United States v. Wainuskis

138 F.3d 183, 1998 U.S. App. LEXIS 7107, 1998 WL 133437
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedApril 9, 1998
Docket96-60742
StatusPublished
Cited by22 cases

This text of 138 F.3d 183 (United States v. Wainuskis) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Wainuskis, 138 F.3d 183, 1998 U.S. App. LEXIS 7107, 1998 WL 133437 (5th Cir. 1998).

Opinions

DUHÉ, Circuit Judge:

Defendant-Appellant Christine Wainuskis appeals the district court’s denial of her 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion to set aside her judgment of conviction for violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(e)(1) because of a change in the law, resulting from a clarification of the meaning of “use” of a firearm in Bailey v. United States, 516 U.S. 137, 116 S.Ct. 501, 133 L.Ed.2d 472 (1995). For reasons that follow, we affirm the district court’s denial of her motion.

I.

Following an investigation of her activities and a search of the residence she shared with Joseph Máteme (“Máteme”), Christine Wainuskis (“Wainuskis”) was indicted by a federal grand jury on four counts involving drugs and weapons: conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute; possession with intent to distribute; knowing use or carrying of a firearm during or in relation to a drug trafficking offense; and felon in possession of a firearm. Officers found methamphetamine, scales, baggies, other items associated with the packaging and distributing of illegal drugs, and 27 guns during the search. Wain-uskis was discovered in a bedroom of her residence, lying on a bed with a loaded gun tucked under the mattress. Her co-defendant, Máteme, was seated near two weapons, both of which were visible to the searching officers and easily accessible to him.

In exchange for the government dropping charges of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute methamphetamine and of possession with intent to distribute that drug, Wainuskis pled guilty to the remaining two counts: violations of 18 U.S.C. 924(c)(1)1 and 18 U.S.C. § 922(g) (felon in possession of a firearm).2 She admitted that the underlying drag trafficking offense in her violation of § 924(c)(1) was possession with intent to distribute methamphetamine. After hearing the plea colloquy and reviewing the Presen-tencing Investigation Report (“PSR”), the district judge imposed the mandatory 5-year sentence for the violation of § 924(c)(1). He departed downward from the sentencing guidelines on the remaining count and assigned a 30-month sentence to ran consecutively.

Wainuskis moved to set aside her conviction and sentence for the violation of § 924(e)(1), based on a change in the law [185]*185resulting from the clarification of “use” of a firearm in Bailey v. United States, 516 U.S. 137, 116 S.Ct. 501, 133 L.Ed.2d 472 (1995). The district court referred the motion to a magistrate judge, who determined that the gun confiscated from under Wainuskis’s mattress at the time of her arrest was not “used or carried” in relation to a drug trafficking offense as defined in Bailey and in United States v. Andrade, 83 F.3d 729 (5th Cir.1996). Initially, the district court agreed with the magistrate judge’s recommendation to vacate the conviction and sentence imposed for the violation of § 924(e)(1), concluding that, under Bailey, the record did not establish a factual basis for such a conviction. Upon further examination of the plea colloquy and the PSR, the district court found that there was sufficient information to support Wain-uskis’s guilty plea and conviction and denied her motion.

Wainuskis appeals. She argues that the factual basis for her plea establishes no more than mere possession and is insufficient to support a conviction of “use.” The Government agrees that there is an insufficient factual basis to support her plea to violating the 18 U.S;C. § 924(c)(1) “use” prong under Bailey. It argues, however, that the plea colloquy record sufficiently supports a guilty determination under the unaffected “carry” prong of § 924(c)(1). We agree.

II.

Wainuskis’s guilty plea was taken under Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Her appeal is properly before this Court because we have ruled in An-drade, 83 F.3d 729, 731 (5th Cir.) that although

[a] plea of guilty typically waives all non-jurisdictional defects in the proceedings below ... nonetheless, in this particular context, where intervening law has established that a defendant’s actions do not constitute a crime and thus that the defendant is actually innocent of the charged offense, application of this rule is misplaced.

Bailey’s clarification of “use” provides Wainuskis with grounds to appeal her conviction and sentence.

We review a district court’s denial of a § 2255 motion under two standards. Because “acceptance of a guilty plea is considered a factual finding that there is an adequate basis for the plea,” the standard of review of this matter is clear error. United States v. Rivas, 85 F.3d 193, 194 (5th Cir. 1996), (citing United States v. Adams, 961 F.2d 505, 509 (5th Cir.1992)). We review the court’s conclusions of law de novo. United States v. Faubion, 19 F.3d 226, 228 (5th Cir.1994).

III.

A.

In denying Wainuskis’s motion to set aside her conviction and sentence imposed under a Rule 11 plea, the district court examined both the facts available at the time of the plea colloquy and those provided later by the PSR. According to the United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual, § 6Bl.l(c)(Nov.l995), when a dismissal of charges is part of a plea agreement, the court “shall defer its decision to accept or reject” any plea agreement “until there has been opportunity to consider the presentence report.” The Government dismissed two counts against Wainuskis in exchange for her guilty plea. The district court relied on both the plea colloquy and PSR to find a factual basis to support her guilty plea. Logically, it must examine the same information to determine if there is a factual basis to set aside her conviction.

This Court has upheld the district court’s use of the PSR to find an insufficient factual basis and to reject a plea agreement. United States v. Foy, 28 F.3d 464 (5th Cir.1994). See also United States v. Gulledge, 491 F.2d 679 (5th Cir.1974).3

Based on the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and our jurisprudence, the district court was [186]*186correct in considering all information at its disposal to determine that a factual basis for WainusMs’s guilty plea existed and to deny her motion to set aside her conviction and sentence.

B.

Wainuskis argues, that Bailey’s clarification of “use” in § 924(c)(1) requires the setting aside of her sentence and conviction. “Use” under Bailey

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Bluebook (online)
138 F.3d 183, 1998 U.S. App. LEXIS 7107, 1998 WL 133437, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-wainuskis-ca5-1998.