No. 19-1485

ELVIN TORRES-ESTRADA,

Petitioner, Appellant,

v.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Respondent, Appellee.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO

[Hon. Juan M. Pérez-Giménez, U.S. District Judge]

Before

Lipez, Thompson, and Kayatta, Circuit Judges.

Ezekiel E. Cortez for petitioner-appellant.

Julia M. Meconiates, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom W. Stephen Muldrow, United States Attorney, and Mariana E. Bauzá-Almonte, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Appellate Division, were on brief, for respondent-appellee.

December 6, 2024 LIPEZ, Circuit Judge. In this collateral criminal appeal, we consider an ineffective assistance of counsel claim brought by a defendant who relied on the plea-bargaining advice of one of his attorneys despite warnings from his other attorneys against accepting that advice. Appellant Elvin Torres-Estrada maintains that the bad advice -- along with that same attorney's obstruction of plea negotiations -- entitles him to resentencing under the principles of Missouri v. Frye, 566 U.S. 134 (2012), and Lafler v. Cooper, 566 U.S. 156 (2012).

More specifically, Torres-Estrada claims that, but for the ineffective assistance of his local counsel, he would have had a more favorable plea agreement and sentencing outcome: a likely term of 188 months' imprisonment instead of 288 months. He therefore argues that he is entitled to resentencing according to the terms originally proposed by the government. We disagree, concluding that his local attorney's representation was not constitutionally deficient and that Torres-Estrada's own decision- making drove the outcome of his plea-bargaining process. We therefore affirm the district court's denial of sentencing relief.

I. A. Overview

In April 2010, Torres-Estrada and sixty-four other individuals were charged in a superseding indictment with, inter alia, conspiring to distribute large amounts of controlled

- 2 - substances near a public housing project from roughly 1995 to 2009.1 As described in detail below, plea negotiations initiated by Torres-Estrada's attorneys stretched into the fall of 2010. Then, in February 2011 -- with no plea bargain relating to the earlier indictment yet in place -- Torres-Estrada and three others were charged in a separate, single-count indictment with conspiring to import controlled substances into the United States.2 On the eve of trial on the initial charges, in March 2011, Torres- Estrada signed a consolidated plea agreement in which he agreed to plead guilty to one count of each indictment. The agreement specified that Torres-Estrada could request a sentence of 264 months (twenty-two years), while the government was permitted to argue for a 288-month (twenty-four-year) term of imprisonment. As

The original indictment was filed in September 2009, and 1 Torres-Estrada remained a fugitive until June 2010. See United States v. Torres-Estrada, 817 F.3d 376, 377 (1st Cir. 2016). Torres-Estrada was charged in seven of the superseding indictment's eleven counts. Count One charged the conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute controlled substances near a public housing project. Counts Three through Six charged him with possession with intent to distribute various drugs: heroin (Count Three), crack cocaine (Count Four), cocaine (Count Five), and marijuana (Count Six). He was charged in Counts Seven and Eleven with conspiring to commit money launderi