Tenth Circuit finds undue judicial involvement in plea deal

I‘ve just seen an interesting opinion released late Friday by the Tenth Circuit concerning plea practices.  Here is the opening paragraph of US v. Cano-Varela, No. 06-8020 (8th Cir. Aug. 10, 2007) (available here):

Marco Antonio Cano-Varela entered a pretrial status conference disappointed with the plea deal his lawyer had helped negotiate and displeased with his lawyer’s provision of Spanish-language discovery materials.  He intended to request a change of counsel so that he could go to trial on drug charges. During the conference, however, the district court informed Mr. Cano- Varela that he would potentially face a vastly longer sentence if he went to trial and was convicted than if he pleaded guilty.  Two weeks later, Mr. Cano-Varela accepted the government’s plea deal.  We hold that the district court violated Rule 11(c)(1)(C)’s prohibition against judicial participation in plea negotiations by comparing, before Mr. Cano-Varela and the government had reached a plea agreement, the potential penal consequences of pleading guilty versus going to trial. We therefore vacate Mr. Cano-Varela’s guilty plea and sentence.