Summary
The Eighth Circuit affirmed the dismissal as untimely of William Joseph Headbird’s 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion challenging his Armed Career Criminal Act sentence based on Descamps v. United States. The court held that Descamps did not establish a newly recognized right or new rule made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review, and declined to consider Headbird’s Johnson-based remand argument because it was raised for the first time in reply.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether Descamps v. United States newly recognized a right that was made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review, thereby triggering the later one-year limitations period under 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)(3).
- Whether Headbird was entitled to remand for resentencing under Johnson v. United States when the Johnson issue was not included in the certificate of appealability and was raised for the first time in his reply brief.
Holdings
- Descamps did not establish a new rule or newly recognize a right for purposes of § 2255(f)(3); it applied existing categorical-approach principles to indivisible statutes. Therefore, Headbird's § 2255 motion was governed by the ordinary one-year limitations period in § 2255(f)(1) and was untimely.
- Headbird was not entitled to remand based on Johnson because the issue was not included in the certificate of appealability and was raised for the first time in his reply brief.
Key quotations
“Rather than establish a new rule for analyzing indivisible statutes, Descamps simply reaffirmed that “[t]he modified approach does not authorize a sentencing court to substitute . . . a facts-based inquiry for an elements-based one.”” (813 F.3d at 1096)
“Accordingly, Headbird’s motion does not rely on a right that was “newly recognized” by the Supreme Court in Descamps, and the district court correctly dismissed Headbird’s motion as untimely based on the limitations period of § 2255(f)(1).” (813 F.3d at 1097)
Factual background
In 2005, a jury convicted Headbird of possessing a firearm as a previously convicted felon under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1). The sentencing court found seven prior violent-felony convictions, applied the Armed Career Criminal Act, and imposed a 327-month sentence. Headbird later argued that three escape convictions and two motor-vehicle convictions no longer qualified as violent felonies, relying principally on Descamps and Begay.
Procedural history
A jury convicted Headbird in 2005 of possessing a firearm as a previously convicted felon. The district court sentenced him under the Armed Career Criminal Act to 327 months, and the Eighth Circuit affirmed on direct review. In 2014, Headbird moved under § 2255 based on Descamps, arguing that Descamps newly recognized a retroactive right and that his prior convictions did not qualify as violent felonies. The district court denied the motion as untimely, granted a certificate of appealability, and the Eighth Circuit affirmed; it also denied Headbird's request for remand based on Johnson.