United States v. Vyner

Defendant plead guilty to violating 18 U.S.C. 1546(a), which penalizes the knowing possession of an altered document prescribed by statute or regulation for entry into the United States. The court concluded that defendant failed to show that his counsel’s conduct at the time of his plea fell below the standard of reasonable competence under the first prong of Strickland v. Washington; under the rule of contemporary assessment, counsel had reason to conclude that section 1546(a) encompasses foreign passports; reasonably competent counsel could have understood section 1546(a), in view of its statutory and regulatory predicates, to criminalize the knowing possession of an altered foreign passport that had expired; and by advising a guilty plea counsel ensured that defendant avoided a mandatory two-year sentence on the count that the government agreed to dismiss in exchange for defendant's plea to a count with fourteen months' maximum imprisonment under the Sentencing Guidelines. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "United States v. Vyner" on Justia Law