United States v. Nigel Baptiste ( 2013 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 13-6617
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
NIGEL HUMPHREY JOHN BAPTISTE,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Maryland, at Baltimore. Richard D. Bennett, District Judge.
(1:06-cr-00171-RDB-3; 1:11-cv-01356-RDB)
Submitted: June 20, 2013 Decided: June 26, 2013
Before GREGORY, DUNCAN, and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.
Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
C. Justin Brown, LAW OFFICE OF C. JUSTIN BROWN, Baltimore,
Maryland, for Appellant. John Francis Purcell, Jr., Assistant
United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Nigel Humphrey John Baptiste seeks to appeal the
district court’s order denying relief on his 28 U.S.C.A. § 2255
(West Supp. 2013) motion. The order is not appealable unless a
circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability.
28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(B) (2006). A certificate of
appealability will not issue absent “a substantial showing of
the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2)
(2006). When the district court denies relief on the merits, a
prisoner satisfies this standard by demonstrating that
reasonable jurists would find that the district court’s
assessment of the constitutional claims is debatable or wrong.
Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); see Miller-El v.
Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003). When the district court
denies relief on procedural grounds, the prisoner must
demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural ruling is
debatable, and that the motion states a debatable claim of the
denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. at 484-85.
We have independently reviewed the record and conclude
that Baptiste has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly,
we deny Baptiste’s motion for a certificate of appealability and
dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the
facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the
2
materials before this court and argument would not aid the
decisional process.
DISMISSED
3