Paoli-Torres v. United States

• Decision Date: 08 June 2022
• Docket Number: CIVIL 19-1892 (ADC),Crim. 12-002-1 (ADC)
• Parties: ELIAS PAOLI-TORRES, Petitioner, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Puerto Rico

ELIAS PAOLI-TORRES, Petitioner,
v.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent.

CIVIL No. 19-1892 (ADC)

Crim. No. 12-002-1 (ADC)

United States District Court, D. Puerto Rico

June 8, 2022

OPINION AND ORDER

AIDA M. DELGADO-COLON, United States District Judge.

Pending before the Court is petitioner Ehas Paoli-Torres's (“petitioner”) motion to vacate, set aside, or correct sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. ECF No. 1. The Government opposed. ECF No. 7. For the ensuing reasons, the Court DENIES petitioner's motion.

I. Procedural History

On January 4, 2012, a grand jury returned a one-count indictment charging petitioner with “possession of a firearm by a prohibited person (Title 18, United States Code, Sections 922(g)(1) and 924(a)(2)).” Crim. No. 12-002, ECF No. 1. On March 5, 2012, he pled guilty. Crim. No. 12-002, ECF Nos. 18 and 19. He was sentenced on June 8, 2012, to 87 months of imprisonment with a supervised release term of 36 months. Crim. No. 12-002, ECF Nos. 35 and 36. Petitioner appealed, and the First Circuit affirmed his sentence on September 6, 2013, upon finding that the Court's sentencing methodology was procedurally and substantively sound, and that the Court did not abuse its discretion by imposing the sentence. Crim. No. 12-002, ECF Nos. 37 and 42. On September 18, 2019, petitioner filed this § 2255 motion. ECF No. 1.

1

II. Discussion

Petitioner moves to vacate his felon-in-possession conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) and 924(a)(2) and “to dismiss the indictment” pursuant to Rehaif v. United States, 139 S.Ct. 2191 (2019). In Rehaif, the Supreme Court held that the Government must prove both that the defendant knew he possessed a firearm and that he knew he belonged to the relevant category of persons barred from possessing a firearm. Id. at 2200. Petitioner contends that his indictment charged that he knowingly possessed a firearm but not that he knew he was barred from possessing a firearm due to a prior felony conviction, in violation of his Fifth Amendment right to be charged by a grand jury. ECF No. 1-1. Petitioner also claims that the Court lacked jurisdiction to enter judgment against him because of the missing knowledge-of-the-prohibited-status element in his indictment. Id. The Government opposed contending that petitioner's claim is procedurally defaulted and that he waived the defects in the indictment when entering his guilty plea. ECF No. 7.

a. Timeliness

Under § 2255, “[a] 1-year period of limitation shall apply to a motion under this section . . . .” See 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f). Where a petitioner is asserting that a right was made retroactive to cases on collateral review, the statute of limitations runs from the latest of “. . . the date on which the right asserted was initially recognized by the Supreme Court, if that right has been newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review . . . .” See 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)(3).

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Petitioner filed his motion to vacate on September 18, 2019. ECF No. 1. Rehaif was issued on June 21, 2019. Thus, petitioner's § 2255 motion is timely. See United States v. Guardado, 552 F.Supp.3d 52, 54-55 (D. Mass. 2021) (performing same analysis but with § 2255 motion filed on June 22, 2020).

b. Jurisdiction

Next, the Court addresses petitioner's challenge that the Court lacked jurisdiction to enter judgment against him because of the missing knowledge-of-his-prohibited-status element in his indictment. ECF No. 1-1. He believes that he was charged with an incomplete offense and thus posits that the indictment's failure to charge a federal crime is a jurisdictional error not subject to waiver even by a guilty plea. Id. (citing United States v. Peter, 310 F.3d 709, 713-14 (11th Cir. 2002)).

The Supreme Court and the First Circuit have already addressed and summarily dismissed similar jurisdictional arguments. See United States v. Cotton, 535 U.S. 625, 630 (2002) (explaining that defects in an indictment do not deprive the Court of its power to adjudicate a case); United States v. Farmer, 988 F.3d 55, 60-61 (1st Cir. 2021) (finding that “the government's failure to allege the scienter-of-status element in the indictment did not deprive the district court of jurisdiction”). Accordingly, petitioner's argument fails because the First Circuit has determined that such jurisdictional challenge is waived when a defendant pleads guilty to the charge. See United States v. Lara, 970 F.3d 68, 86 (1st Cir. 2020); United States v. Burghardt, 939 F.3d 397, 402 (1st Cir. 2019).

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Since petitioner has not raised any new argument that provides a compelling reason to deviate from binding precedent, the Court finds that it had jurisdiction to accept petitioner's guilty plea and sentence him despite the purportedly deficient indictment. See Guardado, 552 F.Supp.3d at 55-56 (dismissing defendant's identical jurisdictional argument because no compelling reason was provided to deviate from binding precedent).

c. Procedural Default

Petitioner claims that the missing knowledge-of-the-prohibited-status element in the indictment is an error that violated his Fifth...