UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 03-4733
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
versus
NANAK CHAND,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Maryland, at Greenbelt. Deborah K. Chasanow, District Judge. (CR-
01-487-DKC)
Submitted: January 16, 2004 Decided: February 12, 2004
Before MICHAEL, KING, and GREGORY, Circuit Judges.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Jonathan L. Katz, MARKS & KATZ, L.L.C., Silver Spring, Maryland,
for Appellant. Thomas M. DiBiagio, United States Attorney, Hollis
Raphael Weisman, Assistant United States Attorney, Greenbelt,
Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
See Local Rule 36(c).
PER CURIAM:
Nanak Chand appeals from the district court’s order
affirming his conviction and sentence imposed by a magistrate judge
for assaulting, resisting, or impeding an officer or employee of
the United States in the performance of his official duties. See
18 U.S.C.A. § 111(a) (West Supp. 2003). Chand contends that he did
not knowingly and intelligently waive his right to a jury trial or
a trial by a district court, that the magistrate judge abused his
discretion by denying Chand’s motion for a continuance to secure
the presence of a witness, that the evidence was insufficient to
support his conviction, and that the eighteen-month delay between
the completion of briefing on appeal and the issuance of the
district court’s opinion violated his right to a speedy appeal.
With respect to the first three issues, we have reviewed the
parties’ briefs, the joint appendix, the supplemental joint
appendix, and the district court’s opinion and find no reversible
error. Accordingly, we affirm for the reasons stated by the
district court. See United States v. Chand, No. CR-01-487-DKC
(D. Md. Aug. 11, 2003).
Chand’s final issue is that the district court’s delay in
adjudicating his appeal amounted to a violation of his right to a
speedy appeal. An “undue delay in processing an appeal may rise to
the level of a due process violation.” United States v. Johnson,
732 F.2d 379, 381 (4th Cir. 1984). To determine whether such a
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delay results in the denial of a speedy appeal, the court considers
the length of the delay, the reason for the delay, the defendant’s
assertion of his speedy appeal right, and any prejudice to the
defendant. Id. at 381-82 (citing Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514,
530 (1972)). Addressing these factors, we find that, while an
eighteen-month delay may rise to the level of an “undue delay” and
while Chand did assert his speedy appeal right by requesting a
ruling on the appeal, Chand suffered no prejudice as a result of
the delay. As this court held in Johnson, there is no prejudice
and affirmative relief is not appropriate when “the appeal has been
heard and found lacking in merit.” 732 F.2d at 382-83. Here, the
district court found no merit to Chand’s issues on appeal and
affirmed his conviction. Thus, we find that Chand suffered no
prejudice and is entitled to no relief on his claim that his speedy
appeal right was violated by the district court’s delayed
disposition of his appeal. See id.
Accordingly, we affirm Chand’s conviction. We dispense
with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are
adequately presented in the materials before the court and argument
would not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED
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