Doncey Boykin v. USA

Filing

Opinion issued by court as to Appellant Doncey Frank Boykin. Decision: Affirmed. Opinion type: Non-Published. Opinion method: Per Curiam. Motion for Leave to File Out of Time filed by Appellant Doncey Frank Boykin is GRANTED. [7245303-2].

Case: 13-12123

Date Filed: 11/19/2014

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[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
No. 13-12123
Non-Argument Calendar
________________________
D.C. Docket Nos. 2:13-cv-08012-JHH; 2:00-cr-00188-JHH-JEO-1
DONCEY FRANK BOYKIN,
Petitioner-Appellant,
versus
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Respondent-Appellee.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Alabama
________________________
(November 19, 2014)
Before MARCUS, WILLIAM PRYOR and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Doncey Frank Boykin, proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s
dismissal as successive of his third motion to vacate his sentence under 28 U.S.C. §
2255. Underlying this motion is Boykin’s conviction on one count of being a felon

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in possession of a firearm, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), and the resulting
sentence, which was the product of an Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”)
enhancement, pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 924(e), and predicated on three prior
felonies. Boykin filed his first § 2255 motion to vacate his sentence in February
2002, which the district court denied with prejudice. Boykin filed a second § 2255
motion in December 2003, in which he explained that his conviction for one of the
three prior felonies had been vacated in October 2002 and that he was now entitled
to resentencing without the ACCA enhancement. The district court dismissed
Boykin’s second § 2255 motion as successive.
In August 2005, Boykin filed a “motion to secure jurisdiction,” pursuant to
Article III of the U.S. Constitution and 28 U.S.C. § 2241, and again argued that he
should be resentenced without the ACCA enhancement.

The district court

construed Boykin’s motion as one seeking § 2255 relief or, in the alternative, relief
under § 2255’s savings clause, and denied the motion. The district court noted that
while the state court vacated Boykin’s prior conviction on October 4, 2002, Boykin
did not file his second § 2255 motion until December 10, 2003, over two months
past the one-year filing deadline. Thus, the district court found that Boykin did not
meet the requirements for relief under § 2255 because his December 2003 second §
2255 motion was untimely. The district court further concluded that, to the extent
that Boykin sought relief under § 2241, such relief was barred because he had not
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satisfied any of the requirements of § 2255’s savings clause.
Boykin filed several other postconviction motions, and in April 2013, filed
the instant, and his third, § 2255 motion to vacate. He argued that the district court
erred in determining that his second § 2255 motion was second or successive when
the grounds that he asserted for challenging his sentence did not exist when filed
his first motion to vacate in 2002. The district court dismissed Boykin’s third §
2255 motion as successive. In this appeal, Boyle addresses the question presented
in the certificate of appealability granted by this Court: “Whether the district court
erred in dismissing as successive Boykin’s numerically third 28 U.S.C. § 2255
motion to vacate, set aside, or correct sentence, in light of Stewart v. United States,
646 F.3d 856 (11th Cir. 2011).” After careful review, we affirm. 1
We review de novo the district court’s dismissal of a § 2255 motion as
second or successive. McIver v. United States, 307 F.3d 1327, 1329 (11th Cir.
2002). Pursuant to § 2255, a federal prisoner claiming the right to be released on
the grounds that his sentence was imposed in violation of federal law or the
Constitution, the court lacked jurisdiction to impose sentence, his sentence is
beyond the maximum authorized by law, or his sentence is otherwise subject to
collateral attack, “may move the court which imposed the sentence to vacate, set
aside[,] or correct the sentence.”

1

28 U.S.C. § 2255(a).

If the district court

Nevertheless, Appellant’s motion to file a reply brief out of time is GRANTED.
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determines that relief is warranted, it must vacate and set aside the judgment and
discharge or resentence the prisoner, or grant a new trial or correct the sentence, if
appropriate. Id. § 2255(b).
The Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (“AEDPA”)
provides for a one-year statute of limitations for filing a § 2255 motion, which
begins to run following the latest of four possible events:
(1) the date on which the judgment of conviction becomes final;
(2) the date on which the impediment to making a [§ 2255] motion created
by governmental action in violation of the Constitution or laws of the United
States is removed, if the movant was prevent from making a motion by such
governmental action;
(3) the date on which the right asserted was initially recognized by the
Supreme Court, if that right has been newly recognized by the Supreme
Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review; or
(4) the date on which the facts supporting the claim or claims presented
could have been discovered through the exercise of due diligence.
Id. § 2255(f). The Supreme Court has held that a state court vacatur is a matter of
fact that refreshes the one-year statute of limitations period, as long as the
petitioner has shown due diligence in seeking the vacatur order. Johnson v. United
States, 544 U.S. 295, 302 (2005).
Before a prisoner may file a second or successive motion to vacate, he must
first obtain an order from this Court authorizing the district court to consider the
motion. 28 U.S.C. §§ 2244(b)(3)(A), 2255(h). Without our authorization, the
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district court lacks jurisdiction to consider a second or successive § 2255 motion to
vacate. United States v. Holt, 417 F.3d 1172, 1175 (11th Cir. 2005).
In Stewart, we held that a numerically second § 2255 motion may not be
“second or successive” under AEDPA. See Stewart, 646 F.3d at 857; see also
Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 486 (2000) (explaining that the phrase “second
or successive,” as used in AEDPA, is a term of art). The Stewart prisoner had filed
his first § 2255 motion, and had then successfully challenged the state convictions
that were predicate convictions for his career offender sentence. See id. at 857–58.
One month after his state convictions were vacated, he filed a second-in-time §
2255 motion, and requested vacatur of the career offender enhancement pursuant
to Johnson. See id. at 858. The district court dismissed the second-in-time § 2255
motion as successive, but we explained, in reversing, that the basis for the secondin-time § 2255 motion -- vacatur of the predicate state convictions -- did not exist
at the time of the prisoner’s first § 2255 motion, and thus the numerically second
motion was not “second or successive” within the meaning of AEDPA. Id. at 863–
65. We also said that the prisoner had acted diligently in pursuing the vacatur and
in bringing a subsequent § 2255 motion raising a claim, under Johnson, that the
statute of limitations for bringing his claim had been refreshed. Id. at 863–64.
We applied the Stewart holding in Boyd v. United States, 754 F.3d 1298
(11th Cir. 2014). In Boyd, the petitioner, whose sentence was enhanced pursuant
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to 21 U.S.C. § 851 based on two prior state convictions, filed an initial § 2255
motion in which he did not argue the validity of those state convictions. Id. at
1300.

His convictions were later vacated, and the petitioner requested to be

resentenced in his second and third § 2255 motions, which were dismissed as
successive. Id. After his fourth § 2255 motion, in which he raised the same claim,
was also dismissed as successive, we held that, under Stewart, the petitioner’s
initial § 2255 motion did not render his fourth § 2255 motion successive because
the grounds for the fourth § 2255 motion -- the vacatur of his state conviction -did not exist at the time of the initial § 2255 motion. Id. at 1300–02. We also
explained that the petitioner’s second and third § 2255 motions did not render his
fourth § 2255 motion successive because “second or successive status only
attaches to a judgment on the merits.” Id. at 1302.
Here, the district court properly dismissed Boykin’s third § 2255 motion for
lack of jurisdiction because it was successive. Boykin’s claim was rejected on the
merits in conjunction with his August 2005 motion to secure jurisdiction. See
Stewart, 646 F.3d at 863–65. In his motion to secure jurisdiction, Boykin argued
that the vacatur of his state conviction entitled him to resentencing without the
ACCA enhancement. The district court held that Boykin’s construed § 2255
motion was untimely because, while Johnson refreshed the one-year statute of
limitations for § 2255 motions following the vacatur of a state conviction, Boykin
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still filed even his earlier, second § 2255 motion too late. Thus, although Stewart
holds that subsequent-in-time § 2255 motions are not necessarily “successive,” that
fact does not help Boykin.

Rather, Boykin’s third § 2255 motion is in fact

successive because his claim regarding the vacated state conviction was in
existence when he filed his second § 2255 motion and his motion to secure
jurisdiction, and the district court denied the claim on the merits as untimely. See
Boyd, 754 F.3d at 1302; Stewart, 646 F.3d at 863–65. Because Boykin did not
obtain our authorization before filing his third § 2255 motion, the district court
properly found that it lacked jurisdiction over the action and dismissed it. See 28
U.S.C. §§ 2244(b)(3)(A), 2255(h).
AFFIRMED.

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