Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-14-04360/USCOURTS-ca4-14-04360-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Lorenzo Malloral Lopez
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 14-4360

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

 Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.

LORENZO MALLORAL LOPEZ,

 Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western 

District of North Carolina, at Charlotte. Robert J. Conrad, 

Jr., District Judge. (3:12-cr-00113-RJC-2)

Submitted: January 15, 2015 Decided: January 20, 2015

Before WILKINSON and NIEMEYER, Circuit Judges, and DAVIS, Senior 

Circuit Judge.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Carol Ann Bauer, Morganton, North Carolina, for Appellant.

Anne M. Tompkins, United States Attorney, William M. Miller, 

Assistant United States Attorney, Charlotte, North Carolina, for 

Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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PER CURIAM:

Lorenzo Malloral Lopez pled guilty, pursuant to a 

written plea agreement, to conspiracy to possess with intent to 

distribute at least 500 grams of cocaine, in violation of 21 

U.S.C. § 846 (2012), and possession of a firearm in furtherance 

of a drug trafficking offense, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 

§ 924(c) (2012). The district court sentenced Lopez to two 

consecutive terms of sixty months’ imprisonment. Lopez appeals 

his criminal judgment, arguing only that his counsel was 

ineffective in permitting him to plead guilty pursuant to a plea 

agreement containing an appellate waiver provision, rather than 

pleading “straight up,” as he had originally contemplated.

We decline to reach the merits of Lopez’s claim. 

Unless an attorney’s ineffectiveness conclusively appears on the 

face of the record, ineffective assistance claims generally are 

not addressed on direct appeal. United States v. Benton, 523 

F.3d 424, 435 (4th Cir. 2008). Instead, such claims should be 

raised in a motion brought pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012), 

in order to permit sufficient development of the record. United 

States v. Baptiste, 596 F.3d 214, 216 n.1 (4th Cir. 2010). 

Because we discern no conclusive evidence of ineffective 

assistance of counsel on the face of the record before us, we 

conclude that Lopez’s claim should be raised, if at all, in a 

§ 2255 motion.

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Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment. 

We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal 

contentions are adequately presented in the materials before 

this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED

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