Felder v. United States

Background

Tyrone Felder, proceeding without a lawyer, filed a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, a procedure allowing a federal prisoner to ask the sentencing court to vacate, set aside, or correct a sentence. Felder had been convicted after a seven-day jury trial of charges arising from two livery-cab carjackings, the deaths of both drivers, and related robberies and firearm offenses. He was sentenced principally to life plus 34 years. The Second Circuit affirmed his conviction and sentence, and the Supreme Court denied his request for review.

Felder raised two claims. First, he argued that his trial lawyers violated the Sixth Amendment by failing to communicate a plea offer before trial. Second, he argued that his cellphone was unlawfully seized and searched in violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Plea-offer claim

The court rejected Felder’s claim that he had not been told about the plea offer. The government described the offer on the record before jury selection on August 27, 2018. The offer involved guilty pleas to both carjacking counts and one firearm count, with a consecutive 25-year mandatory sentence on the firearm count. Defense lawyer Andrew G. Patel said the government’s description was correct. Felder was present, did not object, and did not claim at that time that he was unaware of the offer.

The court applied the two-part test for ineffective assistance of counsel from Strickland v. Washington. Under that test, a defendant must show that the lawyer’s performance fell below reasonable professional standards and that the deficiency caused actual prejudice. The court found that the trial record showed the offer was communicated and rejected, so Felder did not prove deficient performance. The court also held that he could not show prejudice because he did not express interest in the offer when it was described or during the following four years.

The court rejected Felder’s argument that the 25-year firearm sentence showed the offer could not have existed. The court explained that the First Step Act, which later changed the firearm-sentencing rule, was not enacted until December 21, 2018—several months after the offer. The court noted that Felder nevertheless received the benefit of that later amendment at sentencing because it applied to pending cases.

Cellphone claim

The court held that Felder’s Fourth Amendment claim was procedurally defaulted, meaning he had not raised it at the required earlier stage and therefore had to show a legally sufficient reason for that failure and resulting prejudice. The court assumed, only for purposes of the motion, that Felder had shown a reason for not raising the issue because a letter from one of his lawyers appeared to advise him that the claim belonged in a § 2255 motion. The court nevertheless found no prejudice because the claim was plainly meritless.

The court also held that Fourth Amendment claims generally cannot be raised in a § 2255 motion when the defendant had a full and fair opportunity to litigate them at trial and on direct appeal. Felder had received the search-warrant materials in discovery, had filed other pretrial motions, and had not moved to suppress evidence from his cellphone. The court found that he had a full and fair opportunity to challenge the cellphone search and seizure.

In the alternative, the court ruled that the claim lacked merit. It found that the cellphone was lawfully seized from Felder during his lawful arrest and later searched under a court-authorized warrant. The court added that even if the warrant had a defect, the good-faith exception to the exclusionary rule would have prevented suppression because the warrant was issued by a magistrate judge and there was no reason to believe that law-enforcement agents failed to rely on it in good faith.

Disposition

The court denied Felder’s § 2255 motion and dismissed the petition. It found no need for an additional hearing or expansion of the record because the trial transcript contradicted Felder’s plea-offer account and both claims were plainly without merit. Judge Vincent L. Briccetti declined to issue a certificate of appealability, finding that Felder had not made the required substantial showing that a constitutional right had been denied. The court also certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without paying filing fees. The clerk was directed to close the civil case.