United States v. Tyrone Davis

UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 15-6730 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. TYRONE DAVIS, Defendant - Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at Florence. R. Bryan Harwell, District Judge. (4:11-cr-02341-RBH-1; 4:14-cv-00019-RBH) Submitted: September 16, 2015 Decided: September 22, 2015 Before GREGORY, SHEDD, and WYNN, Circuit Judges. Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Tyrone Davis, Appellant Pro Se. Alfred William Walker Bethea, Jr., Assistant United States Attorney, Florence, South Carolina; Stanley D. Ragsdale, Assistant United States Attorney, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. PER CURIAM: Tyrone Davis seeks to appeal the district court’s order denying relief on his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012) 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) (2012). 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) (2012). 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 Davis 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 2 contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process. DISMISSED 3