Patrick Hall v. United States

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
• Decided: April 24, 2026
• Docket: 25-10180
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

USCA11 Case: 25-10180 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 04/24/2026 Page: 1 of 3

NOT FOR PUBLICATION

In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 25-10180 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________

PATRICK DEWAYNE HALL, Petitioner-Appellant, versus

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Respondent-Appellee. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama D.C. Docket No. 2:19-cv-08032-LSC ____________________

Before NEWSOM, BRASHER, and BLACK, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Patrick Hall appeals the district court’s denial of his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion to vacate his sentence. We granted a certificate of appealability on a single issue: “Whether the district court violated USCA11 Case: 25-10180 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 04/24/2026 Page: 2 of 3

2 Opinion of the Court 25-10180

Clisby v. Jones, 960 F.2d 925 (11th Cir. 1992), by failing to address, on remand, Hall’s claims that trial counsel was ineffective for mis- advising him that he had to plead guilty to all charges.” After re- view, 1 we affirm. Under Clisby, a district court must resolve all claims for relief raised in a § 2255 motion. Id. at 935-38; Rhode v. United States, 583 F.3d 1289, 1291 (11th Cir. 2009) (holding that Clisby applies to § 2255 motions). If the district court did not resolve all raised claims, then we must vacate and remand for the district court to address any claims that it did not resolve. See Clisby, 960 F.2d at 938. In this case, the district court did not violate Clisby because it adequately resolved Hall’s claim that his counsel misadvised him that he had to plead guilty to all charges. In its order denying Hall’s § 2255 motion on remand, the district court explicitly concluded that this claim was not meritorious. The district court did so in one sentence but relied on its reasoning in rejecting a different claim that trial counsel misadvised Hall about his potential sentence prior to pleading guilty. Reviewing the district court’s order, it is clear that the court rejected the claim at issue in this appeal because (1) it found Hall’s testimony at the evidentiary hearing about trial counsel’s advice prior to the guilty-plea hearing to be not credible, and (2) even if

1 We review de novo whether a district court violated Clisby. See Dupree v. War-

den, 715 F.3d 1295, 1298 (11th Cir. 2013). USCA11 Case: 25-10180 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 04/24/2026 Page: 3 of 3

25-10180 Opinion of the Court 3

trial counsel misadvised Hall, Hall could not establish prejudice in light of the plea colloquy. The district court’s order is sufficiently clear such that we can infer all of the “analytic steps” that the court took whether or not they were expressly laid out. See Senter v. United States, 983 F.3d 1289, 1294 (11th Cir. 2020). The district court’s order got “to the root of the problem” of Hall’s misadvice claim, so even if the court slightly reframed the claim, doing so was within its discretion. See id. Additionally, by holding an evidentiary hearing and eliciting briefing on all of the issues that we outlined in our opinion in Hall’s prior appeal, the district court developed “a record sufficient to facilitate our re- view.” See Long v. United States, 626 F.3d 1167, 1170 (11th Cir. 2010). For these reasons, the district court resolved Hall’s misad- vice claim “to an extent that makes it amenable to a meaningful review on appeal.” Senter, 983 F.3d at 1294. Thus, the district court did not violate Clisby. AFFIRMED.