Brennerman v. United States
- Lewis Kaplan
- 1:22-cv-00996
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 2
In Brennerman v. United States, Judge Kaplan denied Brennerman’s post-conviction challenge on the merits, denied a certificate of appealability, and closed the case.
Raheem J. Brennerman’s federal post-conviction challenge to his criminal-contempt convictions and sentence; the order also affected his ability to appeal by denying a certificate of appealability.
What happened
Raheem J. Brennerman was convicted by a jury of two counts of criminal contempt of court and received a 24-month prison sentence. The Second Circuit upheld the conviction, and the Supreme Court declined to review it. Brennerman then filed a motion challenging the conviction and sentence under federal post-conviction law, along with additional filings while representing himself.
Brennerman argued, among other things, that his lawyers were constitutionally ineffective because they did not seek certain documents using procedures for obtaining evidence from abroad. The court said those procedures do not apply in criminal cases and found no good cause for the requested discovery. It also relied on the government’s opposition memorandum in finding the post-conviction motion baseless.
The court denied all of Brennerman’s pending motions on the merits, denied a certificate of appealability, and certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith. Judge Lewis A. Kaplan directed the Clerk to close the civil case.
The detailed version
- Brennerman v. United States · No. 1:22-cv-00996
- Lewis Kaplan
- Apr. 13, 2022
Background
A jury convicted Raheem J. Brennerman of two counts of criminal contempt of court. The court sentenced him principally to 24 months in prison. The Second Circuit affirmed the conviction, and the Supreme Court denied review.
Brennerman later filed an omnibus motion that included a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255. Section 2255 permits a federal prisoner to seek post-conviction relief from a sentence or conviction in limited circumstances. His requests for recusal of the judge and for a stay of enforcement of the criminal judgment had already been denied. The remaining matters were the Section 2255 motion and additional, partly duplicative filings that Brennerman submitted without a lawyer.
Court’s reasoning
The court stated that the Section 2255 motion was entirely baseless for the reasons given in the government’s opposition memorandum. The court also found no showing of good cause for discovery of documents that ICBC (London) might have had in London or that might have been held by the U.S. Attorney’s Office or counsel for ICBC (London) in a related civil case.
Brennerman also argued that his lawyers in the criminal contempt case were constitutionally ineffective because they failed to seek the ICBC (London) documents under the Hague Evidence Convention or Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 28(b)(2). The court said those provisions do not apply in criminal cases.
Disposition
The court denied all of Brennerman’s pending motions, including Docket Entries 226 and 227, on the merits. It denied a certificate of appealability, which is required for an appeal from the denial of certain federal post-conviction relief, and certified under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a)(3) that any appeal would not be taken in good faith. The Clerk was directed to close No. 22-cv-0996 (LAK).
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.