Hunter v. United States · ¶21

The question then becomes whether that right to enforce has limits (beyond any stated in the agreement itself) and, if so, what they are. It is common ground that an appeal waiver, like the rest of a plea agreement, must be knowing and voluntary to be valid and thus to be enforceable. See Brady v. United States, 397 U. S. 742, 748 (1970).Related to that settled rule is another: An appeal waiver, again like the rest of the agreement, is not knowing and voluntary if it was the product of ineffective assistance of counsel. See Hill v. Lockhart, 474 U. S. 52, 56 (1985) (“[T]he voluntariness of [a] plea depends on whether counsel's advice was within the range of competence demanded of attorneys in criminal cases”). So an appeal waiver tainted by ineffective assistance is not enforceable.Putting that to the side, the Fifth Circuit, as noted above, holds appeal waivers unenforceable in only…

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