Whether an appellate court must review de novo a district court's determination of government negligence under the Sixth Amendment's Speedy Trial Clause, or review such determinations with deferential clear error review

and undersigned counsel’s need for additional time to prepare a petition that will assist the Court in deciding whether to grant certiorari. Importance of issue presented. Mr. Diaz Gonzalez’s petition will present an important question of constitutional law—whether an appellate court reviews de novo a district court determination that, under the Sixth Amendment’s Speedy Trial Clause, the government was not negligent in failing to prosecute timely a defendant. In Mr. Diaz Gonzalez’s case, the government obtained an indictment against him in March 2020. Despite knowing Mr. Diaz Gonzalez’s home address, the government subsequently failed to arrest him for nearly four years. After Mr. Diaz Gonzalez was brought to federal court in October 2023 and appointed counsel, he filed a motion to dismiss the indictment based on a violation of the Speedy Trial Clause. The district court denied the motion. In applying the four-factor balancing test established by Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514 (1972), the district court concluded that the second, and most important, factor— whether the government’s delay in prosecuting Mr. Diaz Gonzalez was justified—weighed in favor of the government because its efforts to arrest Mr. Diaz Gonzalez were reasonable under the circumstances. On appeal, Mr. Diaz Gonzalez again argued that the delay between his indictment and trial violated the Speedy Trial Clause. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court. At the second Barker factor, the court concluded that it must review with considerable deference the district court’s determination that the government acted with reasonable diligence in prosecuting Mr. Diaz Gonzalez’s case. The court cited in support Doggett v. United States, 505 U.S. 647 (1992), which similarly addressed a Speedy Trial Clause claim. In Doggett, this Court considered the district court’s determination that the government failed diligently to seek the defendant’s arrest and explained that it “review[s] trial court determinations of negligence with considerable deference.” Id. at 652. The Ninth Circuit’s decision highlighted the fact that this Court’s conclusion in Doggett—that a trial court’s determination as to whether the government was negligent in failing to prosecute timely the defendant must be reviewed with “considerable deference’—makes the standard of appellate review for claims under the Speedy Trial Clause an outlier relative to other constitutional protections. Elsewhere, this Court has explained that mixed questions of fact and law relating to constitutional rights protected by the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendments are reviewed de novo, “even when answering a mixed question primarily resolves plunging into a factual record.” U.S. Bank. Nat. Ass’n ex rel. CWCapital Asset Mgmt. LLC v. Village at Lakeridge, LLC, 583 U.S. 387, 396 n.4 (2018) (collecting cases). The Ninth Circuit’s decision also emphasized a long-standing circuit split concerning the appropriate standard of appellate review for each Barker factor. The Ninth Circuit, as well as the Second, Third, Eighth, and Eleventh Circuits, frame a district court’s conclusion regarding the second Barker factor as a factual finding reviewed for clear error. United States v. Sperow, 494 F.3d 1223, 1226 (9th Cir. 2007);, United States v. Cabral, 979 F.3d 150, 158 (2d Cir. 2020); United States v. Velasquez, 749 F.3d 161, 176 (3d Cir. 2014); United States v. Erenas-Luna, 560 F.3d 772, 77 (8th Cir. 2009); United States v. Vargas, 97 F.4th 1277, 1285, 1290 (11th Cir. 2024); see also United States v. Brown, 169 F.3d 344, 349-50 (6th Cir. 1999). The D.C. Circuit and the Fifth Circuit, however, consider the district court’s conclusions regarding each Barker factor as