United States v. Crisp

573 F. App'x 706
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
DecidedJuly 25, 2014
Docket13-5146
StatusUnpublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 573 F. App'x 706 (United States v. Crisp) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States v. Crisp, 573 F. App'x 706 (10th Cir. 2014).

Opinion

ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY

HARRIS L. HARTZ, Circuit Judge.

Defendant Michael Crisp, a federal prisoner, filed a motion for relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma. The district court denied his motion as untimely. Defendant now seeks a certificate of appealability (COA) from this court to pursue an appeal. See 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(B) (requiring a COA to appeal denial of § 2255 application). He argues that his motion was not untimely because it came within one year of Supreme Court decisions establishing a newly recognized right. He also challenges 10th Cir. R. 22.1(A), which requires applicants to file a brief when seeking a COA from this court. We deny a COA, reject the challenge to our local rule, and dismiss the appeal.

I. BACKGROUND

Defendant was indicted for possession with intent to distribute more than 50 grams of cocaine base. The cocaine was discovered after a search of his mother’s home. Defendant challenged admission of the cocaine in the district court, arguing that the search exceeded the scope of his mother’s consent. He also challenged the admission of self-incriminating statements. After the district court denied the motions to suppress, Defendant pleaded guilty under a plea agreement and generally waived his right to appeal, but he preserved his rights to appeal the decision on the motions to suppress and to file claims in a § 2255 motion “based on ineffective assistance of counsel which challenge the validity of the guilty plea or this waiver.” Plea Agreement at 3, United States v. Crisp, No. 08-CR-158-GKF (ND.Okla. Nov. 25, 2008). He was sentenced to 276 months’ imprisonment. He appealed the refusal to suppress his self-incriminating statements, although not the denial of his motion to suppress the cocaine, and this court affirmed his conviction. See United States v. Crisp, 371 Fed.Appx. 925 (10th Cir.2010).

Our decision on Defendant’s appeal was filed on April 5, 2010. Defendant did not seek rehearing or petition for certiorari. On May 7, 2012, he filed a pro se motion for relief under § 2255, arguing (1) that a previous conviction did not qualify as a felony conviction under federal law and should not have been used to enhance his sentence, and (2) that the search of his mother’s house was unlawful. The government moved to dismiss the motion on the grounds that it was untimely and that Defendant raised issues waived in the plea *708 agreement. Defendant retained counsel and moved to amend his § 2255 motion to include a claim for ineffective assistance of appellate counsel based on counsel’s failure to appeal the district court’s denial of his motion to suppress evidence found in the search. The district court dismissed the § 2255 motion as untimely, and Defendant now seeks a COA from this court.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Standard of Review

A COA will issue “only if the applicant has made a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2258(c)(2). This standard requires “a demonstration that ... includes showing that reasonable jurists could debate whether (or, for that matter, agree that) the petition should have been resolved in a different manner or that the issues presented were adequate to deserve encouragement to proceed further.” Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484, 120 S.Ct. 1595, 146 L.Ed.2d 542 (2000) (internal quotation marks omitted). In other words, the applicant must show that the district court’s resolution of the constitutional claim was either “debatable or wrong.” Id. If the application was denied on procedural grounds, the applicant faces a double hurdle. Not only must the applicant make a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right, but he must also show “that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.” Id. “Where a plain procedural bar is present and the district court is correct to invoke it to dispose of the case, a reasonable jurist could not conclude either that the district court erred in dismissing the petition or that the petitioner should be allowed to proceed further.” Id. While the inquiry into whether a COA should issue “does not require full consideration of the factual or legal bases adduced in support of the claims,” Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336, 123 S.Ct. 1029, 154 L.Ed.2d 931 (2003), “[a] prisoner seeking a COA must prove something more than the absence of frivolity or the existence of mere good faith on his or her part,” id. at 338, 123 S.Ct. 1029 (internal quotation marks omitted).

B. Timeliness of Habeas Petition

Defendant’s sole argument in support of timeliness is that reasonable jurists could debate whether his § 2255 motion was filed within one year of the initial recognition by the Supreme Court of a “right [that] has been newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review.” 28 U.S.C. § 2255(f)(3). He relies on the Supreme Court decisions in Missouri v. Frye, - U.S. -, 132 S.Ct. 1399, 182 L.Ed.2d 379 (2012), and Lafler v. Coo per,- U.S.-, 132 S.Ct. 1376, 182 L.Ed.2d 398 (2012), both of which addressed a defendant’s right to effective 'assistance of counsel when entering a guilty plea. But neither decision recognized a new right.

Defendant concedes that we held in In re Graham, 714 F.3d 1181, 1183 (10th Cir.2013), that Frye and Lafler “do not establish a new rule of constitutional law.” Nevertheless, he attempts to distinguish Graham on the ground that it was not applying § 2255(f), but rather § 2255(h), which concerns whether a prisoner is allowed to bring a second or successive § 2255 motion. We are not persuaded. We resolved the substance of Defendant’s issue in Graham when we observed that “[t]he Supreme Court’s language in Lafler and Frye confirm that the cases are merely an application of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, as defined in Strickland [v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984) ], to *709 a specific factual context.” 714 F.3d at 1183 (internal quotation marks omitted). Of particular significance is that both Frye and Lafler were decided in postconviction proceedings.

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Bluebook (online)
573 F. App'x 706, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-v-crisp-ca10-2014.