Document Type
Brief
Publication Date
2008
Keywords
immigration, convictions, deportation, guilty plea
Abstract
The petitioner requested the Maryland Court of Appeals to reverse a decision that his criminal plea of guilty was voluntary. The Court of Special Appeals of Maryland had ruled it voluntary. Law professors at the University of Maryland and the University of Baltimore filed this amicus brief in support of the petitioner.
The brief presents the issue of whether a guilty plea is voluntary and knowingly given when it is based on affirmative misinformation about the direct immigration consequences of such a plea. The amici argue that the petitioner’s plea was unconstitutionally involuntary and unknowing because his attorney, the prosecutor, and an attorney with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) all incorrectly assured him that he would not be deported if he entered a plea of guilty. They also argue that the immigration consequences were not merely collateral, but a direct result of a conviction.
The argument outlines how immigration law and enforcement have changed since 1985 when the Court of Special Appeals last addressed the question of direct or collateral consequences. Due to these changes the amici show that immigration consequences are now definite, immediate and largely automatic. The brief also discusses numerous state and federal cases that hold that affirmative misadvice about the consequences of a plea render that plea involuntary. It describes ample evidence that the petitioner relied on erroneous information to his detriment.
Disciplines
Criminal Procedure | Immigration Law
Comments
On Writ of Certiorari to the Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.
Brief of Amici Curiae Faculty Members of the University of Baltimore School of Law and the University of Maryland School of Law and the National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild in Support of Petitioner.
Prepared under the direction of Professor Maureen Sweeney.