United States v. Paulette
Opinion of the Court
ORDER
Akeelan Paulette was caught transporting cocaine on an Amtrak train for the benefit of his uncle, Ayiko Paulette.
Paulette filed a notice of appeal, though. His appointed lawyer asserts that the ap
Counsel first considers a challenge to the district court’s rejection of Paulette’s untimely motion to suppress. (Paulette specifically reserved the right to challenge this ruling on appeal.) About a month before pretrial motions were due, Paulette’s lawyer withdrew from the case and a new lawyer was appointed. The new lawyer moved to continue the trial date, but she did not seek to extend the deadline for pretrial motions. That deadline passed without action by Paulette’s lawyer.
Nearly five months after the deadline had passed, counsel asked for an extension to file a motion to suppress. She explained that she was having “communication problems” with Paulette but said he had told her he wanted to file a motion to suppress. Counsel noted that she had been appointed late in the case and inherited “voluminous” discovery. She asked the district court to accept her attached motion to suppress, which argued that police had stopped Paulette illegally at the train station.
The district court denied the requested extension and struck the untimely motion, finding that the lawyer had not shown good cause for missing the deadline. The court explained that even though the lawyer had been appointed late in the case, she had three weeks to ask for an extension but inexplicably waited until five months after the deadline had passed. The court added that the motion was meritless anyway because, as the court had detailed in denying the uncle’s motion to suppress, the agents had reasonable suspicion for the investigatory detention. Paulette’s lawyer then filed a motion to reconsider, asking the court simply to deny the motion to suppress on the merits. The court denied that motion because Paulette’s lawyer still had not established good cause for the delay.
We agree with appellate counsel that any challenge to the district court’s decision would be frivolous. District courts have discretion whether to allow untimely motions to suppress for good cause. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 12(b)(3)(C); United States v. Combs, 657 F.3d 565, 568 (7th Cir. 2011). Under these circumstances, where the new trial lawyer waited months before seeking leave to file a late motion to suppress and offered no good reason for the delay, there is no sign that the district court abused its discretion. See United States v. Garcia, 528 F.3d 481, 485 (7th Cir. 2008) (no good cause where new counsel never requested extension).
Appellate counsel next evaluates a potential challenge on the merits of the motion to suppress. But because trial counsel did not establish good cause and thus the motion was not allowed, we could not consider the asserted ground for suppression, not even for plain error. See United States v. Daniels, 803 F.3d 335, 351-52 (7th Cir. 2015); United States v. Acox, 595 F.3d 729, 730-31 (7th Cir. 2010). Accordingly, the challenge would be frivolous.
Finally, appellate counsel weighs and correctly rejects as frivolous a possible attack on the validity of Paulette’s guilty plea, explaining that Paulette expressed some interest in withdrawing the plea. See United States v. Konczak, 683 F,3d 348, 349 (7th Cir. 2012); United States v. Knox,
Accordingly, we GRANT counsel’s motion to withdraw and DISMISS the appeal.
. Ayiko Paulette's appeal, no. 16-1099, is discussed in a separate opinion.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- United States v. Akeelan L.J. PAULETTE
- Status
- Published