Notable pending cert petition asks Justices to resolve split over reach of appeal waivers in a notable setting

I recently noticed that an intriguing and distinctive federal case that I heard about some months ago was flagged here as a “Petition of the Week” over at  SCOTUSblog.  I recommend the full SCOTUSblog post for the case details, but here is the start and close of that post:

The vast majority of criminal cases — 98% of those in federal court, and 95% of those in state court — are resolved through plea bargains.  As a condition for pursuing a lesser conviction or shorter sentence, prosecutors may also require someone who pleads guilty to a crime to sign away their right to appeal.  This week, we highlight petitions that ask the court to consider, among other things, whether a plea deal with an explicit waiver of the right to appeal bars defendants from later asking a court to vacate their conviction if the conduct of which they were accused, it turns out, was not a crime at all….

In Khadr v. United States, Khadr asks the justices to grant review and reverse the D.C. Circuit’s ruling.  He argues that the courts of appeals are divided over whether criminal defendants can  ever waive their right to argue that their conviction was legally invalid by pleading guilty. Just as “[p]lea agreements based upon non-criminal conduct cannot” support a conviction, Khadr writes, nor do general waivers of appeal “bar appellants from seeking review of their convictions for conduct that is not criminal.”

The full cert petition in Khadr is available at this link, and here is how it presents the question that the Justices will consider at a conference later this month:

Plea agreements often include a general waiver of the right to appeal. Circuits are divided over whether the inclusion of such a term bars a defendant from bringing a direct appeal of a conviction, when a subsequent controlling judicial decision has held that the conduct to which the defendant pled guilty was not a crime.  The Second, Third, and Fourth Circuits hold that an appeal may proceed.  In the decision below, a divided panel of the D.C. Circuit joined the Seventh and Ninth Circuits in holding that it may not.

Does a plea agreement that includes a general appellate waiver foreclose a direct appeal when a defendant has pled guilty to conduct that was not criminal?