Hendrix v. Bridges

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
• Decided: April 9, 2025
• Docket: 24-5112
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

Appellate Case: 24-5112 Document: 11-1 Date Filed: 04/09/2025 Page: 1 FILED United States Court of Appeals UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS Tenth Circuit

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT April 9, 2025 _________________________________ Christopher M. Wolpert Clerk of Court JIMMY GLENN HENDRIX,

Petitioner - Appellant,

v. No. 24-5112 (D.C. No. 4:23-CV-00322-JFH-JFJ) CARRIE BRIDGES, Warden, (N.D. Okla.)

Respondent - Appellee. _________________________________

ORDER DENYING A CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY _________________________________

Before MATHESON, BACHARACH, and CARSON, Circuit Judges. _________________________________

This matter arises on a request by the petitioner, Mr. Jimmy

Glenn Hendrix, for a certificate of appealability. Mr. Hendrix needs

the certificate to appeal from the denial of federal habeas relief

following a state-court conviction. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(A).

Mr. Hendrix sought habeas relief based on a denial of due

process when an Oklahoma trial court vacated a conviction and then

reinstated it. We can grant the certificate only upon a showing of a

substantial denial of a constitutional right. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). In

our view, Mr. Hendrix hasn’t made that showing.

Mr. Hendrix was convicted in Oklahoma state court on a charge

of murder. The conviction became final in 2010. Roughly a decade Appellate Case: 24-5112 Document: 11-1 Date Filed: 04/09/2025 Page: 2

later, the Supreme Court held in McGirt v. Oklahoma, 591 U.S. 894,

897–98 (2020), that

 Congress had not disestablished the Muscogee (Creek) Reservation and

 Oklahoma had lacked jurisdiction to prosecute Native Americans for crimes committed on the reservation.

In light of McGirt, the trial court vacated Mr. Hendrix’s

conviction. After the vacatur, however, the State moved to reinstate

the conviction; and the trial court granted the State’s motion. Mr.

Hendrix unsuccessfully appealed in state court, arguing that

reinstatement of the conviction had resulted in a denial of due

process. Mr. Hendrix renewed the argument in federal habeas

proceedings, but the district court denied habeas relief. He wants to

appeal that denial.

We rejected a virtually identical claim in Graham v. White, 101

F.4th 1199 (10th Cir. 2024). There too, the state trial court vacated

the conviction and reinstated it, relying on the Oklahoma Court of

Criminal Appeals’ conclusion that McGirt didn’t apply to convictions

that had become final. We concluded that this sequence of events

didn’t show a failure to reasonably apply Supreme Court precedent

on due process. Id. at 1202–04, 1208–10.

Mr. Hendrix questions the correction of Graham, but it is

subject to review only by the Supreme Court or our court when 2 Appellate Case: 24-5112 Document: 11-1 Date Filed: 04/09/2025 Page: 3

convening en banc. See Thompson v. Weyerhaeuser Co., 582 F.3d

1125, 1130 (10th Cir. 2009). Our panel is thus obligated to follow

Graham, which forecloses habeas relief here.

Mr. Hendrix also argues that the state trial court never had

jurisdiction, which would have prevented reinstatement of the

conviction. In effect, he argues that the continuing existence of the

Creek Reservation compelled the only action the trial court could

take, which was to vacate his conviction and release him, regardless

of state procedural requirements for postconviction relief.

We may deny a certificate of appealability on any basis evident

in the record. See Davis v. Roberts, 425 F.3d 830, 834 (10th Cir.

2005). And the record shows that Mr. Hendrix didn’t exhaust this

argument because he failed to present this theory to the Oklahoma

Court of Criminal Appeals. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1)(A). Given the

failure to exhaust this theory, we decline to issue a certificate of

appealability on this basis.

Accordingly, we deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss

this matter.

Entered for the Court

Robert E. Bacharach Circuit Judge