FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
February 20, 2013
TENTH CIRCUIT
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
HERMAN PATTERSON,
Petitioner - Appellant, No. 12-6252
(D.C. No. 5:12-CV-00376-HE)
v. (W.D. Oklahoma)
MARVIN VAUGHN, Warden,
Respondent - Appellee.
ORDER DENYING
CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY *
Before BRISCOE, ANDERSON, and TYMKOVICH, Circuit Judges.
Petitioner and appellant, Herman Patterson, proceeding pro se, seeks a
certificate of appealability (“COA”) to enable him to appeal the dismissal of his
petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. For the following reasons, we deny his request
and decline to issue a COA.
*
This order is not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of law of
the case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. The court generally disfavors the
citation of orders and judgments; nevertheless, an order and judgment may be
cited under the terms and conditions of 10th Cir. R. 32.1.
BACKGROUND
Mr. Patterson was placed in the Avalon Correctional Facility half-way
house (“Avalon”), a private corrections facility, in July of 2009. He had been
convicted of assault and battery on a police officer and assault and battery with a
dangerous weapon and received five and six year sentences, respectively, to be
served concurrently with some other sentences Mr. Patterson was already serving.
On February 10, 2011, he returned to the half-way house with a paper bag
containing some hamburgers and a pill bottle filled with a green leafy substance,
which authorities presumed was marijuana. It was confiscated and Mr. Patterson
received a disciplinary report on February 21, 2011, for a “law violation.” The
incident was reported to the local police and Mr. Patterson was arrested. 1
A hearing was conducted, presumably at the Avalon half-way house, on
February 25, 2011, which Mr. Patterson attended. Mr. Patterson was found guilty
of the law violation and that finding was approved by the facility head.
Mr. Patterson received notice of the facility head’s approval of the finding of
guilt on February 28, 2011. As a result of this finding, Mr. Patterson lost 365
days of good time credit he had earned. There is apparently no record of any
appeal by Mr. Patterson to the head of the Avalon half-way house after the
finding of guilt.
1
It is not clear from this record whether anything came of his arrest by the
local police.
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Mr. Patterson subsequently wrote eight letters to the Director of the Avalon
half-way house, attempting to appeal the misconduct report. 2 The letters were
apparently procedurally deficient. Mr. Patterson’s first letter was written on
April 4, 2011, and the last was written on July 18, 2011. The last response he
received from Avalon was on August 3, 2011. There is an established
disciplinary procedure to be used by inmates to appeal disciplinary reports, and
Mr. Patterson presumably failed to follow that procedure.
On August 16, 2011, Mr. Patterson filed a petition in the Tulsa County
District Court, seeking review of the disciplinary report. On November 10, 2011,
he was denied relief because he had named the wrong party. Mr. Patterson filed
an appeal with the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals on December 30, 2011,
and the court denied relief on January 31, 2012, because the appeal was not
timely filed.
On September 2, 2011, Mr. Patterson filed a petition for habeas corpus
relief in the federal district court in the Western District of Oklahoma and was
denied relief on December 21, 2011, for failure to exhaust state judicial remedies.
On November 30, 2011, Mr. Patterson filed a petition in Oklahoma County
District Court, seeking review of the disciplinary report. He was again denied
2
The record is unclear whether the “facility head” is the same as the
“Director.” What is clear is that Mr. Patterson never made a successful appeal to
either one.
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relief, this time for failure to exhaust administrative remedies. He did not appeal
that case further, to the court of criminal appeals.
Finally, Mr. Patterson brought the instant petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241
to the federal district court in the Western District of Oklahoma, claiming that he
had been denied due process by the State of Oklahoma by means of the
disciplinary report which stripped him of 365 days of good time earned credits.
The defendant Warden claims that Mr. Patterson has failed to exhaust either his
state administrative or judicial remedies. The Warden has not filed an answer or
response to Mr. Patterson’s § 2241 petition, but instead has filed a motion to
dismiss Mr. Patterson’s petition for failing to properly exhaust the necessary state
remedies.
“A habeas petitioner is ‘generally required to exhaust state remedies
whether his action is brought under § 2241 or § 2254.” Hamm v. Saffle, 300 F.3d
1213, 1216 (10th Cir. 2002) (quoting Montez v. McKinna, 208 F.3d 862, 866
(10th Cir. 2000)). “The exhaustion of state remedies includes both administrative
and state court remedies.” Id.; see also Garza v. Davis, 596 F.3d 1198, 1203
(10th Cir. 2010) (“The exhaustion of available administrative remedies is a
prerequisite for § 2241 habeas relief, although we recognize that the statute itself
does not expressly contains such a requirement.”). “A narrow exception to the
exhaustion requirement applies if a petitioner can demonstrate that exhaustion is
futile.” Garza, 596 F.3d at 1203.
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The magistrate judge to whom the matter was referred recommended that
the respondent’s motion to dismiss be granted and the petition dismissed without
prejudice because Mr. Patterson failed to exhaust his available state court
remedies.
Mr. Patterson filed an objection to the magistrate judge’s Report and
Recommendation, arguing that he did exhaust his remedies because he “gave each
court one full opportunity.” Order at 1 (citing Objection at 3), R. Vol. 1 at 163.
He also claimed that “time has ran out and petitioner has no availability to
exhaust any state remedies.” Id. Mr. Patterson did not, however, challenge the
magistrate judge’s determination that he had failed to appeal or properly appeal
the rulings of the Oklahoma and Tulsa County District Courts to the Oklahoma
Court of Criminal Appeals. He also failed to demonstrate that exhaustion would
be futile because either “there is an absence of available State corrective process”
or “circumstances exist that render such process ineffective to protect the rights
of the applicant.” Order at 1 (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1)(B)(i)(ii)). Id. The
district court accordingly adopted the Report and Recommendation, granted the
Warden’s motion to dismiss and dismissed Mr. Patterson’s petition without
prejudice, for failure to exhaust. The court also denied a COA, finding that
Mr. Patterson had not made “a substantial showing of the denial of a
constitutional right.” Order at 2 (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2)). Id. at 164.
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The court consequently denied Mr. Patterson’s request for leave to proceed on
appeal in forma pauperis (“ifp”). This appeal followed.
DISCUSSION
A petitioner seeking habeas relief must obtain a COA before this court
may consider the merits of his appeal. Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336
(2003). To be entitled to a COA, Mr. Patterson must make “a substantial showing
of the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). To make this
showing, the petitioner must demonstrate that “reasonable jurists could debate
whether (or for that matter, agree that) the petition should have been resolved in a
different manner or that the issues presented were adequate to deserve
encouragement to proceed further.” Miller-El, 537 U.S. at 336 (quotations
omitted). When the district court denies a habeas petition on procedural grounds
without reaching the underlying constitutional claim, this court will issue a COA
only “if the prisoner shows, at least, that jurists of reason would find it debatable
whether the petition states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right, and
that jurists of reason could find it debatable whether the district court was correct
in its procedural ruling.” Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 478 (2000).
Here, there can be no doubt that Mr. Patterson failed to exhaust his
administrative and state judicial remedies. No reasonable jurists could debate the
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question. Accordingly, for the foregoing reasons, we deny a COA and dismiss
this matter. We also deny permission to proceed ifp.
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we DENY a COA and DENY permission to
proceed ifp. This matter shall be dismissed.
ENTERED FOR THE COURT
Stephen H. Anderson
Circuit Judge
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