United States v. Tracey Coad , 590 F. App'x 238 ( 2015 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 14-4276
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
TRACEY LAMONT COAD,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle
District of North Carolina, at Greensboro. James A. Beaty, Jr.,
Senior District Judge. (1:13-cr-00300-JAB-1)
Submitted: January 6, 2015 Decided: January 15, 2015
Before KEENAN and FLOYD, Circuit Judges, and DAVIS, Senior
Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Mark A. Jones, BELL, DAVIS & PITT, PA, Winston-Salem, North
Carolina, for Appellant. Ripley Rand, United States Attorney,
Andrew C. Cochran, Special Assistant United States Attorney,
Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Tracey Lamont Coad pled guilty pursuant to a plea
agreement to possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, in
violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(1), 924(e) (2012), and was
sentenced as an armed career criminal to 212 months’
imprisonment. On appeal, Coad argues that trial counsel
rendered ineffective assistance in failing to preserve any
objections to his armed career criminal status.
We decline to reach Coad’s claim of ineffective
assistance of counsel. Unless an attorney’s ineffectiveness
conclusively appears on the face of the record, ineffective
assistance claims generally are not addressed on direct appeal.
United States v. Benton, 523 F.3d 424, 435 (4th Cir. 2008).
Instead, such claims should be raised in a motion brought
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012), in order to permit
sufficient development of the record. United States v.
Baptiste, 596 F.3d 214, 216 n.1 (4th Cir. 2010). Because there
is no conclusive evidence of ineffective assistance of counsel
on the face of the record, we conclude that this claim should be
raised, if at all, in a § 2255 motion.
Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment.
We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
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contentions are adequately presented in the materials before
this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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