United States v. Wright

85 F.4th 851

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Monica WRIGHT, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 22-2922

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit

Argued September 13, 2023

Decided November 1, 2023

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois. No. 20-cr-40003 — Sara Darrow, Chief Judge.

Katherine Virginia Boyle, Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Urbana, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Valerie A. Davenport, Attorney, Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP, Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellant.

Before Flaum, Ripple, and Scudder, Circuit Judges.

Flaum, Circuit Judge.

Drug dealers from the Quad Cities traveled to Colorado to buy kilos of meth from Monica Wright. After the dealers testified on behalf of the government, Wright was convicted of conspiring to distribute and possessing with intent to distribute methamphetamine. On appeal, Wright challenges what she characterizes as an actual conflict of interest with her attorney, as well as the sufficiency of the evidence underpinning her conspiracy conviction. Because there was no conflict of interest and sufficient evidence of conspiracy, we affirm Wright's conviction.

I. Background

Shawn Pfister and Cynthia Evans dealt methamphetamine in the Quad Cities.¹ In the summer of 2016, they learned of a new potential source: Colorado Springs resident, Monica Wright. In the weeks that followed, Pfister and Evans traveled to Colorado approximately twenty times to buy meth from Wright.

The first trip was in June 2016. Pfister, accompanied by Joey Deherrera—a Colorado-based middleman—went to Wright's home on Marilee Way and purchased just under one kilogram of meth. That cadence persisted, with Wright selling Pfister and Evans roughly one-to-two kilograms of meth per week for approximately seven-to-eight weeks. Deherrera accompanied Pfister and Evans on some of these trips and when he did, he received $500 from the total paid to Wright.

That summer, Pfister was arrested at a casino in Iowa. To help pay Pfister's bail, Evans, who was his on-again, off-again girlfriend, turned to Wright. Wright agreed to sell Evans meth and let Evans stay with her for several days while she sourced the meth. Drugs in hand, Evans returned to the Quad Cities where she sold about nine ounces to a local dealer, Regina Heavener.

Officers searched Heavener's home on September 13, 2016, and recovered over fifty grams of meth. Heavener knew that Evans got the meth from "Monica" in Colorado Springs. After learning of the drug bust (and posting bail), Pfister warned Wright that police might be following their activities.

At one point, Pfister was short on funds to pay for meth, but Wright nevertheless fronted him approximately eight ounces. To pay her back, Pfister gave Wright a stolen pull-behind trailer. On another occasion, Wright asked Pfister if he could get a gun for her meth source. Pfister gave Wright one that he had obtained by trading a vehicle.

Pfister and Wright also had several conversations about the business side of the operation. They discussed the cost of meth, how much Pfister was selling it for, his profits, and whether Wright could keep up with his demand. They also discussed how Wright's drug dealing was paying for rent at the Marilee Way house and for renovations at her house on Auburn Drive. Wright cautioned Pfister and Evans not to use phones to discuss their drug transactions, explaining that her ex-husband had been arrested on drug conspiracy charges after a wiretap was placed on his phone.

In October 2017, the Drug Enforcement Administration executed a search warrant at Wright's residence on Auburn Drive— not the Marilee Way address where Pfister and Evans purchased drugs. Agents did not recover drugs or drug paraphernalia during the search.²

Wright was nevertheless charged by indictment with intent to distribute at least fifty grams of meth and at least 500 grams of a mixture containing meth. She was initially represented by a Federal Public Defender but ultimately retained Hal Garfinkel, who took the case to trial in June 2022.

In its opening statement, the government previewed testimony from Evans, Pfister, Heavener, and Deherrera. Garfinkel also foreshadowed testimony from Deherrera, referring to him as the government's witness. He told the jury that Deherrera would testify that he never saw Wright with large amounts of meth. Despite this potentially helpful testimony, Garfinkel never planned to call Deherrera, just cross-examine him.

The morning of the second day of trial, the government alerted the court to an issue that arose while prepping Deherrera the night before. Deherrera told the government that during a meeting a few months earlier, Garfinkel insinuated that Deherrera lied to the grand jury and encouraged him to change his testimony. The government referenced Deherrera's potentially exculpatory testimony but did not explain whether Deherrera had changed those aspects of his testimony. The government simply stated that it no longer planned to call him as a witness. As a result, it informed the court of a potential conflict: If Wright called Deherrera and he testified to being pressured to change his testimony, Garfinkel would have to take the stand to impeach him. Consequently, it was possible that Garfinkel's decision not to call Deherrera could be motivated by self-interest and in conflict with Wright's best interest.

During the colloquy with the court, Garfinkel vehemently denied Deherrera's allegations. He then said:

So, now if the government doesn't call him—I have no idea what Mr. Deherrera is going to say. And if, in fact, he is going to get up on that stand and say that during our conversation or conversations that I made that insinuation, then asked him to change his testimony, I'm not calling him ....

[T]he government's not going to call him. I'm not going to call him. It is an interesting issue if, in the event Ms. Wright is convicted, if she were to come back post-conviction and then say, well, I could have called Deherrera and I didn't, if that somehow, you know, becomes a Strickland argument. I don't know.

I would think now if Mr. Deherrera is going to testify consistent with the interview last night, I can't imagine why Miss Wright would want him on the stand. I don't want him on the stand. I think at that point that vitiates any conflict.

The court directed Garfinkel to discuss the issue with Wright:

I'm going to ask her about whether or not she — what she wants to do and whether or not her decision is knowingly [sic] and not forced and if she—it's not necessarily a waiver of a conflict because I don't know that there is a conflict, but I just want to explore that with her so it's on the record.

After a brief recess to allow Garfinkel and Wright to confer, the court questioned Wright. Wright confirmed she understood and agreed with Garfinkel's strategy to not call Deherrera. She affirmed that she understood the possibility that Garfinkel was personally motivated not to call Deherrera. Nevertheless, she confirmed that she was "comfortable and confident that Mr. Garfinkel [was] making the decision ... because [it was] not a good strategy for [her] defense."

No additional record was made, and Garfinkel continued representing Wright. At the close of the government's case-in-chief, Garfinkel made an oral motion for directed verdict, which the court denied.

Wright testified in her own defense. Wright explained that she and her boyfriend purchased meth in user amounts to share on a near-daily basis. As for her relationship with Pfister, Evans, and Deherrera, she testified that they came to her home infrequently to smoke meth with her. On those occasions, Pfister and Deherrera provided small amounts of meth and sometimes Wright would contribute some of her own to smoke communally.

Deherrera did not testify at trial, but references to him dominated Garfinkel's closing argument. Garfinkel argued that Deherrera "[was] the [government's] case," "the seminal figure," and "the elephant in the room" was that he did not testify at trial. He described Deherrera's absence as the missing link—a burden the government had to overcome to convict Wright.

The jury nevertheless found Wright guilty on June 16, 2022. On July 10, 2022, Garfinkel filed a motion for leave to file a motion for a new trial instanter. Any motions for a new trial or for judgment of acquittal were due by June 30, 2022. Undeterred, on July 18, 2022, Garfinkel filed an amended motion for leave to file a motion for a new trial, attributing the belated filing to a Covid exposure. At Wright's sentencing hearing on October 12, 2022, the court denied the motion for leave, finding no excusable neglect. Wright was then sentenced to 264 months in prison. Represented by new counsel, she timely appealed her conviction.

II. Discussion

On appeal, Wright mounts a Sixth Amendment challenge. She argues that her constitutional right to conflict-free counsel was violated by Garfinkel's actual conflict of interest. She also challenges the sufficiency of the evidence supporting her conspiracy conviction, claiming that, at most, the evidence showed a buyer/seller relationship. We evaluate each challenge in turn.

A. Sixth Amendment

The Sixth Amendment guarantees criminal defendants two, sometimes opposing, rights: (1) the right to choose their attorney (assuming they do not require appointed counsel), and (2) the right to effective assistance of counsel. United States v. Turner, 594 F.3d 946, 950 (7th Cir. 2010). "[W]here an actual conflict of interest or a serious potential for a conflict exists" between the attorney and her client, those rights are pitted against each other, and the right to select an attorney must give way. United States v. Turner, 651 F.3d 743, 749 (7th Cir. 2011); Turner, 594 F.3d at 948 (reversing the district court's disqualification of counsel explaining it "disregarded the presumption in favor of the defendant's chosen counsel"); Wheat v. United...