United States v. Gajendragadkar ( 1998 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v. No. 97-7267
SUBHASH GAJENDRAGADKAR, M.D.,
Defendant-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of West Virginia, at Beckley.
Elizabeth V. Hallanan, Senior District Judge.
(CR-96-65, CA-97-377-5)
Argued: April 7, 1998
Decided: June 3, 1998
Before MURNAGHAN, NIEMEYER, and MOTZ, Circuit Judges.
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Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
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COUNSEL
ARGUED: Michael Lee Keller, Assistant United States Attorney,
Charleston, West Virginia, for Appellant. Thomas W. Smith, Charles-
ton, West Virginia; Dina Mattingly Mohler, KAY, CASTO,
CHANEY, LOVE & WISE, Charleston, West Virginia, for Appellee.
ON BRIEF: Rebecca A. Betts, United States Attorney, Philip J.
Combs, Assistant United States Attorney, Charleston, West Virginia,
for Appellant.
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Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See
Local Rule 36(c).
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OPINION
PER CURIAM:
Here we face the case of Dr. Subhash Gajendragadkar (Dr. Sub-
hash), a twenty-year resident alien from India who practices medicine
in West Virginia. In 1996, Dr. Subhash was indicted on two counts
of mail fraud stemming from alleged over-billing of patients at his
medical practice. At that time, a non-citizen convicted of an "aggra-
vated felony" involving fraud or deceit was subject to deportation,
pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1251(a)(2)(A)(iii), if the amount of loss result-
ing from the crime exceeded $200,000, see§ 1101(a)(43)(M)(i). The
Government estimated that $40,000 to $70,000 of losses were attrib-
utable to Dr. Subhash. After conferring with counsel and receiving
assurances that a conviction would not result in his deportation,1 Dr.
Subhash pled guilty to both counts.
On September 30, 1996, fourteen days after the entry of Dr.
Subhash's guilty plea, Congress retroactively amended § 1101(a)(43)-
(M)(i), reducing the definitional amount of loss for aggravated felo-
nies from $200,000 to $10,000.2 Thereafter, Dr. Subhash received a
notice of detainer from the Immigration & Naturalization Service,
informing him that he was being investigated for deportation as a
result of his conviction. On April 14, 1997, Dr. Subhash filed a
motion, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255, to vacate his conviction and
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1 Those assurances took two forms. First, counsel for Dr. Subhash
informed him that, based on the amount of loss estimated by the Govern-
ment, his crimes did not constitute aggravated felonies under
§ 1101(a)(43)(M)(i). Second, when Dr. Subhash inquired about the risk
of retroactive changes in the law, counsel advised him that the Ex Post
Facto Clause would shield him from any such changes. The latter advice
was erroneous. See Bugajewitz v. Adams, 228 U.S. 585 (1913) (holding
the Ex Post Facto Clause inapplicable to deportation of aliens).
2 In addition, the text of § 1251(a)(2)(A)(iii) was recodified, without
change, at 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii).
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sentence. As grounds for that motion, he asserted, inter alia, that his
guilty plea was invalid as a result of ineffective assistance of counsel
arising from misinformation regarding the danger of retroactive
changes in the law. The district court agreed and granted Dr. Sub-
hash's motion to vacate the plea.
The well-established test for determining the validity of a guilty
plea is "whether the plea represents a voluntary and intelligent choice
among the alternative courses of action open to the defendant." Hill
v. Lockhart, 474 U.S. 52, 56 (1985) (quoting North Carolina v.
Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 31 (1970)). Where, as here, a defendant asserts
ineffective assistance of counsel as grounds for vacating a guilty plea,
our analysis is guided by the two-prong standard articulated by the
Supreme Court in Hill and its predecessor, Strickland v. Washington,
466 U.S. 668 (1984). Pursuant to that analysis, we must first deter-
mine whether counsel's performance was so deficient that he or she
"was not functioning as the `counsel' guaranteed . . . by the Sixth
Amendment." Strickland, 466 U.S. at 687. To determine whether such
deficiency has occurred, we apply a test of objective reasonableness,
asking, in light of "prevailing professional norms," whether counsel
was "a reasonably competent attorney" and whether the advice given
was "within the range of competence demanded of attorneys in crimi-
nal cases." Id. at 669 (quoting McMann v. Richardson, 397 U.S. 759,
770-71 (1970)). Second, we must determine "whether counsel's con-
stitutionally ineffective performance affected the outcome of the plea
process." Hill, 474 U.S. at 57. To do so, we ask whether it appears
by a "reasonable probability" that, but for counsel's errors, the defen-
dant would not have accepted the plea agreement. 3 See id.In the present case, we agree with the district court that the first
prong of Strickland is satisfied. We have previously held that an attor-
ney's conduct falls below prevailing standards of professional compe-
tence where counsel affirmatively misinforms the defendant about a
legal consequence of a plea agreement, even if the consequence might
otherwise have been described as "collateral." See Ostrander, 46 F.3d
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3 Issues arising pursuant to ineffective assistance of counsel claims
present mixed questions of law and fact. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 698;
Ostrander v. Green, 46 F.3d 347, 354 (4th Cir. 1995), overruled on other
grounds, O'Dell v. Netherland, 95 F.3d 1214 (4th Cir. 1996) (en banc).
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at 355 ("[W]here the client asks for advice about a `collateral conse-
quence' and relies upon it in deciding whether to plead guilty, the
attorney must not grossly misinform his client about the law.");
Strader v. Garrison, 611 F.2d 61 (4th Cir. 1979) (same). Here, the
record demonstrates that Dr. Subhash repeatedly questioned his attor-
ney about the risk of deportation, and that in response to those inqui-
ries counsel erroneously assured Dr. Subhash that he would not be
subject to deportation now or in the future. In light of those facts, we
have no difficulty concluding that counsel's performance was consti-
tutionally deficient.
Moving to the second prong of Strickland, we must determine, in
light of Hill, "whether a reasonable defendant in [Dr. Subhash's]
shoes, having asked for, received, and relied upon encouraging
advice" about the risks of deportation, "would have pled guilty any-
way had he known" that his attorney was mistaken. Ostrander, 46
F.3d at 356. We agree with the district court that the answer is no. As
the record clearly demonstrates, concerns over the possibility of
deportation were foremost in Dr. Subhash's mind during the plea bar-
gaining process. We believe there is a reasonable probability that, in
the absence of counsel's errors, Dr. Subhash, a twenty-year resident
alien whose wife and daughter are U.S. citizens and whose medical
practice is established in West Virginia, would have passed up the
Government's offer of a plea agreement. Although a trial would still
present the risk of deportation, it would provide Dr. Subhash the
opportunity to contest the Government's evidence or, failing that, to
challenge the Government's estimate of loss.
The judgment of the district court is accordingly
AFFIRMED.
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