UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 15-6778
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
JOHN MARQUIS JOHNSON,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
South Carolina, at Florence. R. Bryan Harwell, District Judge.
(4:08-cr-01258-RBH-5; 4:14-cv-01584-RBH)
Submitted: October 29, 2015 Decided: November 10, 2015
Before KING and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior
Circuit Judge.
Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
John Marquis Johnson, Appellant Pro Se. Robert Frank Daley,
Jr., Assistant United States Attorney, Columbia, South Carolina,
for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
John Marquis Johnson seeks to appeal the district court’s
orders denying relief on his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012) motion and
denying his Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) motion to alter or amend the
judgment. The orders are not appealable unless a circuit
justice or judge issues a certificate of appealability. 28
U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(B) (2012). A certificate of appealability
will not issue absent “a substantial showing of the denial of a
constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2) (2012). When the
district court denies relief on the merits, a prisoner satisfies
this standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would
find that the district court’s assessment of the constitutional
claims is debatable or wrong. Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473,
484 (2000); see Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38
(2003). When the district court denies relief on procedural
grounds, the prisoner must demonstrate both that the dispositive
procedural ruling is debatable, and that the motion states a
debatable claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack,
529 U.S. at 484-85.
We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that
Johnson has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we
deny Johnson’s motion for a certificate of appealability and
dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the
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facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the
materials before this court and argument would not aid the
decisional process.
DISMISSED
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