Editing Jonathan Pollard (section)

===Appeals===
In 1989, Pollard's attorneys filed a motion for withdrawal of his guilty plea and trial by jury due to the government's failure to abide by terms of the plea agreement. The motion was denied.<ref>''United States v. Jonathan Jay Pollard'', 747 F. Supp. 797 (1990).</ref> An appeals court affirmed the denial.<ref>United States v. Pollard, 959 F.2d 1011, 295 U.S. App. D.C. 7, 1992 U.S. App. LEXIS 4695 (1992).</ref> Several years later, with a different attorney, Pollard filed a petition for ''[[habeas corpus]]''. A panel of the [[U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit]] ruled two-to-one to deny Pollard's petition, due primarily to the failure of Pollard's original attorneys to file his appeal in a timely manner. Judge [[Stephen F. Williams]] dissented, "because the government's breach of the plea agreement was a fundamental miscarriage of justice requiring relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2255".<ref>''United States v. Pollard'', No. 90-3276 (D.C.)</ref>

In July 2005, Pollard again filed a motion for a new trial, this time on the grounds of ineffective assistance of counsel. He also sought access to classified documents pertinent to his new lawyers' efforts in preparing a [[clemency]] petition. The Court of Appeals rejected both arguments. During February 2006, his attorneys filed a petition for ''[[certiorari]]'' with the [[United States Supreme Court]] regarding access to the classified documents. They argued that the [[separation of powers]] doctrine is a flexible doctrine that does not dictate the complete separation of the three branches of Government from one another. The brief claimed that the Court of Appeals violated this principle in asserting ''[[sua sponte]]'' that the judiciary has no jurisdiction over the classified documents due to the fact that access was for the ultimate purpose of clemency, an executive function. The Supreme Court denied the cert petition in March 2006, ruling that the president's clemency power would be wholly unaffected by successor counsel's access to the classified documents, and that the classified documents were sealed by a protective order, a judicial procedure.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.jonathanpollard.org/2006/020806.htm|title=New Pollard Petition Filed in U.S. Supreme Court}}</ref>