In United States v. Schlenker, --- F.4th ---, No. 20-30141 (9th Cir. 2022), the Court affirmed the district court’s orders (1) granting the government’s motion to dismiss Jeremy Schlenker’s civil action seeking a declaration that filing a 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion would not breach the plea agreement he entered in his criminal case in 2016, and (2) denying Schlenker’s motion to clarify the terms of the plea agreement.
Schlenker pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 1111 and 1153(a), and possession of a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A). As part of the plea agreement, Schlenker waived his right to collaterally attack his conviction and sentence, except for ineffective assistance of counsel claims.
A few years after his sentencing, the Supreme Court held that the residual clause of § 924(c)(3), the provision defining a “crime of violence,” was unconstitutionally vague. The Ninth Circuit then held that second-degree murder is not a “crime of violence” under the elements clause of § 924(c)(3).
As a result of these developments, Schlenker sought to challenge the validity of his § 924(c) sentence in a habeas proceeding, and his counsel so informed the government. The prosecutors responded that the government would oppose such relief and consider the filing of such an action to be a breach of the plea agreement. Schlenker then filed a motion to clarify the terms of his plea agreement (“Motion to Clarify”) in his criminal case. He also filed a civil action seeking a declaration that filing a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 would not breach the plea agreement. In both cases, the district court concluded that it lacked jurisdiction because there was no “case or controversy” as required under Article III. See U.S. Const. Art. III, § 2, cl. 1.
The Court affirmed "because Schlenker’s declaratory action and Motion to Clarify improperly seek to carve out a collateral legal issue from a potential habeas petition and to use the Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2201, as a substitute to challenge his sentence."
