United States v. Angel Hernandez, Jr.

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
• Decided: March 31, 2025
• Docket: 24-12093
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

USCA11 Case: 24-12093 Document: 28-1 Date Filed: 03/31/2025 Page: 1 of 3

[DO NOT PUBLISH] In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 24-12093 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus ANGEL RUBEN HERNANDEZ, JR.,

Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida D.C. Docket No. 6:23-cr-00169-RBD-DCI-1 ____________________ USCA11 Case: 24-12093 Document: 28-1 Date Filed: 03/31/2025 Page: 2 of 3

2 Opinion of the Court 24-12093

Before ROSENBAUM, NEWSOM, AND ABUDU, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Angel Ruben Hernandez, Jr., appeals his conviction follow- ing his plea of guilty to three counts of “failure to record firearms purchaser.” 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(b)(5), 924(a)(1)(D). In the district court, Hernandez moved to withdraw his guilty plea. The district court denied his motion. Now, Hernandez challenges the denial on the ground that “it would be a manifest injustice to not allow [his] plea to be withdrawn.” Because Hernandez has abandoned this argument, we affirm. 1 Hernandez’s sole theory on appeal differs completely from the one that he presented in the district court. There, he argued that he should be allowed to withdraw his plea because his attorney had coerced him into pleading guilty and because his plea was not knowing or voluntary. Now, on appeal, he has abandoned that the- ory, arguing instead that denial of his plea withdrawal would result in “manifest injustice” for reasons unrelated to coercion or the vol- untariness of his plea. “[W]hen an appellant replaces an argument it presented to the district court with ‘an entirely new theory on appeal,’ we ‘are unable to reach the merits’ of that new theory.” Reider v. Philip Morris USA, Inc., 793 F.3d 1254, 1258 (11th Cir. 2015) (quoting Access Now, Inc. v. Sw. Airlines Co., 385 F.3d 1324, 1326–27

1 When reviewing a district court’s denial of a motion to withdraw a guilty

plea, we reverse only when the denial constitutes an abuse of discretion. United States v. McCarty, 99 F.3d 383, 385 (11th Cir. 1996). USCA11 Case: 24-12093 Document: 28-1 Date Filed: 03/31/2025 Page: 3 of 3

24-12093 Opinion of the Court 3

(11th Cir. 2004)). Accordingly, we are unable to reach the merits of Hernandez’s new “manifest injustice” theory. Because Hernandez has abandoned his sole argument, we AFFIRM his conviction.