Post v. Watson
Filing
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ORDER AND OPINION entered by Chief Judge James E. Shadid on 7/10/2018. Petitioner Post's Petition (Doc. 1 ) for Writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 is DENIED. This matter is now terminated. SEE FULL WRITTEN ORDER AND OPINION. (JS, ilcd)
E-FILED
Tuesday, 10 July, 2018 01:55:05 PM
Clerk, U.S. District Court, ILCD
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
CENTRAL DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
DYLAN POST,
Petitioner,
v.
STEVE KALLIS, Warden,
Respondent.
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Case No. 17-cv-1283-JES
ORDER AND OPINION
Now before the Court is Petitioner Post’s Petition (Doc. 1) for Writ of habeas corpus
under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. For the reasons set forth below, the Petition (Doc. 1) is DENIED.
BACKGROUND
On April 8, 2011, Dylan Post pleaded guilty by way of a plea agreement to the offense of
bank robbery by force or violence, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2113(a) and (d). On July 27,
2011, Post was sentenced in United States District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin to
a term of 144 months of imprisonment. United States v. Post, No. 2:10-cr-00274-JPS-1 (E.D.
Wis. 2011). On June 19, 2017, Post filed the instant Petition for Writ of habeas corpus under 28
U.S.C. § 2241, raising a single argument that he no longer qualifies as a Career Offender under
U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1 and is thus entitled to a sentence reduction in light of the Supreme Court’s
decision in Mathis v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 2243 (2016). Doc. 1. The United States filed a
partial Response in opposition, and Post filed a Reply. Docs. 4, 6. This Order follows.
LEGAL STANDARD
Generally, federal prisoners who seek to collaterally attack their conviction or sentence
must proceed by way of motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, the so-called “federal prisoner’s
substitute for habeas corpus.” Camacho v. English, No. 16-3509, 2017 WL 4330368, at *1 (7th
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Cir. Aug. 22, 2017) (quoting Brown v. Rios, 696 F.3d 638, 640 (7th Cir. 2012)). The exception to
this rule is found in § 2255 itself: a federal prisoner may petition under § 2241 if the remedy
under § 2255 “is inadequate or ineffective to test the legality of his detention.” 28 U.S.C. §
2255(e). Under the “escape hatch” of § 2255(e), “[a] federal prisoner should be permitted to seek
habeas corpus only if he had no reasonable opportunity to obtain earlier judicial correction of a
fundamental defect in his conviction or sentence because the law changed after his first 2255
motion.” In re Davenport, 147 F.3d 605, 611 (7th Cir. 1998). Thus, the Seventh Circuit has held
that “alternative relief under § 2241 is available only in limited circumstances: specifically, only
upon showing that (1) the claim relies on a new statutory interpretation case; (2) the petitioner
could not have invoked the decision in his first § 2255 motion and the decision applies
retroactively; and (3) there has been a fundamental defect in the proceedings that is fairly
characterized as a miscarriage of justice.” Montana v. Cross, 829 F.3d 775, 779 (7th Cir.
2016), cert. denied sub nom. Montana v. Werlich, 137 S. Ct. 1813 (2017).
DISCUSSION
Post cannot challenge his Career Offender designation in a collateral proceeding. Two
decisions from the Seventh Circuit, Hawkins v. United States, 706 F.3d 820 (7th Cir. 2013)
(Hawkins I), and Hawkins v. United States, 724 F.3d 915 (7th Cir. 2013) (Hawkins II), preclude
relief for Petitioner Post because together they hold a petitioner may not seek on collateral
review to revisit the district court’s calculation of his advisory guidelines range. The Court is
bound by the Hawkins decisions. Given the interest in finality of criminal proceedings, in
Hawkins I the Seventh Circuit held an erroneous interpretation of the guidelines should not be
corrigible in a postconviction proceeding so long as the sentence actually imposed was not
greater than the statutory maximum. Hawkins I, 706 F.3d at 823–25. It specifically distinguished
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the advisory guidelines from the mandatory system in place at the time of Narvaez v. United
States, 674 F.3d 621 (7th Cir. 2011) (holding Narvaez’s improper sentence under the mandatory
guidelines constituted a miscarriage of justice).
Hawkins moved for rehearing in light of Peugh v. United States, 133 S. Ct. 2072 (2013),
in which the Supreme Court held the Guidelines were subject to constitutional challenges
“notwithstanding the fact that sentencing courts possess discretion to deviate from the
recommended sentencing range.” Peugh, 133 S. Ct. at 2082. The Seventh Circuit denied
rehearing because Peugh was a constitutional case whereas Hawkins I involved a miscalculated
guidelines range, the legal standard in Peugh was lower than for postconviction relief, and
Peugh’s retroactivity was uncertain. Hawkins II, 724 F.3d at 916–18 (“[I]t doesn’t follow that
postconviction relief is proper just because the judge, though he could lawfully have imposed the
sentence that he did impose, might have imposed a lighter sentence had he calculated the
applicable guidelines sentencing range correctly.”). Because Post’s only challenge in his Petition
is to the district court’s calculation of his advisory guideline range (i.e., the Career Offender
designation), his claim is not cognizable on collateral review and must therefore be denied.
CONCLUSION
For the reasons set forth above, Petitioner Post’s Petition (Doc. 1) for Writ of habeas
corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 is DENIED.
This matter is now terminated.
Signed on this 10th day of July, 2018.
s/ James E. Shadid
James E. Shadid
Chief United States District Judge
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