Luis v. United States

• Decision Date: 30 March 2016
• Docket Number: 14–419.
• Parties: Sila LUIS, Petitioner v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

578 U.S. 5

136 S.Ct. 1083

194 L.Ed.2d 256

Sila LUIS, Petitioner

v.UNITED STATES.

No. 14–419.

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued Nov. 10, 2015.

Decided March 30, 2016.

Howard Srebnick, Miami, FL, for Petitioner.

Michael R. Dreeben, Washington, D.C., for Respondent.

Donald B. Verrilli, Jr., Solicitor General, Leslie R. Caldwell, Assistant Attorney General, Michael R. Dreeben, Deputy Solicitor General, Elaine J. Goldenberg, Assistant to the Solicitor General, Sonja M. Ralston, Attorney, Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for Respondent.

Scott A. Srebnick, Scott A. Srebnick, P.A., Miami, FL, Ricardo J. Bascuas, Coral Gables, FL, Howard Srebnick, Joshua Shore, Black, Srebnick, Kornspan & Stumpf, P.A., Miami, FL, for Petitioner.

Scott A. Srebnick, Scott A. Srebnick, P.A., Miami, FL, Howard Srebnick, Joshua Shore, Black, Srebnick, Kornspan & Stumpf, P.A., Miami, FL, for Petitioner.

Justice BREYER announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion in which THE CHIEF JUSTICE, Justice GINSBURG, and Justice SOTOMAYOR join.

A federal statute provides that a court may freeze before trial certain assets belonging to a criminal defendant accused of violations of federal health care or banking laws. See 18 U.S.C. § 1345. Those assets include: (1) property "obtained as a result of" the crime, (2) property " traceable" to the crime, and (3) other "property of equivalent value." § 1345(a)(2). In this case, the Government has obtained a court order that freezes assets belonging to the third category of property, namely, property that is untainted by the crime, and that belongs fully to the defendant. That order, the defendant says, prevents her from paying her lawyer. She claims that insofar as it does so, it violates her Sixth Amendment "right ... to have the Assistance of Counsel for [her] defence." We agree.

I

In October 2012, a federal grand jury charged the petitioner, Sila Luis, with paying kickbacks, conspiring to commit fraud, and engaging in other crimes all related to health care. See § 1349; § 371; 42 U.S.C. § 1320a–7b(b)(2)(A). The Government claimed that Luis had fraudulently obtained close to $45 million, almost all of which she had already spent. Believing it would convict Luis of the crimes charged, and hoping to preserve the $2 million remaining in Luis' possession for payment of restitution and other criminal penalties (often referred to as criminal forfeitures, which can include innocent—not just tainted—assets, a point of critical importance here), the Government sought a pretrial order prohibiting Luis from dissipating her assets. See 18 U.S.C. § 1345(a)(2). And the District Court ultimately issued an order prohibiting her from "dissipating, or otherwise disposing of ... assets, real or personal ... up to the equivalent value of the proceeds of the Federal health care fraud ($45 million)." App. to Pet. for Cert. A–6.

The Government and Luis agree that this court order will prevent Luis from using her own untainted funds, i.e., funds not connected with the crime, to hire counsel to defend her in her criminal case. See App. 161 (stipulating "that an unquantified amount of revenue not connected to the indictment [had] flowed into some of the accounts" subject to the restraining order); ibid. (similarly stipulating that Luis used "revenue not connected to the indictment" to pay for real property that she possessed). Although the District Court recognized that the order might prevent Luis from obtaining counsel of her choice, it held "that there is no Sixth Amendment right to use untainted, substitute assets to hire counsel." 966 F.Supp.2d 1321, 1334 (S.D.Fla.2013).

The Eleventh Circuit upheld the District Court. See 564 Fed.Appx. 493, 494 (2014) (per curiam ) (referring to, e.g., Kaley v. United States, 571 U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 1090, 188 L.Ed.2d 46 (2014) ; Caplin & Drysdale, Chartered v. United States, 491 U.S. 617, 631, 109 S.Ct. 2646, 105 L.Ed.2d 528 (1989) ; United States v. Monsanto, 491 U.S. 600, 616, 109 S.Ct. 2657, 105 L.Ed.2d 512 (1989) ). We granted Luis' petition for certiorari.

II

The question presented is "[w]hether the pretrial restraint of a criminal defendant's legitimate, untainted assets (those not traceable to a criminal offense) needed to retain counsel of choice violates the Fifth and Sixth Amendments." Pet. for Cert. ii. We see no reasonable way to interpret the relevant statutes to avoid answering this constitutional question. Cf. Monsanto, supra, at 614, 109 S.Ct. 2657. Hence, we answer it, and our answer is that the pretrial restraint of legitimate, untainted assets needed to retain counsel of choice violates the Sixth Amendment. The nature and importance of the constitutional right taken together with the nature of the assets lead us to this conclusion.

A

No one doubts the fundamental character of a criminal defendant's Sixth Amendment right to the "Assistance of Counsel." In Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335, 83 S.Ct. 792, 9 L.Ed.2d 799 (1963), the Court explained:

" ‘The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even the intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes no skill in the science of law. If charged with crime, he is incapable, generally, of determining for himself whether the indictment is good or bad. He is unfamiliar with the rules of evidence. Left without the aid of counsel he may be put on trial without a proper charge, and convicted upon incompetent evidence , or evidence irrelevant to the issue or otherwise inadmissible. He lacks both the skill and knowledge adequately to prepare his defense, even though he have a perfect one. He requires the guiding hand of counsel at every step in the proceedings against him. Without it, though he be not guilty, he faces the danger of conviction because he does not know how to establish his innocence.’ " Id ., at 344–345, 83 S.Ct. 792 (quoting Powell v. Alabama, 287 U.S. 45, 68–69, 53 S.Ct. 55, 77 L.Ed. 158 (1932) ).

It is consequently not surprising: first, that this Court's opinions often refer to the right to counsel as "fundamental," id ., at 68, 53 S.Ct. 55 ; see Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233, 243–244, 56 S.Ct. 444, 80 L.Ed. 660 (1936) (similar); Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 462–463, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 82 L.Ed. 1461 (1938) (similar); second, that commentators describe the right as a "great engin[e] by which an innocent man can make the truth of his innocence visible," Amar, Sixth Amendment First Principles, 84 Geo. L.J. 641, 643 (1996) ; see Herring v. New York, 422 U.S. 853, 862, 95 S.Ct. 2550, 45 L.Ed.2d 593 (1975) ; third, that we have understood the right to require that the Government provide counsel for an indigent defendant accused of all but the least serious crimes, see Gideon, supra, at 344, 83 S.Ct. 792 ; and fourth, that we have considered the wrongful deprivation of the right to counsel a "structural" error that so "affec[ts] the framework within which the trial proceeds" that courts may not even ask whether the error harmed the defendant. United States v. Gonzalez–Lopez, 548 U.S. 140, 148, 126 S.Ct. 2557, 165 L.Ed.2d 409 (2006) (internal quotation marks omitted); see id., at 150, 126 S.Ct. 2557.

Given the necessarily close working relationship between lawyer and client, the need for confidence, and the critical importance of trust, neither is it surprising that the Court has held that the Sixth Amendment grants a defendant "a fair opportunity to secure counsel of his own choice." Powell, supra, at 53, 53 S.Ct. 55 ; see Gonzalez–Lopez, supra, at 150, 126 S.Ct. 2557 (describing "these myriad aspects of representation"). This "fair opportunity" for the defendant to secure counsel of choice has limits. A defendant has no right, for example, to an attorney who is not a member of the bar, or who has a conflict of interest due to a relationship with an opposing party. See Wheat v. United States, 486 U.S. 153, 159, 108 S.Ct. 1692, 100 L.Ed.2d 140 (1988). And an indigent defendant, while entitled to adequate representation, has no right to have the Government pay for his preferred representational choice. See Caplin & Drysdale, 491 U.S., at 624, 109 S.Ct. 2646.

We nonetheless emphasize that the constitutional right at issue here is fundamental: "[T]he Sixth Amendment guarantees a defendant the right to be represented by an otherwise qualified attorney whom that defendant can afford to hire." Ibid .

B

The Government cannot, and does not, deny Luis' right to be represented by a qualified attorney whom she chooses and can afford. But the Government would undermine the value of that right by taking from Luis the ability to use the funds she needs to pay for her chosen attorney. The Government points out that, while freezing the funds may have this consequence, there are important interests on the other side of the legal equation: It wishes to guarantee that those funds will be available later to help pay for statutory penalties (including forfeiture of untainted assets) and restitution, should it secure convictions. And it points to two cases from this Court, Caplin & Drysdale, supra, at 619, 109 S.Ct. 2646 and Monsanto, 491 U.S., at 615, 109 S.Ct. 2657 which, in the Government's view, hold that the Sixth Amendment does not pose an obstacle to its doing so here. In our view, however, the nature of the assets at issue here differs from the assets at issue in those earlier cases. And that distinction makes a difference.

The relevant difference consists of the fact that the property here is untainted; i.e., it belongs to the defendant, pure and simple. In this respect it differs from a robber's loot, a drug seller's cocaine, a burglar's tools, or other property associated with the planning, implementing, or concealing of a crime. The Government may well be able to freeze, perhaps to seize, assets of the latter, "tainted" kind before trial. As a matter of property law the defendant's ownership interest is imperfect....