Justia U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff, convicted of attempting to commit a criminal sexual act against his ex-wife and twenty-two counts of criminal contempt for violating a protective order that his ex-wife obtained against him, filed a pro se complaint alleging that he had been convicted in violation of his constitutional rights to a fair trial and due process. The district court construed his amended complaint as a habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. 2254 but dismissed it for failure to allege that he was still in custody, or that he had exhausted his state remedies. The court assumed, without deciding, that plaintiff has a cognizable cause of action directly under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. The court also considered plaintiff's claim under 42 U.S.C. 1983. The court concluded that, under any of these bases, defendant failed to state a claim of relief where the only actors whom plaintiff asserts violated his constitutional rights are entitled to absolute immunity. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court on an alternative ground. The court dismissed without considering the Heck v. Humphrey issues discussed by the district court. View "Teichmann v. State of New York" on Justia Law

Petitioner, a native and citizen of Italy, sought review of the BIA's order determining that his conviction under 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1) for the unlawful possession of ammunition qualifies as an aggravated felony under 8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(43)(E)(ii). Petitioner argued that his conviction for the unlawful possession of ammunition does not constitute an offense "relating to firearms." The BIA held, however, that the "relating to" parenthetical in section 1101(a)(43)(E)(ii) was purely descriptive and not restrictive, classifying only a subset of the crimes defined in section 922(g)(1) as aggravated felonies. The court concluded that the BIA's descriptive reading of section 1101(a)(43)(E)(ii) is reasonable because it harmonized the broader structure of section 1101(43) and judicial precedent. Under Chevron deference, the court concluded that the BIA's ruling is a permissible construction of the statute. Accordingly, the court denied the petition for review. View "Oppedisano v. Holder" on Justia Law

Petitioner, a native and citizen of Jamaica, sought review of the BIA's order affirming the IJ's order of removability. The court concluded that the record supports the BIA's determination that petitioner's conviction of a controlled substance offense remains a removable offense even after the state court vacated the conviction under ARS 13-907 because she sought and obtained vacatur solely for rehabilitative reasons and to avoid adverse immigration consequences. Consequently, petitioner's conviction remains valid for federal immigration purposes. The court dismissed the petition for lack of jurisdiction. View "Sutherland v. Holder" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction of a single count of charge of transfer of a false identification document. The court concluded that the district court erred in admitting evidence of a printed copy of a web page, which the government claimed was defendant's profile page from a Russian social networking site similar to Facebook because the page had not been properly authenticated under Federal Rule of Evidence 901. The government presented insufficient evidence that the page was what the government claimed it to be and, therefore, the district court abused its discretion in admitting the evidence. Because the error was not harmless where the evidence played an important role in the government's case in demonstrating that defendant transferred a fake birth certificate, the court vacated and remanded for retrial. View "United States v. Zhyltsou" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed his conviction for a Travel Act offense as well as various criminal acts. The court rejected defendant's sufficiency challenge to the Travel Act conviction under 18 U.S.C. 1952(a)(3)(A). However, the court vacated the conviction because the district court erred when it excluded, on hearsay and authentication grounds, a recording in which an FBI agent assured defendant that he had done nothing wrong in connection with the underlying arson. The court reversed as to defendant's remaining convictions because the wording of defendant's cooperation agreement did not toll the expired statute of limitations for those offenses.View "United States v. Mergen" on Justia Law

Defendant appealed from his conviction on four counts of intentional murder while engaged in a trafficking crime involving five or more kilograms of cocaine. Defendant challenged his convictions on several grounds. The court held that defendant's pre-arraignment inculpatory statements were admissible under the six-hour safe harbor provided by 18 U.S.C. 3501(c), and concluded that defendant's remaining arguments were without merit. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court.View "United States v. Gonzalez" on Justia Law

Petitioner, a native and citizen of the Dominican Republic, was convicted of attempted arson in the third degree in violation of New York Penal Law sections 110 and 150.10. Petitioner claimed that his conviction is not an aggravated felony rendering him statutorily ineligible for cancellation of removal. Applying Chevron deference, the court deferred to the BIA's reasonable determination that a state "offense described in" 18 U.S.C. 844(i) need not contain a federal jurisdictional element. Accordingly, the court denied the petition.View "Torres v. Holder" on Justia Law

Petitioner, convicted of murder and sentenced to 45 years' imprisonment, was granted a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. 2254 based on his Sixth Amendment Confrontation Clause right. The trial court prohibited petitioner from cross-examining a lead detective to show that the police had not investigated leads provided by a witness whose tips were memorialized in a detective's notes and an investigative DD5 report. The court concluded that, taken together, the trial court's evidentiary rulings unreasonably applied clearly established Sixth Amendment law and drastically impaired petitioner's ability to present that defense. The error was not harmless because there was no forensic evidence tying petitioner to the crime. Therefore, the court affirmed the district court's judgment.View "Alvarez v. Ercole" on Justia Law

The state appealed the magistrate judge's grant of habeas corpus relief and petitioner, convicted of repeatedly raping his wife, ex-wife, and daughter, cross-appealed those portions of the decision adverse to him. The court agreed with the magistrate judge that the Fourth Department's rejection of petitioner's Miranda claim constituted an objectively unreasonable application of Supreme Court precedent. The court held that the admission of petitioner's statements had a substantial and injurious effect or influence on the jury's verdict as to the count's involving the daughter. Therefore, the court affirmed the judgment of the district court insofar as it: (1) granted petitioner habeas relief on his Miranda claim as to the counts of conviction involving the daughter; and (2) denied petitioner's ineffective assistance of counsel claims premised on counsel's failure to conduct an adequate pretrial investigation and introduce the laboratory reports and DNA tests at trial. The court affirmed in part and reversed in part.View "Jackson v. Conway" on Justia Law

Petitioner, a native and citizen of Jamaica, sought review of the BIA's affirmance of the IJ's finding of removal based on her convictions for multiple crimes involving moral turpitude and an aggravated felony as defined in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), 8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(43)(G). Petitioner argued that, although she was convicted of a theft offense, the BIA erred in finding that the term of imprisonment for that offense was at least one year. The court held that petitioner's conviction constituted an aggravated felony theft offense for which the term of imprisonment was at least one year because it is the actual sentence imposed, including any recidivist enhancements applied, that is considered. The court extended to its interpretation of the phrase "term of imprisonment" in the INA the Supreme Court's holding in United States v. Rodriquez, that the phrase "maximum term of imprisonment" in the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA), 18 U.S.C. 924, includes any applicable recidivist sentence enhancement. Accordingly, the court denied the petition for review.View "Dawkins v. Holder" on Justia Law