United States v. Jones

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit F I L E D IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT April 11, 2003 Charles R. Fulbruge III No. 01-50279 Clerk Summary Calendar UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, versus CEDRIC TERRANCE JONES, Defendant-Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas (W-96-CR-111-1; W-00-CV-103) Before BARKSDALE, DEMOSS, and BENAVIDES, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM:* Pursuant to a certificate of appealability granted by our court, Cedric T. Jones, federal prisoner # 79464-077, appeals, pro se, the denial of his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion challenging his conviction for conspiring to possess crack cocaine with intent to distribute. (His motion to file an amended opening brief is GRANTED.) Relying on Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466 (2000), and Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227 (1999), Jones maintains the * Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4. district court could not impose an enhanced sentence based on drug quantity when it was neither alleged in the indictment nor submitted to the jury as an element of the offense. This legal issue is reviewed de novo. E.g. United States v. Faubion, 19 F.3d 226, 228 (5th Cir. 1994). United States v. Brown, 305 F.3d 304, 305-09 (5th Cir. 2002), held that the new rule of criminal procedure announced in Apprendi does not apply retroactively on collateral review. Therefore, Jones’s claim based on Apprendi fails. Jones was decided while Jones’s appeal was pending. The nonretroactivity rule announced in Brown is therefore inapplicable. See Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314, 327-28 (1987). In any event, Jones is not entitled to relief under Jones. It involved a question of statutory construction of the federal carjacking statute, rather than a new principle of constitutional law, and is therefore inapplicable. See Jones, 526 U.S. at 251 n.11. MOTION TO FILE AMENDED BRIEF GRANTED; AFFIRMED 2