UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

TENTH CIRCUIT

SHAWN SHINTON, Petitioner - Appellant,

v. TIM WILKINSON, Respondent - Appellee. No. 14-6035 (D.C. No. 5:13-CV-01014-D) (W.D. Oklahoma)

ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY

Before HARTZ , McKAY , and MATHESON , Circuit Judges.

Defendant Shawn Shinton, an Oklahoma prisoner, filed an application for relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 in th e United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. The district court denied the app lication as untimely. Defendant now seeks a certificate of appealability (COA) from this court to pursue an appeal. See 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(A) (requiring a COA to appeal denial of § 2254 application). We deny a COA and dismiss the appeal.

I. BACKGROUND Defendant was convicted by an Oklahoma jury of second-d egree murder on April 8, 1994. He was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole. The FILED United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit 

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Elisabeth A. Shumaker Clerk of Court2 Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (OCCA) affirmed his conviction on January 18, 1996. Defendant did not petition for a writ of certiorari in the United States Supreme Court. On August 17, 2011, he filed a stat e application for postconviction relief, which was denied. He appealed to the OCCA, which affirmed the denial on September 26,

2012. On September 19, 2013, Defe ndant filed a pro se application for relief in the district court under § 2254, arguing (1) th at his Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated by admission of his in voluntary confession at trial, (2) that his confession was the result of mental and emotional duress, and (3) that a law-enforcement witness testified falsely at his trial. We proceed to review the timeline ss of the application.

II. DISCUSSION A COA will issue “only if the applicant has made a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). This standard requires “a demonstration that . . . includes showing that reasonable jurists could debate whether (or, for that matter, agree that) the petition should ha ve been resolved in a different manner or that the issues presented were adequate to deserve encouragement to proceed further.”

Slack v. McDaniel , 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000) (interna l quotation marks omitted). In other words, the applicant must show that the district court’s resolution of the constitutional claim was either “debatable or wrong.” Id. If the application was denied on procedural grounds, the applicant faces a double hurdle. Not only must th e applicant make a substantial showing of the denial of a constitu tional right, but he must also show “that3 jurists of reason would find it debatable whet her the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.” Id. “Where a plain procedural bar is present and the district court is correct to invoke it to dispose of the case, a reasonable jurist could not conclude either that the district court erred in dismissing the petition or that the petitioner should be allowed to proceed further.” Id. A prisoner bringing a petiti on under § 2254 must file th e petition within one year of the last of the following dates: (A) the date on which the judgment became final by the conclusion of direct review or the expiration of the time for seek ing such review; (B) the date on which the impediment to filing an application created by State action in violation of the Constitu tion or laws of th e United States is removed, if the applicant was preven ted from filing by such State action; (C) the date on which the constituti onal right asserted was initially recognized by the Supreme Court, if the right has been newly recognized by the Supreme Court and made retroactively applicable to cases on collateral review; or (D) the date on which the factual predic ate of the claim or claims presented could have been discov ered through the exerci se of due diligence. 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(1). A prisoner must qualify under § 2244(d)(1)(A), filing his petition within one year of th e time his conviction became final, unless he can invoke a statutory extension under a nother provision of § 2244 or equitable tolling. See Clark v.

Oklahoma , 468 F.3d 711, 714 (10th Cir. 2006). The district court correctly calculated th at Defendant’s convic tion became final on April 17, 1996, ninety days after the OCCA denied his appeal, when his time to file a petition for certiorari with the Un ited States Supreme Court ran out. The court went on to

consider whether he was entitled to a statut ory extension under § 2244(d)(1)(B) or (D).4 Defendant claimed that § 2244(d)(1)(B) was a pplicable because he alleged that he was not able to obtain transcripts of his trial until 2011; the district judge ultimately found that he was in possession of his trial transcri pts by January 14, 2011. And Defendant suggested that the onset of the one-year limitations period woul d be delayed about a month beyond that by applyi ng § 2244(d)(1)(D) because a law-enforcement officer executed an affidavit helpful to his claims on February 11, 2011. In addition, Defendant could take advantage of tolling of the limitations pe riod from August 17, 2011, to September 26, 2012, while his state applica tion for postconviction relief was pending.

See 28 U.S.C. § 2244(d)(2). But even if we give Defendant the benef it of these statutory provisions, the filing of his § 2254 application on September 19, 2013, came too late. The filing was more

than 31 months after executio n of the officer’s affidavit, and his state postconviction application was pending for less than 14 months. There remains the possibility of equitabl e tolling, but equitable tolling is granted “only in rare and excep tional circumstances.” See Coppage v. McKune , 534 F.3d 1279, 1280 (10th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted). And, as the district court ruled, Defendant provided no facts to support such tolling. In this court Defendant addresses only the merits of his claims. He makes no arguments why the district cour t’s timeliness ruling was incorre ct. We conclude that no reasonable jurist could find it debatable that the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.5 III. CONCLUSION We DENY the application for a COA an d DISMISS the appeal. We DENY Defendant’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis

. ENTERED FOR THE COURT

Harris L Hartz Circuit Judge