Fernandez-Rosa v. United States
- Richard Sullivan
- 1:23-cv-00544
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Fernandez-Rosa v. United States, Judge Sullivan ordered more evidence about mailing dates before deciding whether Fernandez-Rosa’s challenge to his conviction was timely.
The order directly affects Hector Emilio Fernandez-Rosa, who must provide evidence about the mailing of his motions, and the United States, which must respond to those materials. It does not yet resolve Fernandez-Rosa’s request to vacate his conviction or sentence.
What happened
Fernandez-Rosa v. United States concerns Hector Emilio Fernandez-Rosa’s request to cancel his 2019 conviction and sentence after he pleaded guilty to joining a cocaine-distribution conspiracy. He filed the request under a federal law allowing prisoners to challenge convictions and sentences.
The court questioned whether his request was filed too late. Fernandez-Rosa said he placed two versions in the prison mail system on August 29 and October 30, 2022, but the court received them later. He also said facility staff rejected the first mailing. The court noted that the filings would be timely if mailed on the dates he claimed.
Judge Sullivan did not decide whether the request was timely or whether Fernandez-Rosa’s conviction and sentence should be changed. Instead, the court ordered Fernandez-Rosa to submit documents and witness statements about when and how he mailed the requests by July 17, 2023, and ordered the government to respond within ten days afterward.
The detailed version
- Fernandez-Rosa v. United States · No. 1:23-cv-00544
- Richard Sullivan
- May 16, 2023
Background
Hector Emilio Fernandez-Rosa, who was incarcerated and representing himself, moved under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 to vacate or set aside his 2019 conviction and sentence. The conviction followed his guilty plea to one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 846.
In an earlier order, the court required Fernandez-Rosa to show why his motion should not be denied as time-barred. The court initially stated that the deadline was September 1, 2022, but this order corrected the deadline to November 1, 2022. The correction was based on a temporary extension of the period for seeking review by the Supreme Court during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The court received one motion on January 19, 2023, which was marked as dated October 30, 2022. It received a duplicative motion on March 6, 2023, which was marked as dated August 29, 2022. In a later declaration, Fernandez-Rosa said he placed the first motion in the prison mail system on August 29, 2022, but facility staff rejected that mailing. He said he then placed another motion in the prison mail system on October 30, 2022.
Issue
The immediate issue was whether Fernandez-Rosa’s motions were filed on the dates he said he delivered them to prison officials for mailing. Under the prison-mail rule, filings by incarcerated people are generally treated as filed when delivered to prison authorities for mailing. If Fernandez-Rosa’s account was correct, the motions would have been timely. The court remained concerned because of the delay between the claimed mailing dates and the dates the Clerk’s Office received the motions, and because it viewed his statements as self-serving.
Order
The court did not decide the motions’ timeliness, did not decide whether a hearing was necessary, and did not reach Fernandez-Rosa’s challenges to his conviction or sentence. Instead, it ordered Fernandez-Rosa to file documents and witness affidavits concerning when and how he mailed the motions by July 17, 2023. It ordered the government to respond within ten days after those materials were filed.
The court also ordered that all further papers include the criminal docket number and be docketed in the criminal case, No. 12-cr-894 (RJS). The Clerk of Court was directed to mail Fernandez-Rosa a copy of the order.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.