Court to Weigh Defendant’s Right to Change Guilty Plea

If a criminal defendant agrees to plead guilty in exchange for a lighter sentence, does he have a right to back out of the deal if the judge refuses to impose that sentence?

The Supreme Court took up that question Monday in a drug case from Anaheim, and the outcome is expected to clarify the rules for plea bargains.

Last year, more than 95% of the nearly 71,000 convictions in federal court were obtained through guilty pleas. “The criminal justice system depends on guilty pleas in general and plea bargaining in particular,” government attorneys told the high court.

The federal rules make clear that a plea agreement between prosecutors and the defendant is not binding on the judge. Moreover, the rules say a defendant “has no right to withdraw the [guilty] plea” if the judge later decides to impose a harsher sentence.

However, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals called it a “miscarriage of justice” to enforce a guilty plea against a defendant who was not warned that his plea must stand even if the government does not uphold its side of the deal.

The ruling came in the case of Carlos Benitez, who on May 28, 1999, arrived at a restaurant in Anaheim with two other men carrying plastic bags containing methamphetamine. The man they were to meet was a government informant, and all three men were arrested.

Five months later, Benitez entered into an agreement with prosecutors in which he would plead guilty and they would recommend a sentence of about six years in prison. His crime had not involved violence or the use of a weapon, and Benitez was not a major participant in a drug-dealing gang.

He was brought before U.S. District Judge Alicemarie Stotler, who explained to him the details of the agreement.

Normally, his drug crime would bring a mandatory minimum of 10 years in prison, she said. And the judge was not required to give him the more lenient sentence that had been agreed to, she added.

Benitez said he understood and signed the plea agreement.

But in March 2000, Stotler imposed a 10-year prison term because she had learned Benitez had prior crimes on his record.

In the meantime, Benitez had asked for a new lawyer and said he was not responsible for the drug crime. “Somebody sought me. I didn’t look for a crime,” he said. But the judge said it was too late to withdraw his guilty plea.

In U.S. vs. Benitez, the Supreme Court will decide what legal standard should govern such cases when a defendant says he was misled into pleading guilty.

Government attorneys conceded that at the initial hearing, Stotler failed to warn Benitez he could not withdraw his guilty plea, even if the agreement for a lighter sentence was withdrawn.

They said a “minor flaw” such as the judge’s failure to warn the defendant should not permit him “to escape the effect of his plea.”

They said a defendant such as Benitez should be required to prove he would not have pleaded guilty had he been fully warned that he could not withdraw his plea.

By contrast, the 9th Circuit ruled the judge’s failure to warn Benitez was a “plain error” that required a reversal of his conviction.

Myra D. Mossman, a lawyer in Santa Barbara, now represents Benitez; she pointed to academic studies concluding that a significant percentage of wrongful convictions are due to innocent people who, facing long prison sentences, agree to plead guilty to a lesser charger or in exchange for a lighter sentence.

She urged the high court to affirm the 9th Circuit’s rule that a defendant’s conviction must be reversed when a judge fails to warn the defendant that his guilty plea cannot be withdrawn.

The case is to be heard in the spring and decided by July.