Federal Public Defender of South Florida – Federal Public Defender of ...

FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER
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ASSISTANT FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER

In In re Garrett, No. 18-1380 (Nov. 2, 2018) (Wiliam Pryor, Hul, Julie Carnes), the Court denied an application for authorization to file a second or successive 2255 motion based on Johnson and Dimaya.
Given the en banc Court’s decision in Ovalles that 924(c)(3)(B) is not unconstitutionally vague after Dimaya, the Court held that the applicant failed to satisfy the gatekeeping crtieria in 2255(h), because there was no new rule of constitutional law...

In United States v. Jones, No. 17-12240 (Oct. 25, 2018) (Marcus, Tjoflat, Newsom), the Court held that Florida second-degree murder is a violent felony under the elements clause of the Armed Career Criminal Act.
The Court rejected the defendant’s primary argument that the use of poison did not constitute the use of physical force.  Prior circuit precedent had rejected that exact argument in the context of Florida first-degree murder.  And the only difference...

In United States v. Carthen, No. 16-17653 (Oct. 25, 2018) (Martin, William Pryor, Baldock), the Court affirmed the defendants’ robbery and firearms convictions and sentences over multiple challenges.
First, the Court found sufficient evidence that one of the defendants conspired to commit a robbery and voluntarily participated in the robbery with a firearm....