Page:Jones v. Hendrix.pdf/56

24 purported finality goals. Consider two individuals who have been convicted of the same federal crime—perhaps two codefendants who were tried and sentenced together. Both complete their direct appeals, but only one files a §2255 motion within AEDPA’s statute of limitations, while the other one decides not to or misses the deadline. If §2255(h) bars a successive petition raising a legal innocence claim, then when Rehaif is handed down—altering the elements of the crime of conviction such that both prisoners have a colorable claim of legal innocence—only the one who did not previously file a §2255 petition can raise this retroactive statutory innocence claim.

Reference to Congress’s interest in “finality” cannot explain this odd unequal treatment. Under the Court’s interpretation, a prisoner whose conviction became final 30 years ago can assert a Rehaif claim if he never previously filed a §2255 motion, whereas someone whose conviction became final 2 years ago cannot if he has already had a §2255 petition adjudicated.

Interpreting §2255(h) as completely foreclosing successive petitions bringing statutory innocence claims also places prisoners in an untenable catch-22 that cannot be what any rational Congress actually intended. Consider what has happened in this very case. Per AEDPA’s statute of limitations, Jones had to file his first §2255 petition within one year of his conviction becoming final. §2255(f). He did so, and that petition was successful; the Eighth Circuit found that Jones had received ineffective assistance of counsel. United States v. Jones, 403 F. 3d 604, 605 (2005). In the majority’s view, by seeking to vindicate his Sixth Amendment rights in this way, Jones has forfeited, forever