Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca11-23-13486/USCOURTS-ca11-23-13486-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Attorney General, State of Florida
Appellee
John Curry
Appellant
Secretary, Florida Department of Corrections
Appellee

Document Text:

[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 23-13486

____________________

JOHN CURRY, 

Petitioner-Appellant,

versus

SECRETARY, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS,

ATTORNEY GENERAL, STATE OF FLORIDA, 

Respondents-Appellees.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Florida

D.C. Docket No. 8:20-cv-02120-TPB-SPF

____________________

USCA11 Case: 23-13486 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 01/03/2025 Page: 1 of 4
2 Opinion of the Court 23-13486

Before ROSENBAUM, ABUDU, and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

John Curry, a Florida prisoner, applied for a certificate of appealability (a “COA”) to appeal the District Court’s denial of his 

petition for a writ of habeas corpus. A jury found Curry guilty of 

murder and attempted felony murder resulting from Curry’s involvement in a drug-related burglary and robbery. After failing to 

obtain postconviction relief in direct and collateral state court proceedings, he petitioned for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2254. Curry argued eleven grounds for relief in that petition, all 

of which the District Court denied. 

Curry then moved for a COA under 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c). His 

application raised only two of the issues that he presented in his 

petition to the District Court: (1) whether his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to move to suppress a statement he gave to police and (2) whether his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to 

properly argue a motion for judgment of acquittal. However, the 

COA that we issued was granted on a third issue that Curry never 

raised in his application: “Whether the district court erred in denying Curry’s claim that trial counsel was ineffective for asking him 

about the nature of his prior felony convictions on direct examination?” 

We have held as an en banc Court that a COA “must specify 

what issue or issues raised by the prisoner satisfy” the requirement 

that “the applicant has made a substantial showing of the denial of 

a constitutional right.” Spencer v. United States, 773 F.3d 1132, 1137 

USCA11 Case: 23-13486 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 01/03/2025 Page: 2 of 4
23-13486 Opinion of the Court 3

(11th Cir. 2014) (en banc) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

While an erroneously issued COA does not implicate our jurisdiction over the appeal, see Gonzalez v. Thaler, 565 U.S. 134, 142–45, 132 

S. Ct. 641, 649–50 (2012), we may still vacate a COA that we erroneously issued. Spencer, 773 F.3d at 1137–38. Indeed, “[w]e have 

the authority and duty to vacate a COA” that was improvidently 

granted. Lambrix v. Sec’y, DOC, 872 F.3d 1170, 1179 (11th Cir. 2017) 

(per curiam). 

That is the case here. A prisoner’s application is what 

“demonstrate[s] that reasonable jurists would find the district 

court’s assessment of the constitutional claims debatable or 

wrong.” Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484, 120 S. Ct. 1595, 1604 

(2000); accord Buck v. Davis, 580 U.S. 100, 115, 137 S. Ct. 759, 773 

(2017). But Curry never raised or mentioned in his application the 

issue on which we granted a COA, much less why the District 

Court’s assessment of that issue was debatable or wrong. Looking 

beyond the issues presented in Curry’s application is not “consonant with the limited nature of the [COA] inquiry.” Buck, 580 U.S. 

at 117, 137 S. Ct. at 774. 

Certainly, we have sua sponte remediated defective COAs by 

revisiting the petitioner’s application and determining from the issues raised therein that the petitioner made the showing required 

for a COA. See, e.g., Penney v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Corr., 707 F.3d 1239, 1242 

(11th Cir. 2013), vacated as moot, 2013 WL 5962971 (M.D. Fla. Apr. 

17, 2013); Lambrix, 872 F.3d at 1180. But we cannot do so here because Curry did not even raise in his application the issue of 

USCA11 Case: 23-13486 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 01/03/2025 Page: 3 of 4
4 Opinion of the Court 23-13486

whether the District Court erred in denying his claim that his trial 

counsel was ineffective for asking him about the nature of his prior 

felony convictions on direct examination. We cannot make an end 

run around Curry’s application and “ignore the clear command of 

Congress articulated in subsections 2253(c)(2) and (3).” Spencer, 

773 F.3d at 1137.

For these reasons, the COA was improvidently granted. As 

a result, we vacate our previous order granting the COA, and we 

dismiss Curry’s appeal.

CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY VACATED AS 

IMPROVIDENTLY GRANTED, AND APPEAL DISMISSED.

USCA11 Case: 23-13486 Document: 34-1 Date Filed: 01/03/2025 Page: 4 of 4