Jackie Roller v. Warden

Filing

Opinion issued by court as to Appellant Jackie Ray Roller. Decision: Affirmed. Opinion type: Non-Published. Opinion method: Per Curiam. The opinion is also available through the Court's Opinions page at this link http://www.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions.

Case: 16-17305

Date Filed: 07/13/2017

Page: 1 of 3

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
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No. 16-17305
Non-Argument Calendar
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D.C. Docket No. 1:16-cv-03621-ODE

JACKIE RAY ROLLER,
Petitioner-Appellant,
versus
WARDEN,
Respondent-Appellee.
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Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
________________________
(July 13, 2017)
Before WILLIAM PRYOR, JORDAN and ROSENBAUM, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Jackie Ray Roller, a Georgia prisoner, appeals the dismissal of his petition
for a writ of habeas corpus. 28 U.S.C. § 2254. The district court dismissed Roller’s

Case: 16-17305

Date Filed: 07/13/2017

Page: 2 of 3

petition for failure to obtain leave to file a second or successive application. Id.
§ 2244(b)(3)(A). We affirm.
In 1991, Roller was convicted of felony murder and possession of a firearm
and sentenced to consecutive terms of life imprisonment and of five years. Roller
v. State, 453 S.E.2d 740 (Ga. 1995). In 2003, the trial court resentenced Roller and
imposed the identical sentence, after which the state court denied Roller an out-oftime appeal. Roller then filed a federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus
challenging his convictions and his most recent sentence, which the district court
denied on the merits. See 28 U.S.C. § 2254. In 2015, Roller moved the state court
to clarify and nullify his sentence and conviction, but the trial court denied Roller’s
motion and the Supreme Court of Georgia dismissed Roller’s appeal.
In 2016, Roller filed another federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus,
which the district court “dismissed as impermissibly successive.” See id.
§ 2244(b)(2). The district court recounted denying the petitions that Roller filed
“twenty years ago . . . challeng[ing] his 1991 judgment of conviction” and after
being “resentenced . . . in 2003”; “dismiss[ing] [a] third petition as impermissibly
successive because [Roller] did not obtain permission from the court of appeals”;
and learning that “[i]n 2011, the court of appeals denied [Roller’s] application to
file another § 2254 petition.” The district court ruled that Roller could not
circumvent the prohibition against successive petitions by challenging the
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Case: 16-17305

Date Filed: 07/13/2017

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judgment of the state court in 2015 because those “proceedings . . . did not result in
a new judgment or otherwise nullify [Roller’s] previous 2254 petitions.”
We review de novo the dismissal of a petition for a writ of habeas corpus as
“second or successive.” McIver v. United States, 307 F.3d 1327, 1329 (11th Cir.
2002). “[A] state prisoner seeking postconviction relief from the federal courts . . .
[in a second or subsequent petition for a writ of habeas corpus must] comply with
the gatekeeping requirements of 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b).” Burton v. Stewart, 549 U.S.
147, 149 (2007). Section 2244(b) requires that, “[b]efore a second or successive
application permitted by this section is filed in the district court, the applicant shall
move in the appropriate court of appeals for an order authorizing the district court
to consider the application.” 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b)(3)(A).
The district court correctly dismissed Roller’s petition, which collaterally
attacked his convictions and his most recent sentence, both of which he challenged
in a petition for a writ of habeas corpus that the district court denied on the merits.
Roller failed to obtain from this Court leave to file a successive petition. Id.
§§ 2244(b)(3)(A), 2255(h). Because Roller “neither sought nor received
authorization from the Court of Appeals before filing . . . [his] ‘second or
successive’ petition challenging his custody, . . . the District Court was without
jurisdiction to entertain it.” Burton, 549 U.S. at 157.
We AFFIRM the dismissal of Roller’s petition.
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