del Monte's sentences on Counts 7 and 8 were also affirmed; and Perez's sentences on Counts 1, 5, 6, and 7 were vacated, and his case remanded so that he could be afforded his right of allocution.

Defendant appealed his convictions for aggravated identify theft, principally claiming the government did not produce sufficient evidence that defendant knew the name and social security number he used in applying for a United States passport belonged to an actual person. Defendant also argued that a two-level obstruction-of-justice enhancement was erroneously applied to his sentence because the admittedly false statements he made during his pretrial services interview were not material, because he did not intend to obstruct justice, and because no finding was made that he had actually obstructed justice. Defendant also asserted for the first time on appeal, that use of his pretrial services interview statements against him violated the Fifth Amendment because he had not yet been Mirandized when the statements were made. After thorough review, the court concluded that the evidence was sufficient to support defendant's convictions and that the district court properly applied the obstruction-of-justice enhancement to his sentence.

Petitioner, who was convicted of capital murder, appealed the district court's denial of habeas relief on two alternative grounds. First, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals rested its decision on independent and adequate state procedural grounds when it relied on Rules 32.6(b) and 32.7(d) of the Alabama Rule of Criminal Procedure to dispose of the relevant claim, thereby precluding federal review. Second, even if these procedural grounds did not preclude the district court from considering the relevant claims on the merits, 28 U.S.C. 2254(d)(1) barred habeas relief because the Court of Criminal Appeal's decision was neither contrary to, nor involved an unreasonable application of Strickland v. Washington. While the district court erred in finding that petitioner had procedurally defaulted the relevant claim, the court agreed with that court's alternative holding that, through the lens of section 2254, petitioner was unable to carry the burden of demonstrating that his attorneys' allegedly ineffective assistance of counsel prejudiced the sentencing phase of his criminal proceedings, as required by Strickland.

In 1994, defendant was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder, one count of armed burglary, and one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, but those convictions were set aside on appeal by the Florida Supreme Court. In 2004, defendant was retried and again convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and defendant claimed that this second trial violated the Fifth Amendment's prohibition on double jeopardy. On direct appeal, the Florida Supreme Court denied him relief, as did the federal district court on his application for a writ of habeas corpus. Having carefully reviewed the Florida Supreme Court's decision in light of United States Supreme Court precedent, the court held that defendant was not entitled to habeas relief because he was not "twice put in jeopardy" as that phrase was defined in federal constitutional law.

Petitioner, a native and citizen of Cuba and a lawful permanent resident of the United States, petitioned for review of the decision of the BIA affirming the IJ's order of removal rendered on the ground that he was inadmissible to the United States because he was convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude due to his conviction for false imprisonment under section 787.02, Florida Statutes. The court held that the BIA and the IJ erred by considering evidence beyond the record of petitioner's false imprisonment conviction to determine that he had been convicted of a crime involving moral turpitude. The court held, however, that because the BIA and IJ assumed without deciding that the Florida offense of false imprisonment was not categorically a crime involving moral turpitude, the court must remand to the BIA to determine in the first instance whether petitioner's false imprisonment conviction qualified as a conviction of a crime involving moral turpitude. Therefore, the court granted the petition and remanded for further proceedings.

In 1987, petitioner burglarized a home and murdered the two people inside. Petitioner, now a death-row inmate, appealed the district court's denial of his section 2254 petition for a writ of habeas corpus. The court held that petitioner had pointed to no Supreme Court precedent establishing that the Florida Supreme Court's decision, that petitioner's trial lawyers had performed well enough, was contrary to, or an unreasonable application of, clearly established federal law, or that it was based on an unreasonable determination of the facts. The court also held that the Florida Supreme Court's decision rejecting petitioner's Batson claim was neither contrary to, nor an unreasonable application of, federal law as determined by the United States Supreme Court. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's denial of habeas relief.

In this Section 1983 case, four homeless plaintiffs challenged the constitutionality of two ordinances in the City Code of St. Petersburg, Florida and of the city's enforcement of the ordinances. The trespass ordinance at issue authorized certain city agents to issue a temporary trespass warning for specific city land on which the agent determined that the warning recipient had violated city or state law. The storage ordinance at issue prohibited storage of personal property on city land such as parks and rights-of-way. The district court dismissed all of plaintiffs claims. The court affirmed the district court's rulings, except the court vacated part of the district court's ruling about the trespass ordinance. Plaintiffs have stated claims on the issues of procedural due process under the United States Constitution and on their right to intrastate travel under the Florida Constitution.

Defendant appealed the district court's denial of his motion to vacate, set aside, or correct his sentence, filed pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 2255. On appeal, defendant argued that the district court erred in ruling that his sentencing claim was not cognizable under section 2255. Defendant also argued that the actual innocence exception to the procedural default rule applied to excuse the procedural default of his sentencing claim. The court held that defendant procedurally defaulted his claim by failing to raise it on direct appeal and that the actual innocence exception did not apply to defendant's claim of legal innocence. Accordingly, the court affirmed the district court's denial of the section 2255 motion.

This case stemmed from Odyssey Marine Exploration, Inc.'s (Odyssey) discovery of a 19th Century Spanish vessel in international waters where Odyssey filed a verified admiralty complaint in rem against the shipwrecked vessel and sought a warrant of arrest. The Kingdom of Spain, the Republic of Peru, and twenty-five individuals filed claims against the res and Spain subsequently filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that the res was a Spanish warship and the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over Odyssey's claims because the vessel was immune from judicial arrest under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), 28 U.S.C. 1602-1611. The court affirmed the district court's grant of Spain's motion to dismiss where the district court correctly applied the Rule 12(b)(1) standard for factual challenges to jurisdiction to Spain's motion to dismiss; the district court did not abuse its discretion by evaluating Spain's Rule 12(b)(1) motion based on the extensive record before it; the evidence in the record fully supported the finding of the district court that the res was the Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes (Mercedes), a Spanish vessel that sank in 1804, for the purposes of sovereign immunity and the district court correctly decided that FSIA immunity applied to the arrest of the Mercedes; the cargo aboard the Mercedes was treated as part of the shipwreck of the Mercedes for sovereign immunity purposes; and the district court did not err when it ordered the Odyssey to release the recovered res to the custody of Spain.

Defendants were convicted of offenses relating to their support for Islamist violence overseas. The issues raised on appeal related to the admission of testimony from an FBI agent; sufficiency of the evidence; admission of an expert's testimony; admission of portions of a television interview with Osama bin Laden; denial of a motion to suppress statements made to FBI agents; denial of a motion to dismiss an indictment based on alleged outrageous government conduct; admission of evidence of innocent intent; denial of a motion for severance; application of the terrorism enhancement to defendants' sentences; and, on cross-appeal, substantive and procedural error in sentencing. After review of the entire record, the court held that defendants were not entitled to relief on any of their claims. The court held, however, that the district court erred in imposing Jose Padilla's sentence. Accordingly, the court affirmed defendants' convictions in all respects but vacated Padilla's sentence and remanded his case to the district court for re-sentencing.