Steele v. Murphy

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit

No. 02-2213

THOMAS F. STEELE,

Petitioner, Appellant,

v.

ROBERT MURPHY,

Respondent, Appellee.

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS

[Hon. Mark L. Wolf, U.S. District Judge]

Before

Boudin, Chief Judge,
Torruella, Circuit Judge,
and Stahl, Senior Circuit Judge.

Willie J. Davis, with whom Davis, Robinson & White, LLP, was
on brief, for appellant.
Annette C. Benedetto, Assistant Attorney General, Criminal
Bureau, with whom Thomas F. Reilly, Attorney General, was on brief,
for appellee.

April 12, 2004
 TORRUELLA, Circuit Judge. Thomas Steele, petitioner-

appellant, appeals the district court's denial of his petition for

a writ of habeas corpus. After careful review, we affirm.

I. Background

Thomas Steele was indicted by a grand jury for seven

counts of aggravated rape, two counts of kidnaping, two counts of

assault and battery, five counts of assault and battery with a

dangerous weapon, and armed robbery. On October 14, 1982, Steele

pleaded guilty to these charges. The plea was accepted and Steele

was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not less than twelve

years and not more than thirty years.

In mid-1984, Steele had an opportunity to be moved to a

lower security facility. Before the move took place, the

Commonwealth of Massachusetts ("Commonwealth") had Steele evaluated

by a psychologist. See Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 123A, § 6. The

psychologist determined that Steele might be a sexually dangerous

person. On January 24, 1985, the Commonwealth filed a motion to

have Steele committed to the Treatment Center for Sexually

Dangerous Persons for a sixty-day evaluation. The motion was

granted. On May 17, 1985, the Commonwealth petitioned to have

Steele committed to the Treatment Center from one day to life.

Steele was so committed.

In May 1992, Steele filed a motion in a Commonwealth

Superior Court requesting a trial, because the original trial judge

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had failed to inform him that, as a result of his plea, he could be

committed from one day to life as a sexually dangerous person. The

Superior Court found that Steele had not been informed that he

could be classified as a sexually dangerous person but held that

the failure to inform Steele of a possible life-long detention did

not merit a withdrawal of his plea.

On appeal, the Massachusetts Appeals Court affirmed the

denial of the motion for a new trial. Commonwealth v. Steele, 715

N.E.2d 477 (Mass. App. Ct. 1999). The Massachusetts Supreme

Judicial court denied Steele's application for further review.

Commonwealth v. Steele, 722 N.E.2d 977 (Mass. 1999).

Steele filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in

the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts

arguing that the Commonwealth's failure to inform him of the

consequences of the plea violated his due process rights under the

Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and that his

plea was not knowing and voluntary. Steele v. Murphy, No. 00-

10563-MLW (D. Mass. Aug 26, 2002). The district court denied his

petition. Id. Steele appeals.

II. Analysis

When "reviewing a judgment on a petition for a writ of

habeas corpus, this Court examines the legal conclusions of the

district court . . . de novo." Norton v. Spencer, 351 F.3d 1, 4

(1st Cir. 2003) (citing Almanzar v. Maloney, 281 F.3d 300, 303 (1st

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Cir. 2002)). The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of

1996 ("AEDPA"), 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1)-(2),

prohibits a federal court from granting an
application for a writ of habeas corpus with
respect to a claim adjudicated on the merits
in state court unless that adjudication
resulted in a decision that was contrary to,
or involved an unreasonable application of,
clearly established Federal law, as determined
by the Supreme Court of the United States.

Id. (quoting Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 399 (2000)). As the

Supreme Court clarified, "[u]nder the 'contrary to' clause, a

federal habeas court may grant the writ if the state court arrives

at a conclusion opposite to that reached by this Court on a

question of law or if the state court decides a case differently

than this Court has on a set of materially indistinguishable

facts." Id. at 6 (citations and quotations omitted). There is no

Supreme Court case involving "materially indistinguishable facts"

that is contrary to the outcome in this case. Rather, the debate

centers on whether the state court determination was an

"unreasonable application" of clearly established federal law

established by the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court has not addressed whether a defendant

has a constitutional right to be informed, before pleading guilty,

of the possibility of being deemed a sexually dangerous person.

Steele contends that the Commonwealth's decision denying his motion

for a new trial was contrary to clearly established Supreme Court

precedent in Brady v. United States, 397 U.S. 742, 748 (1970).

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When Steele agreed to plead guilty, he agreed to give up several

constitutional rights. See Boykin v. Alabama, 395 U.S. 238, 243

(1969) (noting that a defendant, by entering a guilty plea, waives

many constitutional rights including the privilege against self-

incrimination, the right to a trial by jury, and the right to

confront accusers). In Brady, the Supreme Court held that

"[w]aivers of constitutional rights not only must be voluntary but

must be knowing, intelligent acts done with sufficient awareness of

the relevant circumstances and likely consequences." Brady, 397

U.S. at 748. Steele contends that he did not waive his

constitutional rights voluntarily or knowingly because he was not

advised of a consequence of pleading guilty, namely, the

possibility of being committed from one day to life as a sexually

dangerous person.

Although a defendant must be informed of the "likely

consequences" of pleading guilty, he does not need to be informed

of all the possible consequences of a guilty plea. Indeed, a

defendant need only be "fully aware of the direct consequences" of

such a plea. Brady, 397 U.S. at 755 (citation omitted); see

also United States v. Sambro, 454 F.2d 918, 922 (D.C. Cir. 1971)

(en banc) (per curiam) (stating that "[w]e presume that the Supreme

Court meant what it said when it used the word 'direct'; by doing

so, it excluded collateral consequences") (emphasis in original).

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 The distinction between direct and collateral

consequences of a plea "turns on whether the consequence represents

a definite, immediate, and largely automatic effect on the range of

a defendant's punishment." United States v. Bouthot, 878 F.2d

1506, 1511 (1st Cir. 1989) (internal quotations and citations

omitted).1

We believe that the possibility of commitment for life as

a sexually dangerous person is a collateral consequence of pleading

guilty. As a result, the failure to inform Steele about the

possibility of being classified as a sexually dangerous person did

not violate clearly established Supreme Court precedent established

in Brady. See, e.g., George v. Black, 732 F.2d 108, 110 (8th Cir.

1984) (possibility that convicted sex offender could be confined

1
See, e.g., United States v. Morse, 36 F.3d 1070, 1072 (11th Cir.
1994)(potential loss of federal benefits was a collateral
consequence); King v. Dutton, 17 F.3d 151, 153 (6th Cir. 1994) (use
of murder conviction as aggravating circumstance in sentencing for
unrelated murder charge was collateral consequence); United States
v. Salmon, 944 F.2d 1106, 1130 (3d Cir. 1991) (effect of conviction
on sentencing for later offense under career offender law was a
collateral consequence); United States v. Campusano, 947 F.2d 1, 5
(1st Cir. 1991) (ability to use state court conviction against
defendant in subsequent federal prosecution was collateral
consequence of state court guilty plea); United States v. Russell,
686 F.2d 35, 39 (D.C. Cir. 1982) (deportation was collateral
consequence); Moore v. Hinton, 513 F.2d 781, 782-83 (5th Cir. 1975)
(suspension of defendant's driver's license was collateral
consequence of defendant's guilty plea); Wall v. United States, 500
F.2d 38, 39 (10th Cir. 1974) (possibility of consecutive sentences
was collateral consequence). But see United States v. Harris, 534
F.2d 141, 142 (9th Cir. 1976) (mandatory special parole term was a
direct consequence); Paige v. United States, 443 F.2d 781, 782-83
(4th Cir. 1971) (non-eligibility for parole was direct consequence
of plea).

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pursuant to civil commitment proceedings after expiration of

criminal sentence was collateral consequence); Cuthrell v. Dir.,

Patuxent Inst., 475 F.2d 1364, 1367 (4th Cir. 1973)(possibility of

civil commitment was collateral consequence).

Rather than being labeled a sexually dangerous person as

a direct result of pleading guilty to the crimes Steele committed,

the Massachusetts law in effect when Steele was deemed a sexually

dangerous person required many steps before a court could conclude

that Steele was sexually dangerous. These steps were followed in

Steele's case. First, a statutorily designated official concluded

that Steele appeared to be a sexually dangerous person. Mass. Gen.

Laws ch. 123A, § 6. Upon doing so, a psychiatrist, Dr. Robert

Moore, administered a psychiatric examination. Id. Dr. Moore

concluded that Steele might be a sexually dangerous person. Upon

learning of Dr. Moore's conclusions, the Superintendent of the

North Central Correctional Institution at Gardner submitted a

motion to the Massachusetts Superior Court to commit Steele to the

Massachusetts Treatment Center at Bridgewater for a sixty-day

evaluation. Id. The motion was granted. Steele was examined by

two more psychologists while at the Treatment Center and both

concluded that Steele was a sexually dangerous person. The

Commonwealth then filed a petition seeking to commit Steele to the

Treatment Center as a sexually dangerous person. A full

evidentiary hearing was held for the court to determine if the

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prisoner was sexually dangerous. Id. at § 5. The court determined

that Steele was sexually dangerous and committed him to the

Treatment Center from one day to life.

Steele concedes that, in some situations, being committed

as a sexually dangerous person is not an automatic result of

pleading guilty. Still, he argues that, in his situation, being

committed was inevitable, considering that he pleaded guilty to

seven counts of aggravated rape, assault, and kidnaping. We

disagree. Although the charges against Steele perhaps made him a

likely candidate for being classified a sexually dangerous person,

his classification as one was not a direct, immediate, or largely

automatic result of pleading guilty. See George, 732 F.2d at 110-

11 (stating that while commitment proceedings are mandatory,

commitment is not); Cuthrell, 475 F.2d at 1366 (holding that

commitment is a collateral consequence of a plea when commitment

does not depend directly on the defendant's plea but on a

subsequent, independent civil trial). The process that led to

Steele's being committed to the Treatment Center involved three

psychological evaluations, a sixty-day observation period, and two

court hearings. Had the psychiatric evaluations not found Steele

to be sexually dangerous, or if Steele had convinced the court at

the full evidentiary hearing that he was not a sexually dangerous

person, he may not have been committed. The many possible outcomes

that could have resulted in Steele's not being classified as

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sexually dangerous further illustrate that commitment as a sexually

dangerous person is a collateral, rather than direct, consequence

of pleading guilty.

An argument could be made that Steele's plea was

involuntary because he was not informed that a statutorily

designated official could request that Steele undergo a psychiatric

evaluation if Steele "appear[ed]" to be sexually dangerous. See

Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 123A, § 6.2 Such an argument is unconvincing

for several reasons. First, the fact that a prison official may

believe that a prisoner appears to be sexually dangerous does not

have a "definite, immediate, and largely automatic effect on the

range of a defendant's punishment." Bouthot, 878 F.2d at 1511

(internal quotations and citations omitted). Second, as other

circuits have held, a defendant does not need to be informed of all

the possible consequences of a plea, regardless of whether there is

a high probability that such a consequence will occur. See, e.g.,

Russell, 686 F.2d at 39 (stating that deportation is a collateral

consequence despite criminal convictions leading often, and

2
This provision of Massachusetts law applied to any "prisoner
under sentence in any jail." If Steele's argument were valid, any
prisoner sentenced to jail, from rapists to traffic violators,
would have to be notified that they may be deemed a sexually
dangerous person. It should also be noted that Massachusetts Rule
of Criminal Procedure 12(c)(3)(B) requires that a defendant
pleading guilty be informed "of any different or additional
punishment based upon second offense or sexually dangerous persons
provision of the General Laws." Failure to follow this state
procedural rule does not affect our analysis of Steele's federal
constitutional claim.

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sometimes automatically, to deportation proceeding); Moore, 513

F.2d at 782-83 (suspension of defendant's driver's license was

collateral consequence of defendant's guilty plea despite guilty

plea automatically leading to a license suspension hearing before

another court).

III. Conclusion

For the aforementioned reasons, the district court's

denial of Steele's petition for a writ of habeas corpus is

Affirmed.

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