United States v. Valle-Perla

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
• Decided: March 20, 2025
• Docket: 25-30004
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

Case: 25-30004 Document: 40-1 Page: 1 Date Filed: 03/20/2025

United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ____________ United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit

No. 25-30004 FILED March 20, 2025 ____________ Lyle W. Cayce United States of America, Clerk

Plaintiff—Appellee,

versus

Eduin Ariel Valle-Perla,

Defendant—Appellant. ______________________________

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana USDC No. 6:24-CR-272-1 ______________________________

Before Graves, Willett, and Wilson, Circuit Judges. Per Curiam: * Eduin Ariel Valle-Perla was charged with illegally reentering the United States after being removed, in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a). A magistrate judge ordered that Valle-Perla be detained pretrial, and the district court denied Valle-Perla’s motion to revoke the magistrate judge’s detention order. Valle-Perla then appealed the district court’s denial.

_____________________ * This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5. Case: 25-30004 Document: 40-1 Page: 2 Date Filed: 03/20/2025

No. 25-30004

In the meantime, on March 6, 2025, Valle-Perla pleaded guilty to the charge. As Valle-Perla concedes, his guilty plea moots his appeal for pretrial release. See United States v. O’Shaughnessy, 772 F.2d 112, 113 (5th Cir. 1985); see also United States v. Ruiz-Garcia, 832 F. App’x 313, 314 (5th Cir. 2020) (unpublished) (dismissing as moot pretrial detention due to a guilty plea). 1 Accordingly, Valle-Perla’s appeal is DISMISSED as moot.

_____________________ 1 In a 28(j) letter conceding that his appeal his moot, Valle-Perla nevertheless asks us to find “an exception to mootness” because the “challenged practices are likely to recur.” Valle-Perla invokes the voluntary-cessation exception, but that doctrine only applies when the mootness arises from the defendant’s voluntary cessation of a challenged practice. See Freedom From Religion Found., Inc. v. Abbott, 58 F.4th 824, 833 (5th Cir. 2023). The government here did not voluntarily cease holding Valle-Perla in pretrial detention. Rather, his pretrial detention was overtaken by his subsequent guilty plea, which deprives him of any “legally cognizable interest” in this appeal. O’Shaughnessy, 772 F.2d at 113. Moreover, we are unaware of any precedent—and Valle-Perla does not cite any—applying the voluntary-cessation exception in the criminal context.