United States v. Gordon

UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 01-6070 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, versus PAUL C. GORDON, Defendant - Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern Dis- trict of Virginia, at Richmond. Robert E. Payne, District Judge. (CR-93-85) Submitted: June 21, 2001 Decided: June 28, 2001 Before WIDENER and GREGORY, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge. Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Paul C. Gordon, Appellant Pro Se. David T. Maguire, Assistant United States Attorney, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See Local Rule 36(c). PER CURIAM: Paul Gordon, sentenced in 1993 for conspiring to distribute over 300 grams of cocaine base, seeks to appeal the district court’s dismissal of his motion under 28 U.S.C.A. § 2255 (West 2000). On appeal, Gordon contends the district court erred in dismissing his claim of ineffective assistance of counsel based on his counsel’s failure to raise an objection to the amount of cocaine base attributable to Gordon. However, because Gordon does not challenge the determination in his presentence report that he was responsible for conspiring to distribute at least 208 grams of cocaine base prior to June 1992, and Gordon’s sentence was predi- cated on his distribution of at least 150 grams of cocaine, see United States Sentencing Guidelines Manual § 2D1.1(c)(3) (2000), Gordon cannot demonstrate prejudice as a result of his attorney’s failure to raise this objection at sentencing, see Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687-88 (1984) (requiring both deficient performance and resulting prejudice in order to sustain an ineffec- tive assistance of counsel claim). Accordingly, we deny a certif- icate of appealability, and dismiss Gordon’s appeal.* We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are * Although Gordon’s appeal was not received until two years after the denial of his § 2255 motion, we assume without deciding that Gordon timely mailed notice of his appeal on January 12, 1999 as he claims. 2 adequately presented in the materials before the court and argument would not aid in the decisional process. DISMISSED 3