Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ared-2_14-cv-00064/USCOURTS-ared-2_14-cv-00064-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 530
Nature of Suit: Prisoner Petitions - Habeas Corpus
Cause of Action: 28:2254 Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus (State)

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF ARKANSAS 

EASTERN DIVISION

VYRON WHEELER 

Reg #10989-007 PETITIONER 

VS. 2:14CV00064 KGB/JTR 

 

C.V. RIVERA, Warden, 

FCI Forrest City, et al. 

RESPONDENT 

 

RECOMMENDED DISPOSITION

 The following Recommended Disposition (“Recommendation”) has been 

sent to United States District Judge Kristine G. Baker. You may file written 

objections to all or part of this Recommendation. If you do so, those objections 

must: (1) specifically explain the factual and/or legal basis for your objection; and 

(2) be received by the Clerk of this Court within fourteen (14) days of the entry of 

this Recommendation. The failure to timely file objections may result in waiver of 

the right to appeal questions of fact. 

 Mail any objections to: 

 Clerk, United States District Court 

 Eastern District of Arkansas 

 600 West Capitol Avenue, Suite A149 

 Little Rock, AR 72201-3325

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I. Background

 Pending before the Court is a § 2254 Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus 

filed by Petitioner, Vyron Wheeler. Doc. 2. Before addressing Wheeler’s habeas 

claims, it is important to understand the procedural history of the case. 

 On March 4, 1997, Wheeler was convicted, by a jury in the District of 

Columbia Superior Court,1

 of second-degree murder and possession of a prohibited 

weapon. Doc. 11-1. He received an aggregate sentence of twenty years’ to life 

imprisonment. Id.

 On July 2, 1997, Wheeler filed a direct appeal in the District of Columbia 

Court of Appeals. 

 While his appeal was pending, he also filed, in the District of Columbia 

Superior Court, three postconviction motions pursuant to D.C. Code § 23-110. 

Doc. 3 at 74 -75. Those motions, which raised ineffective assistance of counsel and 

prosecutorial misconduct claims, were all denied. Id. 

 On October 2, 2003, “[i]n a consolidated appeal [of Wheeler’s direct appeal 

and an appeal from the denial of postconviction relief],” the District of Columbia 

Court of Appeals affirmed. Wheeler v. United States, 832 A.2d 1271 (D.C. 2003); 

Doc. 3 at 74-75. 

 1

 In 1970, Congress enacted the District of Columbia Court Reform and Criminal Procedure Act, which 

created the District of Columbia Superior Court and the District of Columbia Court of Appeals, “to be like a State 

court system.” See Banks v. Smith, 377 F.Supp.2d 92, 94 (D. D.C. 2005). 

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 On April 28, 2010, Wheeler filed, in the District of Columbia Superior 

Court, a fourth postconviction motion pursuant to D.C. Code § 23-110, “based on 

‘newly discovered evidence’ of ethical violations at the D.C. Morgue and Brady

violations by the Government.” Doc. 3 at 75. On December 15, 2010, District of 

Columbia Associate Judge Harold Cushenberry entered an Order denying 

Wheeler’s motion because it was “successive and procedurally barred.” Doc. 3 at 

74-78. 

 Wheeler appealed the denial of postconviction relief. On October 20, 2011, 

the District of Columbia Court of Appeals affirmed: “The trial court did not err in 

finding appellant failed to demonstrate cause for failing to raise his claims in his 

direct appeal or previous § 23-110 motions.” Doc. 3 at 79; Wheeler v. United 

States, No. 11-CO-50, (D.C. Oct. 20, 2011); The Court also denied Wheeler’s 

subsequent requests for an en banc rehearing and a recall of the appellate mandate. 

Doc. 3 at 80, 82. 

 Wheeler initiated this habeas action on May 12, 2014, while he was 

incarcerated at FCI Forrest City.2 Doc. 2. He argues that: (1) the District of 

 2

 On June 23, 2014, Wheeler filed a change of address indicating that he had been transferred to FCI 

Fairton, in New Jersey. Doc. 9. However, a federal prisoner’s post-filing transfer does not generally defeat habeas 

jurisdiction. See Mujahid v. Daniels, 413 F.3d 991, 993-94 (9th Cir. 2005) (habeas petitioner incarcerated in the 

District of Oregon properly named the warden of the institution where he was imprisoned and filed petition in the 

District of Oregon - “[petitioner’s] subsequent transfer and placement onto supervised release do not alter this 

[jurisdiction] analysis” noting that “jurisdiction attaches on the initial filing for habeas corpus relief, and it is not 

destroyed by a transfer of the petitioner and the accompanying custodial change.”); United States v. Foster, 4 Fed. 

Appx. 605, 607 n.3 (10th Cir. 2001) (unpublished decision) (“Of course, parole or subsequent removal of a 

petitioner from the district with jurisdiction at the time a habeas petition is filed does not divest the court of its 

jurisdiction.”); White v. Lamanna, 42 Fed. Appx. 670 (6th Cir. 2002) (Ohio district court improperly dismissed a 

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Columbia Court of Appeals applied the wrong legal standard when it held that he 

could have discovered the alleged Brady material as early as 1996; (2) the District 

of Columbia Court of Appeals applied the incorrect legal standard in denying his 

Motion to Recall Mandate; (3) “the postconviction courts failed to correctly apply . 

. . [the] actual innocence gateway test;” and (4) the “postconviction courts were 

objectively unreasonable” and violated his Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights. 

Docs 2 and 3. 

 Respondent argues that this Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction over 

Wheeler’s habeas claims because he has not shown that his postconviciton remedy 

under D.C. Code § 23-110 is inadequate or ineffective. 

 For the reasons discussed below, the Court agrees with Respondent’s 

argument and recommends that Wheeler’s Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus be 

dismissed, with prejudice. 

II. Discussion

 An inmate who is incarcerated in federal prison pursuant to a conviction 

from the D.C. Superior Court is generally considered a “state” prisoner for 

purposes of habeas relief in federal court. See Adams v. Middlebrooks, 810 F. 

Supp.2d 119, 122 (D. D.C. 2011) (“the clear weight of authority . . . finds that a 

prisoner in custody pursuant to a judgment of the D.C. Superior Court must seek 

 

properly filed habeas petition after prisoner’s transfer to a federal prison in Indiana). Thus, this Court retains 

personal jurisdiction over this action. 

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habeas review under 28 U.S.C. § 2254”) (internal quotations omitted); Tyree v. 

Lindsay, 2007 WL 3231802 (M.D. Pa. 2007) (unpublished) (“Petitioner correctly 

indicated, and Respondent recognizes . . . that his Habeas Petition was filed 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 and not § 2241, since he is a District of Columbia 

convicted inmate confined in a federal prison challenging his D.C. conviction”); 

but see Page v. Holland, 2013 WL 3830166 (E.D. Ky 2013) (unpublished) 

(construing federal prisoner’s habeas claims challenging conviction from the D.C. 

Superior Court pursuant to § 2241, not § 2254). 

 Regardless of whether Wheeler’s habeas claims are characterized under 28 

U.S.C. § 2254 or § 2241, the result is the same. A prisoner who is convicted and 

sentenced by the District of Columbia Superior Court may seek collateral review 

pursuant to D.C. Code § 23–110(a), which authorizes a motion to vacate on the 

ground that the “sentence was imposed in violation of the Constitution of the 

United States[.]” Importantly, the statute goes on to provide that a habeas petition 

challenging the same sentence “shall not be entertained” by a federal court “unless 

it also appears that the remedy by [D.C. Code § 23-110(a)] is inadequate or 

ineffective to test the legality of his detention.” D.C. Code § 23-110(g). Thus, D.C. 

Code 23-110(g) “entirely divested the federal courts of jurisdiction to hear habeas 

corpus petitions by prisoners who had a section 23-110 remedy available to them, 

unless the petitioner could show that the section 23-110 remedy was inadequate or 

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ineffective[.]” Blair-Bey v. Quick, 151 F.3d 1036, 1043 (D.C. Cir. 1998) (internal 

quotations and citations omitted). 

 Wheeler argues that D.C. Code § 23-110(a) is inadequate because his case is 

analogous to Williams v. Martinez, 586 F.3d 995 (D.C. Cir. 2009). Williams

involved a prisoner, convicted in D.C. Superior Court, attempting to assert a 

habeas claim of ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. There was wellestablished D.C. Court of Appeals case law holding that ineffective assistance of 

appellate counsel claims could not be raised in a § 23-110(a) motion, and could 

only be raised in “a motion to recall the mandate . . . filed directly in the D.C. 

Court of Appeals[.]” Id. at 998. “Thus, because the [D.C.] Superior Court lacks 

authority to entertain a section 23-110 motion challenging the effectiveness of 

appellate counsel, that section is, by definition, inadequate to test the legality of 

Williams’s detention [and] section 23-110 does not bar Williams’s habeas 

petition.” Id. 

 Wheeler’s case is in no way analogous to Williams v. Martinez. Wheeler 

does not raise an ineffective assistance of appellate counsel claim. Instead, his 

habeas claims are premised on alleged Brady violations and his “actual 

innocence.” These are the kind of claims that have been held to be cognizable in a 

D.C. Code § 23-110(a) action. See Briscoe v. Jarvis, 2015 WL 124115 (D. D.C. 

Jan. 9, 2015) (government’s alleged failure to disclose Brady material was 

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cognizable in a D.C. Code § 23-110 action — dismissing habeas claim for lack of 

jurisdiction); Ibrahim v. United States, 661 F.3d 1141 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (holding 

that stand-alone and “gateway” actual innocence claims were cognizable under 

D.C. Code § 23-110). “The § 23-110 remedy . . . is not considered inadequate or 

ineffective simply because the requested relief has been denied.” Plummer v. 

Fenty, 321 Fed. Appx. 7 (D.C. Cir. 2009); see also Austin v. Miner, 235 Fed. 

Appx. 48 (3rd Cir. 2007) (“Section 23-110 . . . is not inadequate or ineffective 

simply because [petitioner] is prevented from . . . using the remedy a second time 

to litigate or re-litigate this claim[.]” 

 Because Wheeler has not shown that his remedy under D.C. Code § 23-

110(a) is inadequate or ineffective, the Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction over 

this habeas action, and recommends that the Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus 

be dismissed, with prejudice.3

III. Conclusion

 IT IS THEREFORE RECOMMENDED THAT: 

 1. The Petition for a Writ of Habeas Corpus be DISMISSED, WITH 

PREJUDICE; 

 3

 On April 14, 2015, Wheeler filed a “Motion for Writ of Mandamus” requesting: (1) an expedited 

disposition; or (2) an alternative transfer of venue, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1404, to the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia. Doc. 14. Because habeas subject-matter jurisdiction is clearly lacking in this case, 

Wheeler’s request for a change of venue is futile. See Nash v. Wendt, 2008 WL 4646336 (N.D. W. Va. 2008) 

(unpublished) (denying, as futile, an alternative request for a change of venue to the United States District Court for 

the District of Columbia because D.C. Code § 23-110 “prevent[ed] the federal courts from taking jurisdiction over 

the petitioner’s claims”). 

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 2. Petitioner’s “Motion for Writ of Mandamus” (doc. 14), construed as 

Motion for Change of Venue, be DENIED, AS FUTILE; and 

 3. A Certificate of Appealability be DENIED. 

 Dated this 23rd day of April, 2015. 

 

 ____________________________________ 

 UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

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