United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit Nos. 12-2364, 12-2367 UNITED STATES, Appellee, v. WENDELL RIVERA-RUPERTO, a/k/a Arsenio Rivera, Defendant, Appellant. APPEALS FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO [Hon. Juan M. Pérez-Giménez, U.S. District Judge] Before Torruella, Lipez, and Thompson, Circuit Judges. H. Manuel Hernández for appellant. Robert J. Heberle, Attorney, Public Integrity Section, Criminal Division, U.S. Department of Justice, with whom Francisco A. Besosa-Martínez, Assistant United States Attorney, Nelson Pérez-Sosa, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief, Appellate Division, and Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney, were on brief, for appellee. January 13, 2017 THOMPSON, Circuit Judge. This case arises out of a now- familiar, large-scale FBI investigation known as "Operation Guard Shack," in which the FBI, in an effort to root out police corruption throughout Puerto Rico, orchestrated a series of staged drug deals over the course of several years.1 For his participation in six of these Operation Guard Shack drug deals, Defendant- Appellant Wendell Rivera-Ruperto stood two trials and was found guilty of various federal drug and firearms-related crimes. The convictions resulted in Rivera-Ruperto receiving a combined sentence of 161-years and 10-months' imprisonment. Although Rivera-Ruperto raises similar challenges in his appeals from the two separate trials, each trial was presided over by a different district judge. Thus, there are two cases on appeal, and we address the various challenges today in separate opinions.2 In this present appeal from the first trial, Rivera- Ruperto argues that the district court committed reversible errors when it: (1) denied his claim for ineffective assistance of counsel during the plea-bargaining stage; (2) failed to instruct the jury that it was required to find drug quantity beyond a reasonable 1 See, e.g., United States v.
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