Commonwealth v. Balthazar

The defendant, Billy Balthazar, appeals from the denial of his motion for a new trial in which he sought to vacate guilty pleas that he entered in 2009, claiming that counsel’s failure to correctly advise him of the immigration consequences of those pleas deprived him of his right to the effective assistance of counsel under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and art. 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. Although we agree that counsel’s advice did not satisfy the standards articulated in Padilla v. Kentucky, 559 U.S. 356, 368-369 (2010) (Padilla), and Commonwealth…