Springer v. USA

Filing 8

ORDER: For the reasons stated in the attached memorandum and order, Springer's Section 2255 petition (Doc. 1 ) and his request to supplement (Doc. 5 ) are both DENIED. The Court further DENIES a certificate of appealability. The CLERK is DIRECTED to enter judgment in favor of the United States and against Springer. Signed by Chief Judge Michael J. Reagan on 12/7/2016. (wtw)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
WILLIE SPRINGER,
Petitioner,
vs.
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Respondent.

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Case No. 14-cv-0319-MJR

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
REAGAN, Chief District Judge:
In July 2012, Willie Springer was indicted on a charge of being a felon in
possession of a firearm. He subsequently pled guilty to the charge without the benefit
of a plea agreement, and he was ultimately sentenced to 96 months in prison. Springer
did not file a direct appeal, but on March 10, 2014, he filed a petition to vacate, set aside,
or correct his sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. While his petition is extremely
difficult to follow, Springer seems to advance four basic arguments—he maintains that
his lawyer failed to properly challenge the traffic stop that led to his arrest and the
video evidence of that arrest; that his lawyer failed to adequately represent him at the
plea stage of the case; that his lawyer did not challenge some of the facts used to gird
his sentence; and that his lawyer did not conduct a reasonable investigation into the
evidence or subpoena certain witnesses that could have aided in his defense. Springer
later moved to supplement his § 2255 petition with an argument that his plea was
improper because it was taken by Magistrate Judge Wilkerson rather than the

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undersigned district judge. The United States has responded to Springer’s petition and
Springer has filed his reply brief, so the merits of Springer’s original petition and his
motion to supplement that petition are now before the Court for a ruling.
Background
On July 16, 2012, Trooper Derek Cullen with the Illinois State Police was on
patrol in East Saint Louis, Illinois. A little after midnight, Cullen observed a black
vehicle traveling on Martin Luther King Drive; the vehicle had no front registration
plates and had very dark tinted windows. Given the lack of front plates, Cullen turned
on the emergency lights on his cruiser to initiate a traffic stop. The black vehicle turned
into a parking lot near an apartment complex and Cullen followed. Just as the black
vehicle started to pull into a parking spot, the passenger side door opened and Willie
Springer jumped out, holding a large rifle in his hand. Cullen immediately jumped out
of his own cruiser and took cover behind his car, fearful that Springer would begin
shooting.

He saw Springer run around the passenger side door and towards the

courtyard of the apartment complex, so Cullen gave chase and remotely deployed his
canine, Loco, from his cruiser. With Loco alongside him, Cullen yelled at Springer to
drop the gun and to stop running, but Springer declined. As Springer continued to run
and more residents from the complex came outside to watch, Cullen ordered Loco to
apprehend Springer, and Loco managed to knock Springer to the ground. Springer
rolled around towards Cullen, still holding the rifle, and Cullen again told Springer to
drop the rifle. At that point, just as Springer was pivoting towards Cullen with the rifle,

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Springer finally dropped the rifle, saying something to the effect of “What gun?” and
indicating that he did not know what weapon Cullen was referencing.
As Springer dropped the gun, he began to push up off the ground to get to his
feet. Cullen kicked the gun behind him so that Springer would have trouble reaching it
and again told Springer not to move. Springer finally stopped moving and Cullen told
him to lay on the ground with his hands exposed. A short while later, backup arrived
to help Cullen, and Springer and his rifle were secured. Cullen and other officers
searched the vehicle that Springer fled from and located an empty 50 round magazine
on the passenger seat; the magazine fit the rifle that Springer was carrying. Police also
found two Halloween masks in the car, one in the front area and one on the back seat.
Springer had a prior felony conviction for attempted armed robbery, so he was
indicted on a federal charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm on July 17, 2012.
He was appointed a federal defender, and the defender began plea negotiations with
the United States concerning the gun charge. On November 2, 2012, the Assistant
United States Attorney sent a written plea offer to Springer’s federal defender, offering
to enter into a binding plea with Springer for a sentence of seventy two months in
prison. The United States tendered a formal plea agreement a little over a week later,
but that plea agreement was rejected—Springer’s federal defender told the United
States that Springer did not wish to enter a binding plea agreement but instead wanted
to plead “open” instead. On November 21, 2012, Springer pled guilty before Magistrate
Judge Wilkerson. Springer was later informed that the plea before Judge Wilkerson
was viewed as a report and recommendation to the undersigned that Springer’s plea
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before Judge Wilkerson should be accepted. Springer indicated that he had no objection
to that recommendation, insisted that no one had promised him anything to press him
into a plea, and asked the undersigned to accept his plea. The undersigned did so.
To tee up Springer’s sentencing, the Probation Office prepared a presentence
investigation report. Springer was assessed an offense level of 21 and a criminal history
category of II, leading to an advisory range of 41-51 months. Springer’s defender filed
an objection to the presentence report challenging the application of a two-level
enhancement pursuant to Section 3C1.2 for reckless endangerment—the defender was
of the view that the enhancement was not proper because Springer’s rifle was unloaded
when Springer fled into the courtyard.

The United States filed a response citing

Seventh Circuit precedent that it said clearly showed that the enhancement was proper.
The undersigned held a sentencing hearing on April 19, 2013. At the start, the
federal defender withdrew the objection to the reckless endangerment enhancement
and indicated that there were no objections to the presentence investigation report.
Springer went on to admit that everything in the report was true, correct, and accurate.
The United States then offered testimony from Trooper Cullen, who testified consistent
with the account above, as well as a video recording of Cullen’s in-car camera, which
corroborated Cullen’s account of what occurred on the night of Springer’s arrest.
Part of Springer’s advisory sentencing range was based on his criminal history,
and one of his crimes—a 1999 conviction for attempted armed robbery—was of
particular interest to the United States at the sentencing hearing. As it concerned that
conviction, the United States called Major Thomas Coppotelli, the Assistant Chief of
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Police of the Collinsville Police Department, to testify. Coppotelli stated that he was
involved in a homicide and traffic accident investigation involving Springer in 1997. In
November of that year, police were called to the intersection of 29th Street and Trenley
Avenue in East Saint Louis concerning an accident involving a pickup truck and a
Chevy Corsica. They found Gerald Little, a local drug dealer, in the back of the pickup
truck, and Christopher Price, an associate of Little’s, underneath the truck. Police also
found two individuals in the Corsica. Little had been shot several times in the torso and
head and died on the way to the hospital; Price had been shot several times in the torso
and head and was already deceased; and the two individuals in the Corsica were
transported to the hospital for minor injuries and treated.

Two handguns were

recovered from the cab of the truck, and an examination of the scene produced several
spent shell casings and projectiles. An investigation led police to five men, including
Springer, who were believed to have been involved in the deaths of Little and Price.
As a part of the police investigation, Coppotelli interviewed Springer twice, and
Springer finally admitted to Coppotelli that Springer and four others had decided to rob
Little, the presumption being that he would have money because he dealt narcotics.
The group came up with a plan where Springer and a compatriot would wait for Little
to come to the compatriot’s home, and three of Springer’s friends would station
themselves outside of the home in preparation for Little’s arrival. When Little arrived
at the door, Springer or his compatriot would use a two-way walkie talkie to let the
other three know that Little had arrived, and then the trio, who were armed with guns
and wearing masks, would descend on Little and rob him. To make sure the three
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robbers would not be recognized, Springer and two of the other members of the group
bought ski masks and other black clothing for the three robbers to use.
As planned, Little and Price came to the compatriot’s home on November 6,
1997, and Little got out of the truck to head into the house while Price remained in the
pickup truck to serve as Little’s driver. Springer and his compatriot saw Little getting
out of the truck and heard him yell greetings toward the house. The compatriot went to
the door and met Little but told him to hold on as the compatriot needed to find his
keys to open the door. At that time, Springer and his compatriot heard several shots
being fired outside the door. Little then took off running towards the pickup truck and
was shot several times by one of Springer’s associates, and Price got out of his truck,
seemingly to see what was going on. One of Springer’s associates closed on the pickup
truck and ordered Price back into it. That associate got into the truck with Price, while
the other two grabbed Little, threw him in the bed of the truck, and then jumped in with
him. Springer and his compatriot stayed inside the home till the pickup drove off.
According to Major Coppotelli, some of the other associates admitted that they
left the scene with Little and Price in the pickup truck, with Price driving at the threat of
gunpoint. There was some disagreement among the associates about what happened
next, but either way, the car was involved in an accident and Price rolled out of the car.
Price then tried to get away by crawling underneath the truck, but was shot multiple
times by at least two of Springer’s associates. One of the associates also shot Little
again, to make sure that he was dead. All three individuals then fled the scene. Those
three individuals, along with Springer and his compatriot at the house, were ultimately
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charged with felony murder in Illinois state court. To avoid the felony murder count,
Springer eventually pled guilty to a charge of attempted armed robbery, and was
sentenced to fifteen years of incarceration in an Illinois prison.
Based on Springer’s involvement in the 1997 attempted robbery, the fact that the
1997 incident led to the deaths of two individuals, the fact that Springer’s conduct in
this case occurred near a residential area, and the sinister nature of the items Springer
possessed on the night of his arrest in this case, the United States sought an above
guidelines sentence of 97 months. Springer, for his part, asked for a within guidelines
sentence of 51 months, insisting that his flight was motivated by fear and that he was
not preparing to commit another crime on the night of his arrest. The undersigned
evaluated the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors and decided that a 96 month sentence was the
right path. That sentence was based on the fact that there was a potential for danger to
bystanders, mainly because Trooper Cullen would have been within his rights to shoot
Springer but might have missed, or because other residents in the complex might have
tried to shoot at Springer, putting Springer, other civilians, and Cullen in danger. It was
also based on the fact that Springer’s gun and the masks in the car suggested that
Springer was about to rob someone that night, and on the fact that his 1997 conviction
was underrepresented in his criminal history, for the crime resulted in two deaths.
Springer did not appeal his conviction or his sentence. However, on March 10,
2014, Springer filed a motion to vacate or correct his sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §
2255. That petition and Springer’s supplemental motion are now ripe for review.

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Discussion
Springer filed his petition pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255, which allows a defendant
to attack the validity of his sentence if it was “imposed in violation of the Constitution
or laws of the United States,” if the sentencing court imposed sentence “without
jurisdiction,” if the sentence was “in excess of the maximum authorized by law,” or if
the sentence is “otherwise subject to collateral attack.” Springer comingles a number of
conclusory and difficult to follow arguments throughout his opening petition, but he
seems to assert four basic grounds for attacking his guilty plea or his ultimate sentence.
He says that his appointed counsel was ineffective for not challenging Trooper Cullen’s
stop and the video evidence of that stop; that his counsel did not perform adequately at
the plea stage of the case; that his counsel did not challenge some of the facts laid out in
the presentence report or put forth at the sentencing hearing; and that his counsel did
not conduct a reasonable investigation into the evidence against Springer.
The Court will begin with Springer’s argument that his lawyer was ineffective
because he failed to challenge the July 2012 stop or the video evidence of it. To make
out a claim of ineffective assistance, a petitioner must show that his counsel’s
performance was deficient and that, but for counsel’s performance, a “reasonable
probability exists that he would have received a different sentence.” Mertz v. Williams,
771 F.3d 1035, 1043-44 (7th Cir. 2014). Both aspects of this test must be demonstrated by
a § 2255 petitioner to succeed on a habeas claim—if a prisoner fails to make an adequate
showing on deficient performance or prejudice, he has not established ineffective
assistance. United States v. Montgomery, 23 F.3d 1130, 1134 (7th Cir. 1994).
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Springer’s first claim trips over the deficient performance requirement for at least
two reasons. For one, all of the failures related to Cullen’s stop and the video recording
of it concern counsel’s conduct before the plea, and Springer’s complaints about his
lawyer now are inconsistent with what he told Judge Wilkerson about his lawyer’s
performance when Springer pled guilty. At the plea colloquy, Springer told Judge
Wilkerson that he was satisfied with his lawyer’s representation, that his lawyer had
done everything that Springer had asked, and that Springer had ample opportunity to
go over his case with his lawyer. Springer’s statements at the plea hearing are entitled
to a presumption of truthfulness, and Springer has not alleged enough to undercut that
presumption now. See Barker v. United States, 7 F.3d 629, 634 n.5 (7th Cir. 1993).
More fundamentally, even if Springer had not heaped praise on his lawyer at the
plea hearing, his ineffective assistance claim related to the stop and the video would
still fail, for any motion attacking those items would have been frivolous.

See

Whitehead v. Cowan, 263 F.3d 708, 731 (7th Cir. 2001). As it concerns Cullen’s stop, an
officer may make an investigative stop of a person based on a well-founded suspicion
that the person has been or is about to be engaged in criminal activity, United States v.
Smith, 697 F.3d 625, 631 (7th Cir. 2012), and Cullen had a well-founded suspicion here.
When Cullen ran after Springer and ultimately stopped him, Springer had just jumped
out of a car that had been pulled over for a legitimate traffic stop, he was holding a rifle,
and he was running towards a residential complex with that rifle on open display. That
is more than enough to justify reasonable suspicion for a stop, meaning that any motion
challenging the stop would be bunk. As it concerns the video recording of the stop,
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there is nothing to suggest that the video recording of the events was faulty or
vulnerable to any technical challenge. On the contrary, Trooper Cullen’s testimony
corroborates

the

video,

and

Springer’s

non-specific

arguments

concerning

investigations that might have discovered a problem with the video do not come close
to satisfying his burden to prove ineffective assistance. E.g., Santos v. United States,
298 F. App’x 519, 523 (7th Cir. 2008); Richardson v. United States, 379 F.3d 485, 488 (7th
Cir. 2004); United States v. Hubbard, 929 F.2d 307, 310-11 (7th Cir. 1991).
Springer goes on to attack his attorney’s performance at the plea stage in a
variety of ways, but those attacks lack merit because Springer has not demonstrated
deficient performance.

Springer first faults his lawyer for not working out a plea

agreement and instead permitting him to plead “open” (without the benefit of a plea
agreement), but Springer admits in his reply brief, when presented with evidence from
the United States and from Springer’s appointed defender himself, that his appointed
defender did secure a plea agreement and that Springer himself rejected it. Springer
goes on to argue that his lawyer had an obligation to work out a far better plea
agreement than the one he rejected, but a lawyer’s performance does not dip into the
land of deficient merely because he failed to work out the absolute best plea possible.
See United States v. Springs, 988 F.2d 746, 749 (7th Cir. 1993).

Springer finally

maintains that his lawyer did not explain the consequences of his plea and made
promises as to what the undersigned would do at sentencing—the appointed defender,
says Springer, did not tell Springer of the possibility that his sentence could exceed sixty
months if he pled guilty without the benefit of a plea agreement and promised him that
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his sentence would not go over that amount. Springer’s problem is that he has not
offered much more than naked assertions concerning what his lawyer said as it related
to sentencing possibilities or what his lawyer promised, see Galbraith v. United States,
313 F.3d 1001, 1008-09 (7th Cir. 2002), and even if he had gotten specific enough to make
out a credible challenge, the aspersions Springer casts on his lawyer fly in the face of
Springer’s admissions before Magistrate Judge Wilkerson and the undersigned. As the
Court already said above, Springer told Judge Wilkerson that he had ample opportunity
to discuss his case with his lawyer and that he was satisfied with his lawyer’s able
performance, and those admissions cast serious doubt on his statements now that his
lawyer did not lay out the consequences of a plea. Putting the proverbial nail in the
coffin, Springer told the undersigned at the sentencing hearing that no one had made
any promises to him to get him to plead guilty. As the Court already said, Springer’s
statements to Magistrate Judge Wilkerson and the undersigned are entitled to a
presumption of verity, and Springer has not said enough to put that presumption into
doubt. See Hutchings v. United States, 618 F.3d 693, 699 (7th Cir. 2010).
Assuming Springer had somehow offered up enough to suggest deficient
performance related to his plea, his ineffective assistance claim concerning the plea
would still fail for at least two reasons, both having to do with a lack of prejudice. For
one, to make out an ineffective assistance claim concerning a plea, a defendant must not
only allege that his lawyer bungled the plea but that there is a reasonable chance that
the sentence would have turned out differently with better advice, as it might if the
petitioner would not have pled guilty at all or would have pled guilty to a more
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beneficial plea agreement rather than the plea scenario he chose. E.g., Lafler v. Cooper,
132 S. Ct. 1376, 1385 (2012); Martin v. United States, 789 F.3d 703, 706-07 (7th Cir. 2015);
Koons v. United States, 639 F.3d 348, 351 (7th Cir. 2011). In this case, the United States
and Springer’s lawyer disclaim any other plea offers beyond the first one and Springer
has not offered any non-conclusory allegations about other agreements, so Springer’s
claim turns largely on whether he would have opted to go to trial or would have
accepted the first binding plea agreement put to him by the United States. While
Springer’s briefs are extremely difficult to parse, he never clearly alleges that he would
have taken either course of action, meaning that his plea-related claim must fail.
Even if the Court assumed that Springer would have taken the initial binding
plea agreement or that his lawyer would have secured a better binding or non-binding
agreement, Springer has still suffered no harm. As the Court already said, Springer
does not allege that he would have gone to trial rather than plead guilty, probably
because he does not want to jeopardize any acceptance of responsibility credit he
received by sparing the United States of a trial. For Springer to suffer prejudice, then,
there must at least be a reasonable probability that the undersigned would have
accepted the first binding plea agreement or a second more favorable binding plea
agreement, or would have been inclined to sentence Springer to a lower sentence than
the one he received if he had pled guilty pursuant to a non-binding agreement. See
Edwards v. United States, 612 F. App’x 390, 392 (7th Cir. 2015). None of those paths
would have come to fruition. Given Springer’s criminal history, the danger that he
posed to the community during the chase through the residential complex in July 2012,
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and the fact that the presence of the rifle and the masks indicated that Springer was
going to commit another crime on the night of his arrest, the undersigned likely would
have rejected the first agreement and any better one, and would have still sentenced
Springer to 96 months even if there was a non-binding plea agreement in place.
Springer next insists that his appointed lawyer was deficient because he failed to
challenge some of the justifications for his sentence, mainly those linked to the reckless
endangerment enhancement and the undersigned’s decision to vary Springer’s sentence
upward because, among other things, the circumstances of Springer’s arrest indicated
that he was about to commit another crime when he and the driver of the vehicle were
pulled over by Trooper Cullen. As to the endangerment enhancement, Springer insists
that his lawyer erred by not introducing evidence that might have showed that Springer
fled from Trooper Cullen on the night of his arrest not out of an effort to impede the
administration of justice, but merely because Springer wished to avoid being bitten by a
police canine. Springer does not identify any witness that would have offered that kind
of testimony, and even if he did the undersigned would not have credited it, as Trooper
Cullen’s testimony and the corroborating video recording leaves no room for doubt that
Springer immediately fled the scene when Cullen pulled the vehicle over, rather than
fleeing at the sight of Cullen’s canine partner. As to the Court’s decision to vary
Springer’s sentence upward partly because he was carrying a rifle and had access to
masks on the night of the arrest—facts that indicated to the undersigned that Springer
was about to commit another crime that night—Springer faults his lawyer for not
challenging that conclusion.

The rub is that Springer’s lawyer did challenge the
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undersigned’s line of thinking on that front, and the Court is hard pressed to come up
with any additional challenge that counsel could have employed to change the Court’s
mind. In any event, Springer does not specifically flesh out the kind of challenge that
would have made a difference to the Court’s thinking, so his ineffective assistance claim
concerning some of the facts and conclusions at sentencing must be rejected. 1
Springer’s fourth challenge, and the final one in his petition, looks to be a catchall one, primarily focused on his lawyer’s failure to confront certain witnesses or
investigate his case. Most of those challenges are vague and non-specific to Springer’s
case, and the Court must reject conclusory challenges like that as a matter of course.
E.g., United States v. Robinson, 467 F. App’x 100, 102 (3d Cir. 2012); United States v.
Banks, 355 F. App’x 123, 126 (10th Cir. 2009); Mitchell v. United States, 359 F.2d 833,
836-37 (7th Cir. 1966). To the extent Springer gets specific with these challenges, his
claims focus primarily on the testimony surrounding Trooper Cullen’s stop, the video
of that stop, and the evidence offered at the sentencing hearing indicating that Springer
was going to commit another crime on the night of his arrest. Those arguments must be
rejected for the reasons already set forth above, namely that any additional questioning
or confrontation by Springer’s defender would have gone nowhere.

Springer also

insists that his lawyer did not conduct an adequate investigation into his case before his
Springer also says that the Court’s decision to vary upward partly based on the rifle
and masks violates the Supreme Court’s decision in Alleyne v. United States, 133 S. Ct.
2151 (2013), as the undersigned made those factual findings rather than allowing a jury
to make them. But Alleyne and cases like it require factual findings by a jury rather
than a judge only when the facts affect either the statutory maximum or the statutory
minimum. See United States v. Garcia, 754 F.3d 460, 473 (7th Cir. 2015). Springer was
sentenced within the statutory range, rendering any Alleyne challenge meritless.
1

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plea and sentencing, but he offers little in the way of what that investigation would
have looked like or what it would have revealed, meaning that he has not met his
burden to make out ineffective assistance. E.g., Hardamon v. United States, 319 F.3d
943, 951 (7th Cir. 2003); United States v. Balzano, 916 F.2d 1273, 1273 (7th Cir. 1990).
That covers most of the arguments in Springer’s petition, but as the Court
already mentioned, Springer has peppered a number of other vague and conclusory
arguments throughout his 42 paged typed memorandum in support. Among other
points, Springer includes a summary of the law concerning whether a federal sentence
is reasonable or unreasonable. He also includes large swaths of what look to be cutand-paste summaries of various federal cases, without detailing how those cases bear
on the facts of his own conviction and sentence. Springer may have structured his
memorandum of law in this fashion as a way of increasing his chances of success on
appeal, his planned argument being that the Court missed one of his many challenges.
Out of an abundance of caution, the Court stresses that it has reviewed all of Springer’s
additional challenges and finds that none of them have merit, primarily because
Springer has not specifically laid out, for these undeveloped challenges and many of his
others, how his counsel was deficient or how he suffered prejudice stemming from his
counsel’s conduct. See Barauskas v. Lane, 946 F.2d 1292, 1295 (7th Cir. 1991).
With the arguments in Springer’s § 2255 petition dealt with, the Court must also
assess a motion to supplement that Springer filed six months after his original petition.
In that supplement, Springer insists that his conviction and sentence must be set aside
because a magistrate judge took his plea rather than the undersigned district judge.
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Even if allowing an amendment for an argument that could have been raised in
Springer’s original petition would be proper on the circumstances here, there is no point
in allowing the motion because Springer’s supplemental argument would be futile for
two reasons. For one, Springer does not characterize his argument as a failure on the
part of his lawyer to perform adequately but instead as a direct error by the Court. That
kind of error could have been raised in a direct appeal of Springer’s sentence, but
Springer did not file an appeal and he offers no cause in his supplement to explain why
he did not file the challenge earlier. See Prewitt v. United States, 83 F.3d 812, 816 (7th
Cir. 1996). More fundamentally, even if Springer packaged the magistrate plea point as
an ineffective assistance claim, the claim would still fail.

Springer is right that a

magistrate judge cannot accept a plea in the entirety, but he can conduct a plea colloquy
and submit a report and recommendation concerning the plea, which the district judge
can review to accept or reject a plea. See United States v. Harden, 758 F.3d 886, 891 (7th
Cir. 2014). A review of the record shows that is what ultimately happened here. Judge
Wilkerson accepted the plea, but the undersigned gave Springer an opportunity at the
sentencing hearing to back out of the plea or to allow the undersigned to interpret
Judge Wilkerson’s conduct as a report and recommendation concerning the plea to the
undersigned, which the undersigned would accept. Springer told the undersigned that
he wanted the Court to read his plea before Judge Wilkerson as a report and
recommendation, which he asked the Court to accept.

That conduct presents no

problem under Harden, meaning this plea-related challenge must fail.

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That does away with all of Springer’s claims of error, but there is one other
closing item. Pursuant to Rule 11(a) of the Rules Governing Section 2255 Cases, the
Court must issue or deny a certificate of appealability when it enters a final order
adverse to the applicant, as the applicant cannot appeal without one. The habeas
statute provides that a certificate may issue only where the petitioner “has made a
substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right,” 28 U.S.C. § 2253, as would
be the case when “reasonable jurists would find the district court’s assessment of the
constitutional claims debatable or wrong,” Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000).
Based upon the record before it, the Court concludes that reasonable jurists would not
find Springer’s points debatable, so the Court must deny a certificate of appealability.
Disposition
Springer’s § 2255 petition (Doc. 1) and his request to supplement (Doc. 5) are
both DENIED. The Court further DENIES a certificate of appealability. The CLERK is
DIRECTED to enter judgment in favor of the United States and against Springer.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
DATED: December 7, 2016
/s/ Michael J. Reagan
Chief Judge Michael J. Reagan
United States District Court

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