Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-15-06178/USCOURTS-ca4-15-06178-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Sabino Torres-Flores
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 15-6178

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

 Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.

SABINO TORRES-FLORES,

 Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern 

District of North Carolina, at Wilmington. Louise W. Flanagan, 

District Judge. (7:10-cr-00070-FL-2; 7:13-cv-00076-FL)

Submitted: July 23, 2015 Decided: July 27, 2015

Before NIEMEYER and KING, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior 

Circuit Judge.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

William Lee Davis, III, Lumberton, North Carolina, for Appellant. 

Jennifer E. Wells, Seth Morgan Wood, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES 

ATTORNEY, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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PER CURIAM:

Sabino Torres-Flores seeks to appeal the district court’s 

order accepting the recommendation of the magistrate judge and 

dismissing as untimely his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012) motion. The 

order is 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 

Torres-Flores has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we 

deny Torres-Flores’ motion for a certificate of appealability and 

dismiss the appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the 

facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the 

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materials before this court and argument would not aid the 

decisional process.

DISMISSED

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