Criminal Procedure – Habeas corpus

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U.S. Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Criminal

Criminal Procedure – Habeas corpus

Where the district court sentenced the defendant based on a mistake as to the mandatory minimum, the defendant may seek relief under 28 U.S.C. 2255.

“The plea agreement did not spell out a specific procedural path for such relief, but we are confident both parties meant to allow for the possibility if Dorsey were to turn out as it in fact did. An alternate route would have been for Bai-ley to have filed an apparently futile appeal but to have asked that it be stayed pending a final decision in Dorsey, but that is not necessarily the only available path. Again, § 2255 allows a federal prisoner to seek to vacate or correct a sentence imposed in violation of the laws of the United States. Sentencing a defendant based on a court’s mistaken belief about the applicable statutory penalties is an example, even though such issues must ordinarily be raised in a direct appeal.”

Reversed and Remanded.

13-3229 U.S. v. Bailey

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Lawrence, J., Hamilton, J.

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