David Monroe v. United States

GODBOLD, Circuit Judge:

We agree with defendant-appellant that the district court erred in denying his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion to vacate. The motion raised the issue of whether the federal district court had failed to comply with provisions of Rule 11, Fed.R.Crim.P., in accepting defendant’s plea of guilty to second degree murder pursuant to which he was given a 20-year sentence. Defendant, then a federal prison inmate, was indicted under 18 U.S.C. § 1111 on a charge of first degree murder in connection with the knife killing of another prisoner in a scuffle. He entered a plea of not guilty.…