United States v. Williams

• Decision Date: 23 June 2015
• Docket Number: No. 14–5070.,14–5070.
• Citation: 790 F.3d 1059
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. Jeffrey Dan WILLIAMS, Defendant–Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

790 F.3d 1059

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff–Appellant

v.Jeffrey Dan WILLIAMS, Defendant–Appellee.

No. 14–5070.

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit.

June 23, 2015.

Richard A. Friedman, Appellate Section, Criminal Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C. (Patrick C. Harris and Patricia S. Harris, Special Assistants, United States Attorneys, Little Rock, AR; Leslie R. Caldwell, Assistant Attorney General, David A. O'Neil, Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General, and Sung–Hee Suh, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Washington, D.C., with him on the briefs), for Plaintiff–Appellant.

Barry L. Derryberry, Research and Writing Specialist (William Widell, Assistant Federal Public Defender with him on the brief), Office of the Federal Public Defender, Tulsa, OK, for Defendant–Appellee.

Before BACHARACH, BALDOCK, and McHUGH, Circuit Judges.

McHUGH, Circuit Judge.

I. INTRODUCTION

After multiple attempts over the course of fourteen years to attack his federal convictions on various drug and firearm charges, Jeffrey Dan Williams filed a motion in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma seeking to withdraw his guilty plea based on newly discovered evidence. Specifically, Mr. Williams submitted affidavits in support of his claim that his guilty plea was involuntarily entered because the law enforcement officers investigating his case planted evidence, gave false testimony, and used threats and intimidation to suborn perjury from other witnesses. After conducting an evidentiary hearing, the district court vacated Mr. Williams's convictions. It concluded that the officers had perpetrated a fraud on the court and that vacating Mr. Williams's convictions was necessary to correct the fraud and to prevent a miscarriage of justice. The government appeals, asserting the district court lacked jurisdiction over Mr. Williams's motion due to his failure to first obtain certification from this court, as required by 28 U.S.C. § 2255, permitting him to file a second or successive petition for habeas corpus relief.

Exercising jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2244, we hold that the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA) limits the courts' power to correct fraud on the court and to prevent a miscarriage of justice when the court vacates a conviction in response to a second or successive habeas petition. Although a district court may invoke these powers sua sponte, the district court here acted on Mr. Williams's motion to withdraw his guilty plea, which is a second or successive petition. We therefore reverse the district court's order vacating Mr. Williams's conviction for lack of jurisdiction. But we exercise our discretion to treat Mr. Williams's appellate brief as a request to file a second or successive motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255(h), and we grant that request in part.

II. BACKGROUND

A. Factual History¹

According to the government, from at least 1995 to 1997, Mr. Williams operated and directed an illegal drug distribution operation, primarily in Tulsa, Creek, and Osage Counties, Oklahoma. He was an experienced methamphetamine cook and charged large fees to teach others to manufacture methamphetamine. Mr. Williams also employed associates to help him manufacture methamphetamine, to purchase necessary precursor chemicals, and to find locations to manufacture and store his product.

Local authorities arrested individuals connected with the conspiracy beginning in 1994 but they did not realize the full scope of the conspiracy until 1997. By that point, the authorities had made controlled buys, seized methamphetamine and paraphernalia at traffic stops, and interviewed various witnesses about their involvement with Mr. Williams and a coconspirator, James Edmondson. At that point, law enforcement officers turned the focus of their investigation to Mr. Williams. Various searches of Mr. Williams's vehicle, residence, and the residence of his then-girlfriend uncovered drugs, drug paraphernalia, drug manufacturing equipment, and a firearm. As a result, Mr. Williams was arrested and ultimately charged under federal law.

B. Procedural History

1. The Federal Indictment, Guilty Plea, and Sentencing

Mr. Williams pled guilty to four counts alleged in a federal indictment: conspiring to manufacture and possess methamphetamine (the conspiracy count); two counts of possessing with intent to distribute methamphetamine on March 12, 1997, and July 22, 1997 (the drug counts); and possessing a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime (the firearm count). At sentencing, Mr. Williams disputed the amount of methamphetamine he was responsible for manufacturing and/or distributing, but the district court rejected Mr. Williams's argument and instead accepted the testimony of a DEA agent. The district court therefore sentenced Mr. Williams to a total term of 420 months imprisonment, including 360 months for each of the conspiracy and drug counts, running concurrently, and 60 months for the gun count, running consecutively.

2. The Direct Appeal and Prior Post–Conviction Relief Proceedings

Mr. Williams appealed his conviction, and we affirmed. See United States v. Williams, 201 F.3d 449 (10th Cir.1999) (unpublished table decision). He then filed a series of collateral attacks. His first four § 2255 motions were denied by the district court and the Tenth Circuit. See, e.g., In re Williams, No. 08–5079 (10th Cir.2008); United States v. Williams, 167 Fed.Appx. 25 (10th Cir.2006) (per curiam) (unpublished); United States v. Williams, 44 Fed.Appx. 443 (10th Cir.2002) (unpublished).

On November 12, 2010, Mr. Williams filed a fifth request for postconviction relief, in which he first raised the allegations relevant to this appeal. Mr. Williams claimed at least five Tulsa Police Department officers who were involved in the investigation of his case were also the subject of an investigation into corruption at the Tulsa Police Department (the corruption investigation), which uncovered instances of planted evidence and perjury in other criminal cases. According to Mr. Williams, these officers fabricated and manipulated evidence, intimidated witnesses, and used false informants in his case.

Although we denied Mr. Williams authorization to file a successive habeas petition because he had not provided evidence to support his allegations, we noted our denial was “without prejudice to Mr. Williams's refiling, in this court, a motion for authorization containing a complete description of all relevant facts and circumstances, with supporting evidence.”

In an attempt to comply with our instructions, Mr. Williams refiled his request for authorization to file a second or successive § 2255 petition with this court and attached notarized statements from various witnesses. We again denied the motion because the new evidence did not establish a connection between any officer implicated in the corruption investigation and the witnesses and federal agents involved in Mr. Williams's case.

3. The Current Postconviction Relief Proceeding

a. Mr. Williams's Motion

Mr. Williams next filed a pro se “Motion to Withdraw and Nullify Guilty Plea” (the Motion) with the district court on January 17, 2012, which is the subject of this appeal. In the Motion, he argued that “the same officers [involved in the corruption investigation had] engaged in the same type of illegal conduct during the investigation, searches and seizures [in Mr. Williams's case,]” and that this conduct resulted in Mr. Williams's guilty plea. Mr. Williams attached evidence undermining the testimony of the DEA agent used to support the drug quantity findings at Mr. Williams's sentencing.² In addition, Mr. Williams attached his own affidavit in which he claimed Tulsa officers conducted searches without probable cause, coerced testimony regarding the gun charge, and seized less methamphetamine than they reported. Mr. Williams further stated that he was pressured to plead guilty because his counsel advised him the government was planning to file a Fourth Superseding Indictment which would add a continuing criminal enterprise (CCE) charge against Mr. Williams and would name Mr. Williams's younger sister as a codefendant.

b. The District Court's Response

The district court construed the Motion as a request under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(d)(3), which acknowledges a district court's inherent authority to set aside a judgment for fraud on the court. The district court also appointed counsel for Mr. Williams, ordered the parties to conduct discovery, and held an evidentiary hearing, which was conducted intermittently between May 2012 and June 2012.³

At the hearing, the district court received testimony from multiple witnesses who supported Mr. Williams's claims that the Tulsa police officers acted fraudulently during the investigation of his case.

The district court issued an opinion and order vacating Mr. Williams's judgment and sentence and dismissing the third superseding indictment. In so doing, the district court found that Tulsa Police Department officers committed a fraud on the court that required Mr. Williams's convictions to be set aside. In the alternative, the court granted Mr. Williams's motion to withdraw his guilty plea based on the court's common law authority to prevent a miscarriage of justice, specifically finding that Mr. Williams had demonstrated actual innocence by a preponderance of the evidence. To distinguish an intervening decision of this court, United States v. Baker, 718 F.3d 1204 (10th Cir.2013),⁴ which held that motions alleging fraud on the court should be treated as second or successive petitions, the district court explained that “it is the Court, not the defendant, that has invoked its inherent authority and has construed Mr. Williams'[s] motion to Withdraw and Nullify Guilty Plea as a fraud on the court motion.” United States v. Williams, 16 F.Supp.3d 1301, 1313 n. 5 (N.D.Okla.2014).

The district court...