United States v. Betea

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 10-7015
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff – Appellee,
v.
JERMAINE BETEA,
Defendant – Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Alexandria. Claude M. Hilton, Senior
District Judge. (1:09-cv-01414-CMH; 1:06-cr-00305-CMH-7)
Submitted: March 11, 2011 Decided: March 18, 2011
Before GREGORY and KEENAN, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior
Circuit Judge.
Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Jermaine Betea, Appellant Pro Se. James Philip Gillis, Michael
Edward Rich, Assistant United States Attorneys, Alexandria,
Virginia, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Jermaine Betea seeks to appeal the district court’s
orders denying relief on his 28 U.S.C.A. § 2255 (West Supp.
2010) motion and denying his motion to alter or amend judgment.
The orders are not appealable unless a circuit justice or judge
issues a certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)
(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 Betea has not made the requisite showing.
Accordingly, we deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss
the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the facts
and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials
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before the court and argument would not aid the decisional
process.
DISMISSED
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