Contreras v. Davis

JASON MICHAEL CONTRERAS, Petitioner - Appellee, v. KEITH W. DAVIS, Warden, Sussex II State Prison, Respondent - Appellant.

JASON MICHAEL CONTRERAS, Petitioner - Appellant, v. KEITH W. DAVIS, Warden, Sussex II State Prison, Respondent - Appellee.

No. 17-6307

No. 17-6351

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

Argued: December 5, 2017

December 21, 2017

UNPUBLISHED

Appeals from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, at Alexandria. James C. Cacheris, Senior District Judge. (1:13-cv-00772-JCC-TRJ) Before NIEMEYER, SHEDD and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges.

Vacated and remanded by unpublished opinion. Judge Duncan wrote the opinion, in which Judge Niemeyer and Judge Shedd joined.

ARGUED: Matthew Robert McGuire, OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee. George A. Somerville, HARMAN CLAYTOR CORRIGAN & WELLMAN, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee/Cross-Appellant. ON BRIEF: Mark R. Herring, Attorney General, Stuart A. Raphael, Solicitor General, Trevor S. Cox, Deputy Solicitor General, Rosemary V. Bourne, Senior Assistant Attorney General, OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee. Jonathan P. Sheldon, Kelsey Karen Marie Peregoy, SHELDON FLOOD & HAYWOOD, PLC, Fairfax, Virginia; for Appellee/Cross-Appellant.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

DUNCAN, Circuit Judge:

Defendant-Appellee Jason Michael Contreras petitioned the district court for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254, alleging that his conviction rested on an invalid guilty plea in light of Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012), and that his sentence violated his rights under the Eighth Amendment. The district court granted the petition on the ground that his sentence violated Miller and remanded to state court for resentencing in accordance with the Eighth Amendment. For the reasons that follow, we vacate the district court's judgment and remand with instructions to dismiss Contreras's petition.

I.

When Contreras was fifteen years old, his drug-addicted mother abandoned him at a crack house, entrusting him to the care of two adult drug dealers. Over twelve days in October 1996, Contreras participated in a crime spree. He robbed three people at gunpoint, stealing their cars or other valuables, then broke into a woman's home. On October 26, the drug dealers made Contreras and another juvenile flip a coin to determine who would carry out a fourth robbery. Contreras lost, so he took a gun and proceeded to confront thirty-five-year-old David Semko, who was walking to his car in the dark. Semko fled when he saw Contreras, and Contreras shot him in the back, killing him.

Contreras was arrested on October 30, 1996. On March 27, 1997, he pleaded guilty in circuit court in Norfolk, Virginia, to first-degree murder, attempted robbery, statutory burglary, three counts of robbery, and five counts of using a firearm in thecommission of a felony. At the time that Contreras pleaded guilty, he did so understanding that the maximum penalty for both the first-degree murder charge and robbery charges was life imprisonment. Virginia had abolished parole for offenses committed on or after January 1, 1995. By pleading guilty, he sought to avoid mandatory life imprisonment without parole.

Contreras was sentenced on May 15, 1997. Five witnesses testified at the sentencing hearing on Contreras's behalf, including his grandmother, his aunt, his stepfather, his social worker, and his juvenile probation officer. Both Contreras's attorney and Contreras himself asked the court for a reduced sentence on account of his youth. The court sentenced Contreras to terms of imprisonment of twenty-three years for the firearms charges, two years for statutory burglary, two years for attempted robbery, five years each for the three robberies, and thirty-five years for Semko's murder, all of which were to be served consecutively. Contreras's combined sentence for the eleven offenses was thus seventy-seven years of imprisonment.

On June 9, 1999, Contreras filed a state petition for a writ of habeas corpus, claiming trial error, ineffective assistance of counsel, and prosecutorial misconduct. His state habeas petition was denied, and he did not appeal to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court established that imposition of life without parole for juvenile, non-homicide offenders was unconstitutional. Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 82 (2010). In 2012, the Supreme Court held that "the Eighth Amendment forbids a sentencing scheme that mandates life in prison without possibility of parole" for juveniles convicted of homicide offenses. Miller, 567 U.S. at 489. On June 25, 2013, Contrerasfiled a petition for a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 alleging that he was being held in state custody in violation of his Eighth Amendment rights under Miller. The district court initially denied his petition, and this court affirmed in 2015. Then, the U.S. Supreme Court announced in Montgomery v. Louisiana, 136 S. Ct. 718 (2016), that Miller had articulated a substantive rule that could be applied retroactively on collateral review. Id. at 732. The Court granted Contreras's petition for writ of certiorari and vacated his judgment, remanding for reconsideration in light of Montgomery.

On remand, the district court granted Contreras's petition for writ of habeas corpus, concluding that Contreras's sentences, "while technically in compliance with the mandates of Miller and Graham, still subject juveniles to life behind bars." Contreras v. Davis, 229 F. Supp. 3d 475, 481 (E.D. Va. 2017). Thus, it found Contreras's sentence "irreconcilable with the mandates of Graham and Miller" because seventy-seven years in prison constituted a "de facto" life sentence for a fifteen-year-old. Id. at 482. The court also noted that "[e]ven assuming, arguendo, that Petitioner's sentence is constitutional, the Court remains concerned with the validity of Petitioner's guilty plea," which the court worried was made under threat of a now-unconstitutional punishment and therefore was rendered involuntary. Id. The district court remanded to state court for resentencing. The Respondent appealed. Contreras moved the district court to amend its judgment under Rule 52(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to remand instead for a new trial, and the Respondent moved for a stay pending this appeal. The district court denied Contreras's Rule 52(b) motion and granted the requested stay pending appeal.

II.

We conclude that Contreras's claims are not cognizable under Miller because he is not subject to a mandatory life sentence without parole. Furthermore, following Dingle v. Stevenson, 840 F.3d 171 (4th Cir. 2016), even if Contreras pleaded guilty to avoid a now-unconstitutional sentence of mandatory life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, Miller does not render his guilty plea unconstitutional. Because we find no constitutional defect in Contreras's sentence, we vacate the district court's judgment and remand with instructions to reinstate Contreras's original sentence.

First, Contreras's sentence for the murder of David Semko is not the mandatory life sentence contemplated by Miller. Virginia does not impose mandatory life-without-parole sentences, even for capital murder. Jones v. Commonwealth, 795 S.E.2d 705, 711-12 (Va. 2017). Furthermore, "[i]n Virginia . . . a criminal defendant has a statutorily provided opportunity to present mitigation evidence at his sentencing hearing." Id. at 713. As this court has noted, Miller only prohibits mandatory life-without-parole sentences, while "leav[ing] open the possibility that a juvenile who committed homicide can be sentenced to life without parole so long as the sentence is not mandatory but is imposed through an individualized procedure." In re Vassell, 751 F.3d 267, 270 (4th Cir. 2014). Here, Contreras received an individualized sentence after five witnesses presented mitigating evidence on his youth, lessened culpability, and capacity for change. Thus, even if Contreras's thirty-five-year sentence for murder--or his total sentence of seventy-seven years for his combined crimes--could constitute a "de facto" life sentence (which we do not decide here), Contreras received an individualized sentence after considerationof mitigating evidence about his youth and ability to be rehabilitated, which is all that is constitutionally required under Miller.

Second, even though Contreras's sentence is long, he may be released under Virginia's geriatric release program and thus has a meaningful opportunity to receive...