United States v. Carlos Dashawn Brown

RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION

Pursuant to Sixth Circuit I.O.P. 32.1(b)

File Name: 24a0099p.06

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

┐

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

│

Plaintiff-Appellee, │

> No. 22-3797

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v. │

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CARLOS DASHAWN BROWN, │

Defendant-Appellant. │

┘

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio at Cleveland.

No. 1:19-cr-00247-1—Solomon Oliver, Jr., District Judge.

Decided and Filed: April 30, 2024

Before: SILER, NALBANDIAN, and MATHIS, Circuit Judges.

_________________

COUNSEL

ON BRIEF: Kevin M. Schad, FEDERAL PUBLIC DEFENDER’S OFFICE, Cincinnati, Ohio,

for Appellant. Justin Seabury Gould, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY’S OFFICE, Cleveland,

Ohio, for Appellee.

SILER, J., delivered the opinion of the court in which NALBANDIAN, J., joined in full,

and MATHIS, J., joined in Part II and in the result.

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OPINION

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SILER, Circuit Judge. Like any other criminal defendant, Carlos Brown has a right to be

brought to trial within seventy days of his arraignment—absent, of course, the Speedy Trial

Act’s laundry list of exclusions. 18 U.S.C. § 3161 et seq. Yet Brown alleges that, in the 1,176

days between his arraignment and his guilty plea, his right to a speedy trial was twice violated.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 2

Either violation would warrant the dismissal of his indictment. We consider whether these

violations were covered by the Act’s exclusions. Id. § 3161(c)(1), (h)(1).

The first violation involved a thirty-six-day delay in transporting Brown from Ohio to the

Federal Medical Center (“FMC”), Lexington for his competency evaluation. This delay,

according to the district court, was excludable. It denied Brown’s motion to dismiss. The

second violation involved a twenty-one-day period after the denial of Brown’s first motion to

dismiss. Again, the district court denied Brown’s motion to dismiss. It instead entered a twenty-

one-day retroactive ends-of-justice continuance. We find that the district court erred in denying

both motions, vacate his conviction, and remand to the district court to determine whether his

indictment should be dismissed with or without prejudice.

I. Brown’s Transportation Claim

A.

Brown was indicted under fraud and identity theft charges for his role in a credit card

scheme. By December 19, 2019, forty-two days of non-excludable time had elapsed on Brown’s

Speedy Trial clock.1 That day, the district court granted the parties’ joint motion for a

competency evaluation and ordered Brown to “self report to the nearest facility as designated by

the Bureau of Prisons within 45 days of said designation.” Later that day, Brown returned to his

residential treatment center and broke down, screaming, crying, and hitting staff members. He

was taken into custody for violating the conditions of his bond.

On December 23, the district court ordered that Brown remain in custody and that he “not

be allowed to self-report to his examination. Instead, he must immediately report as soon as a

facility is designated and the examination shall be conducted as soon as possible.” It took

1As of Brown’s first motion to dismiss, the parties agreed that forty-nine days had elapsed on Brown’s

Speedy Trial clock. But the district court recalculated the elapsed days when deciding Brown’s second motion to

dismiss and concluded that the parties had been mistaken, and only forty-two days had elapsed. The district also

recognized that it erroneously excluded weekends and holidays from its 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F) calculation and

added four days. But under either calculation, forty-two non-excludable days passed before December 19, 2019.

The government now claims—in a footnote and without argument—that only thirty-five days elapsed.

Because the government failed to make this argument to the district court and has not attempted to argue that the

district court’s conclusion was clearly erroneous, we disregard this claim.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 3

eighteen days—until January 10, 2020—for the Bureau of Prisons (“BOP”) to designate FMC

Lexington for Brown’s evaluation. Yet the designation remained unresolved: This designation

was pursuant to the district court’s initial December 19 self-report order, rather than its amended

December 23 order. See United States v. Brown, No. 1:19-CR-247, 2021 WL 4804743, at *2

(N.D. Ohio Oct. 13, 2021). Fourteen days later, on January 24, BOP confirmed that FMC

Lexington would remain suitable for Brown’s evaluation under the district court’s December 23

order, after all. Id. Ten days after that, on February 3, the marshals began transporting Brown

from Ohio to FMC Lexington. Id. Four days later, on February 7, Brown arrived. Id.

B.

The Speedy Trial Act requires the government to try a defendant within seventy days

from indictment or arraignment, whichever is later, with certain days excluded from the

calculation. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1), (h)(1).

Transporting a defendant to a competency evaluation is one such exclusion. When a

court orders that a defendant be transported to a competency evaluation, the government has ten

days to get the defendant to the facility. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F). We will refer to this as the

“transportation period.” The ten-day transportation period starts with the order directing

transportation and ends with the defendant’s arrival at the facility. United States v. Turner, 602

F.3d 778, 782-83 (6th Cir. 2010). Any time beyond that is presumed unreasonable and is

included in the defendant’s Speedy Trial clock calculation. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F). The

government may rebut that presumption of unreasonableness “[i]f legitimate problems arise in

transporting a defendant[.]” Turner, 602 F.3d at 785.

When reviewing a denial of a motion to dismiss on Speedy Trial Act grounds, we review

the district court’s legal conclusions de novo and its factual findings for clear error. United

States v. Sobh, 571 F.3d 600, 602 (6th Cir. 2009). We review whether the district court properly

excluded certain days from the Speedy Trial clock for abuse of discretion. United States

v. Richardson, 681 F.3d 736, 739 (6th Cir. 2012).

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 4

C.

Brown alleges that his rights under the Speedy Trial Act were first violated when thirty-

six countable days elapsed between the court’s December 23, 2019, transportation order and his

February 7, 2020, arrival at FMC Lexington.

Did the December 23 order trigger the ten-day transportation period?

We first consider whether the district court’s December 23 order, which directed that

“[Brown] must immediately report as soon as a facility is designated and the examination shall

be conducted as soon as possible[,]” qualified as a transportation order triggering the ten-day

transportation period in 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F). Brown argues that it did. The government

disagrees. It instead argues that the transportation period started on January 24, 2020, when BOP

designated FMC Lexington for Brown’s evaluation. Because this is a legal question, we review

it de novo. See United States v. Zabawa, 719 F.3d 555, 561 (6th Cir. 2013) (reviewing de novo a

district court’s conclusion that a delay in transportation did not count toward the defendant’s

Speedy Trial clock).

When a district court issues one order concerning the evaluation and transportation of a

defendant, the order qualifies as an “order directing . . . transportation.” See Turner, 602 F.3d at

784 (“Here, the court’s first order covered evaluation and transportation, which satisfies the

requirement of an ‘order directing . . . transportation.’” (quoting 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F))). 2

This order directing transportation starts the ten-day transportation period. Id. at 782 (“The

relevant period under § 3161(h)(1)(F) beg[ins] with the order directing [] transportation and

end[s] with the defendant’s arrival at the destination.” (quotations omitted)). BOP’s designation

of a facility is irrelevant to the transportation period. Id. at 784 (“The statute says nothing about

the designation of a specific institution; it refers only to the ‘transportation of any defendant . . .

to and from places of examination or hospitalization,’ and starts counting days on ‘the date . . .

[of] an order directing such transportation.’” (alterations in original) (quoting 18 U.S.C.

2The district court’s order in Turner read: “Further, as part of this Order, the United States Marshal and the

Bureau of Prisons are hereby directed to conduct the transportation and the evaluation of the defendant in an

appropriate, expeditious manner.” Turner, 602 F.3d at 783.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 5

§ 3161(h)(1)(F))). The district court here directed Brown’s transportation in its December 23

order. That is when the ten-day transportation period began.

The government argues semantics. It agrees that an order both requiring a defendant’s

evaluation and directing his transportation starts the ten-day transportation period. Yet it denies

that the December 23 order was such a two-in-one evaluate-and-transport order. Instead, the

government fixates on the order’s requirement that Brown be transported “as soon as a facility is

designated.” This phrase, the government argues, makes the order to transport Brown

conditional on the designation of a facility. In the government’s view, such a “conditional

transportation order” does not trigger the ten-day transportation period until BOP designates a

facility.

But this is a distinction without a difference. Any transportation order that does not name

a facility is conditioned on the designation of a facility—after all, where would the government

be transporting the defendant if it had not yet designated a facility? The “conditionality” of

Brown’s transportation order is meaningless. Turner is clear that Brown’s December 23

designate-and-transport order started the ten-day transportation period.

The district court could have averted the issues instigated by the designation delay if it

had filed two orders: one directing the designation of a facility for Brown’s evaluation, and then,

upon the designation of a facility, a second order directing the marshals to transport Brown. See

id. at 784 (implying that when a district court issues a facility designation order, then—upon the

facility’s designation—issues a separate transportation order, the ten-day transportation period

begins running upon the transportation order). The government claims that the district court’s

order accomplished the same goal as Turner’s two-order suggestion, albeit in one order. But the

government misses the point: Turner dictates that when a district court orders the evaluation and

transportation of a defendant in a single order, that one order is considered a transportation

order. Such is the case with the district court’s order that “[Brown] must immediately report as

soon as a facility is designated and the examination shall be conducted as soon as possible.”

That order “covered evaluation and transportation, which satisfies the requirement of an ‘order

directing . . . transportation.’” Id. (quoting 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F)). Had the district court

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 6

intended for the orders to be read separately, it could have issued two separate orders—as it did

later in the proceedings, when Brown required a second competency hearing.

In short, the ten-day transportation period started on December 23, 2019, when the

district court issued its transportation order. Brown’s transportation concluded on February 7,

2020, meaning that he spent thirty-six days in transportation beyond the excepted ten-day

transportation period. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F).

Did the government rebut the presumption that the thirty-six-day delay was unreasonable?

These thirty-six days are presumptively unreasonable and, unless the government rebuts

the presumption, count toward Brown’s Speedy Trial clock. The government may rebut this

presumption of unreasonableness if it provides evidence that there were legitimate logistical

issues in arranging transportation, see Turner, 602 F.3d at 785, or that the delay was the

prisoner’s fault, see Zabawa, 719 F.3d at 562 (finding that delays caused by a defendant’s

injuries from fighting, a hunger strike, and disciplinary violations were the defendant’s fault, thus

rebutting the presumption of unreasonableness). The government cannot rebut the presumption

by vaguely relying on logistical difficulties. Turner, 602 F.3d at 783.3 We review this

application of the Speedy Trial Act for abuse of discretion. See Richardson, 681 F.3d at 739.

The government has done very little to rebut the presumption of unreasonableness on

appeal. It only claimed that the “legitimate problems” leading to the delay included the “rapid

change in circumstances brought about by Brown’s bond violation, his sudden return to custody,

and the revocation of his ability to self-report.” It also asserted that “Brown has not shown the

court erred in finding that the government had rebutted the presumption.” But this argument

improperly shirks the burden of proof and passes it to Brown: The government must rebut the

presumption of unreasonableness. And here, the government’s vague reference to the

“legitimate problems” it faced do not rebut that presumption. The three “legitimate problems”

3For example, the Fifth Circuit found that the government did not rebut the presumption by relying on

budgetary constraints or the “showing of diligent effort.” United States v. Castle, 906 F.2d 134, 137 (5th Cir. 1990).

The Ninth Circuit found that delays for “matters of economy”—to accommodate the group transport of prisoners—

do not rebut the presumption of unreasonableness. United States v. Taylor, 821 F.2d 1377, 1384 (9th Cir. 1987),

rev’d on other grounds, 487 U.S. 326 (1988).

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 7

the government cites are three ways of stating the same problem: that Brown was initially

ordered to self-report to the facility, but four days later, the government was instead ordered to

transport him. The government does not explain why this four-day change caused such

disruption to Brown’s transportation that it took forty-six days to move him from Ohio to FMC

Lexington. Rather, these are the type of vague logistical difficulties which we held insufficient

to rebut the presumption of reasonableness in Turner. See Turner, 602 F.3d at 783 (holding that

“vaguely relying” on logistical difficulties cannot rebut the presumption of unreasonableness).

Because the government did not sufficiently brief this issue on appeal, we return to the

record. The only evidence the government presented regarding the delay was the affidavit of

Jeffrey Oleksiak, the Marshals Service investigative analyst tasked with arranging Brown’s

transportation to his evaluation.

Oleksiak’s affidavit is largely repetitive of the facts already presented. He stated that he

received initial notice “[o]n or about” December 19 indicating that BOP would designate a

facility where Brown was to self-report. He then learned “[o]n or about” December 23 that the

court remanded Brown to the custody of the marshals.

Oleksiak then pinned the delay on BOP. He explained that BOP’s process of designating

a facility for a defendant who is on bond is different from its process of designating a facility for

a defendant who is in custody, because “the holding facility completes a medical report that must

be reviewed and considered by BOP in making their final designation.”

So, “on or about” December 23, Oleksiak informed BOP that the court remanded Brown,

and BOP confirmed it would review Brown’s medical report. “On” January 10, BOP notified

Oleksiak that it had designated FMC Lexington based on the December 19 order, but that it was

not sure if that designation would remain in light of Brown’s December 23 remand. “On”

January 24, BOP notified Oleksiak that it would allow Brown to maintain his designation of

FMC Lexington. That day, Oleksiak started arranging transportation with the marshals. “On or

about” January 29, the marshals confirmed they could transport Brown. “On or about” February

3, the marshals began transporting Brown. Brown arrived at FMC Lexington on February 7.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 8

After reviewing Oleksiak’s affidavit, we are left with more questions than answers about

the delay in designating FMC Lexington for Brown’s evaluation.

Because Oleksiak is affiliated with the Marshals Service, he could not shed light on

BOP’s inability to designate a facility for Brown, despite blaming it for the delay. Although

Oleksiak referenced a medical report, he did not explain why it took BOP twenty-two days—

from December 19 to January 10—to designate FMC Lexington in the first place, even when it

knew around December 23 that Brown had been remanded to custody. Likewise, he failed to

explain why it took BOP until January 24—more than a month from the order, and another

fourteen days from the initial designation—to decide that FMC Lexington would still be suitable

for Brown’s evaluation. If BOP had a legitimate explanation for these delays, the government

should have offered evidence to that effect, rather than relying on a non-BOP witness.4

And although Oleksiak arranged Brown’s transportation with the marshals, he did not

explain why it took the service ten days—between January 24 and February 3—to start

transporting Brown to FMC Lexington, when the district court ordered that Brown “immediately

report as soon as a facility is designated.”

In short, the government’s explanation for the delay leaves large swaths of the calendar

unaccounted for and does not rebut the presumption of unreasonableness. See 18 U.S.C.

§ 3161(h)(1)(F). The “government offers no handhold for rebutting the presumption that it

should not take the marshals more than ten days to transport an inmate from a prison to the site

of a competency examination.” Turner, 602 F.3d at 783. The district court abused its discretion

in finding otherwise. So, thirty-six days are added to Brown’s clock. With seventy-eight days

on his Speedy Trial clock, Brown surpassed the Speedy Trial Act’s seventy-day limit. See

18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1). On this argument alone, we vacate Brown’s conviction. See 18 U.S.C.

§ 3162(a)(2).

4During a hearing on this issue, the district court itself noted that BOP “isn’t the same as the U.S. Marshal,

two different entities, and then there’s no indication that the Marshals have authority over the Bureau to require

them to designate.”

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 9

D.

Brown also argues that six more days should count toward the clock, based on the delay

in returning him to custody following his evaluation. His argument is meritless. Brown arrived

back in Ohio on March 25, 2020, but the psychiatric report arrived weeks later, on April 17. The

period between the examination and the arrival of the report can be excluded as delay resulting

from a competency proceeding, even if the transportation exception does not apply. See 18

U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(A).

II. Brown’s Ends of Justice Continuance Claim

A.

In July 2021, Brown moved to dismiss the indictment under the Speedy Trial Act,

alleging, as above, that the time the government took to transport him to FMC Lexington went

beyond the ten-day time limit for transportation under 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F). The district

court held two hearings on the matter. Following the second hearing on August 25, the district

court took the motion under advisement, meaning it had thirty days to issue an order before

Brown’s Speedy Trial clock began to run again. United States v. Moran, 998 F.2d 1368, 1371

(6th Cir. 1993). Forty-nine days later, on October 13, the district court denied Brown’s first

motion to dismiss.

Twenty-one days later, on November 3, 2021, Brown filed his second motion to dismiss

under the Speedy Trial Act, arguing that (1) the nineteen extra days the district court took when

it had his first motion under advisement—September 24 to October 13—and (2) the twenty-one

days between the court’s order denying his first motion to dismiss and his second—October 13

to November 3—brought his Speedy Trial clock over the threshold of seventy countable days.

The district court denied Brown’s motion. It first agreed with Brown and concluded that

nineteen non-excludable days elapsed while it was deciding the first motion to dismiss and

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 10

should be added to Brown’s Speedy Trial clock. This brought Brown’s elapsed days from forty-

six5 to sixty-five.

But the court denied Brown’s second argument. It retroactively placed an ends-of-justice

continuance on the record between October 13, when it denied Brown’s first motion to dismiss,

and November 3, when Brown filed his second motion to dismiss. The court provided a limited

justification for the continuance:

[T]he court held a Pretrial Status Conference in the case in a reasonable period of

time following the court’s order, and provided notice of the conference on

October 18, 2021, just five days after the court’s order. Second, this is consistent

with the circumstances under which the court had routinely placed ends-of-justice

continuances on the record while awaiting the next procedural steps in the

case. . . . This is no different. In doing so, the court considered its schedule as

well as anticipated when counsel might reasonably be available under the

circumstances.

R. 68, 342 (citation omitted). Brown eventually pled guilty to three charges pursuant to a plea

agreement, was sentenced to thirty-eight months in prison—thirty-three of which he had already

served in pretrial detention—and has since begun his three years of supervised release. Brown

was also ordered to pay restitution of $177,716.07.

B.

The Speedy Trial Act allows for a continuance whenever a district court finds “that the

ends of justice served by taking such action outweigh the best interest of the public and the

defendant in a speedy trial.” 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(A). But this “substantive openendedness”

is balanced by “procedural strictness”: To enact an ends-of-justice continuance, the district court

must take several steps. Zedner v. United States, 547 U.S. 489, 509 (2006).

First, before the continuance begins, the district court must consider certain statutory

factors: whether the failure to grant a continuance would result in a miscarriage of justice or

make continuation of the proceeding impossible; whether the case’s unusual nature or

complexity requires extra time for preparation; whether there is a delay in filing the indictment

5As we noted earlier, while the parties initially agreed that forty-nine days had elapsed to this point, the

district court then recalculated and concluded that only forty-six days had elapsed.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 11

because of timing or complex or unusual facts; and whether the failure to grant a continuance

would deny the defendant reasonable time to obtain counsel, unreasonably deny a party

continuity of counsel, or deny a party reasonable time necessary for effective preparation. 18

U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(B). Next—but still before granting the continuance—the district court must

make findings, even “if only in the judge’s mind,” that the ends of justice would be served by a

continuance and would outweigh the defendant’s and public’s interests in a speedy trial. Zedner,

547 U.S. at 506-07. Then, by the time the district court rules on the defendant’s motion to

dismiss under § 3162(a)(2), it must put its express findings on the record, orally or in writing. Id.

We review the district court’s decision to grant an ends-of-justice continuance under

18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(A) for an abuse of discretion. United States v. Williams, 753 F.3d 626,

635 (6th Cir. 2014). A district court abuses its discretion when it does not properly place its

reasoning on the record. Richardson, 681 F.3d at 740.

C.

The question here is whether the district court abused its discretion in entering its ends-

of-justice continuance. Brown contends that it did. The government disagrees. We find that the

district court abused its discretion because it failed to conduct a proper ends-of-justice analysis

on the record, as demanded by the Speedy Trial Act. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(A).

Consider again the factors that Congress, through the Speedy Trial Act, commands

district courts to consider when contemplating an ends-of-justice continuance: whether the

failure to grant a continuance would result in a miscarriage of justice or make continuation of the

proceeding impossible; whether the case’s unusual nature or complexity requires extra time for

preparation; whether there is a delay in filing the indictment because of timing or complex or

unusual facts; and whether the failure to grant a continuance would deny the defendant

reasonable time to obtain counsel, unreasonably deny a party continuity of counsel, or deny a

party reasonable time necessary for effective preparation. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(B).

Compare these permissible factors with those that the district court listed in retroactively

entering its ends-of-justice continuance: it held a pretrial status conference after a reasonable

period of time; such scheduling was consistent with the circumstances under which it previously

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 12

granted ends-of-justice continuances; and it considered its schedule and when counsel might

reasonably be available.

The factors the district court considered here do not correlate with those the Speedy Trial

Act demands that it consider. Absent from the district court’s reasons was any explanation of the

“ends of justice” served by its continuance. The district court instead tried to rationalize the

twenty-one elapsed days by explaining that it scheduled a status conference at a reasonable time,

that it considered its own schedule6 and counsel’s availability, and that such continuances were

routine in Brown’s case.

In short, the district court’s retrospective explanation for its ends-of-justice continuance

did not meet the Speedy Trial Act’s requirement that it explain, on the record, why the ends of

justice served by the continuance outweigh the public’s and defendant’s interests in a speedy

trial. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(A). This failure constituted an abuse of discretion. Cf.

Richardson, 681 F.3d at 740. As a result, the twenty-one days are not excludable from Brown’s

Speedy Trial clock. See Zedner, 547 U.S. at 507 (“[W]ithout on-the-record findings, there can

be no exclusion[.]”); Richardson, 681 F.3d at 738-39 (warning that a delay resulting from an

ends-of-justice continuance will not be excludable from the seventy-day period unless the court,

on the record, balances the ends of justice served by the continuance versus the interests in a

speedy trial).7 With eighty-six days on his Speedy Trial clock, Brown again surpasses the

Speedy Trial Act’s seventy-day limit, even if the district court correctly disposed of Brown’s

first motion to dismiss. See 18 U.S.C. § 3162(a)(2).

6This consideration itself was improper, as the Speedy Trial Act forbids district courts from granting

continuances because of “general congestion of the court’s calendar.” 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(C).

7We also question the district court’s timing.The Speedy Trial Act requires the district court make its

ends-of-justice findings before the continuance begins. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(7)(A); Zedner, 547 U.S at 506-07.

Otherwise, the district court is improperly “invent[ing] after-the-fact findings to justify an ends of justice

continuance that ‘cannot fairly be said,’ upon review of the record, to have served as its basis for granting the

continuance.” United States v. Brown, 819 F.3d 800, 814 (6th Cir. 2016) (quoting United States v. Richmond, 735

F.2d 208, 216 (6th Cir. 1984)).

So, for the district court’s retroactive ends-of-justice continuance to be permissible, it must have been

determined by the day the continuance began—October 13, 2021—that the continuance served the ends of justice

and outweighed Brown’s and the public’s interest in a speedy trial. See Zedner, 547 U.S. at 506. Yet in its post-hoc

justification for the continuance, the district court discussed events that occurred days and weeks after October 13.

Because the district court’s ends-of-justice findings could not have been made before the continuance began, they

were improper.

No. 22-3797 United States v. Brown Page 13

III.

The district court erred when it denied each of Brown’s motions. Accordingly, we

REVERSE the district court’s decision, VACATE Brown’s convictions, and REMAND for

dismissal of the indictment with or without prejudice.8

8Because we vacate Brown’s conviction, we need not consider his challenged restitution order.