[DO NOT PUBLISH]

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

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No. 13-12274

Non-Argument Calendar

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D.C. Docket No. 4:10-cv-00408-MP-CAS

NATASKA HOWARD, 

 Petitioner-Appellant,

versus

WARDEN, 

 Respondent-Appellee.

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Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Florida

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(September 10, 2014)

Before PRYOR, MARTIN, and FAY, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

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Nataska Howard, a federal prisoner proceeding pro se, appeals the district 

judge’s dismissal of her petition for writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. 

We affirm.

I. BACKGROUND

On March 7, 2006, Howard was arrested for her participation in distributing 

narcotics. See United States v. Howard, 252 F. App’x 955, 957 (11th Cir. 2007)

(per curiam) (providing the factual background for Howard’s arrest). Following a 

jury trial, Howard was convicted of one count of conspiracy to possess with intent 

to distribute five or more grams of cocaine base, in violation of 21 U.S.C. 

§§ 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B), 846, and one count of possession with intent to distribute 

five or more grams of cocaine base, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), 

(b)(1)(B). Based on her status as a career offender, Howard received concurrent 

30-year sentences on each count under U.S.S.G. § 4B1.

We affirmed on direct appeal,. Howard, 252 F. App’x at 962. Howard

challenged the use of a prior state conviction as a career-offender predicate crime. 

We rejected her argument and concluded, because she had failed to object to

various presentence-investigation-report provisions, Howard had admitted facts 

sufficient to show the prior crime was a career-offender-predicate crime of 

violence. Id. at 959-61 & n.2. In 2008, Howard filed a habeas petition under 28 

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U.S.C. § 2255, which the district judge denied. Both the district judge and this 

court denied Howard’s requests for a certificate of appealability.

Howard filed a petition under § 2241 in 2010. Under the Fair Sentencing

Act of 2010 (“FSA”) § 2a, Pub. L. No. 111-220, 124 Stat. 2372,1 she argued she 

was actually innocent of her sentences, which were based on pre-FSA disparities 

between powder and crack-cocaine sentences. Howard further contended she was 

actually innocent of her career-offender status, because several of her prior 

convictions did not qualify as career-offender predicate crimes. She asserted her 

predicate crimes had been established with improper documents, in violation of 

Shepard v. United States, 544 U.S. 13, 125 S. Ct. 1254 (2005), and Taylor v. 

United States, 495 U.S. 575, 110 S. Ct. 2143 (1990). She further argued her 30-

year sentences had been improperly enhanced under 21 U.S.C. § 851, based on a 

prior non-felony marijuana conviction. Howard argued she was entitled to § 2241 

relief under the 28 U.S.C. § 2255(e) “savings clause,” because (1) she previously 

had filed a § 2255 motion; (2) her claims did not rely on newly discovered 

evidence or new rules of constitutional law; and (3) therefore, a successive § 2255 

motion would be inadequate to test the illegality of her detention.

The district judge characterized Howard’s § 2241 petition as an attempt to 

circumvent the restrictions on successive § 2255 motions. The judge dismissed the 

 1 The FSA reduced the “100–to–1 crack-to-powder ratio to 18–to–1.” Dorsey v. United 

States, 132 S. Ct. 2321, 2329 (2012).

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petition and concluded (1) the FSA did not apply retroactively; (2) Howard could 

not satisfy the § 2255(e) savings clause, because her sentences did not exceed the 

statutory maximums for her convictions; and (3) her actual-innocence claim was 

misplaced, because she was not charged with, or convicted of, being a career 

offender.

On appeal, Howard argues the district judge erred when he dismissed her 

§ 2241 petition. She contends several recent Supreme Court cases established she 

was convicted of a nonexistent crime—her career-offender designation. She 

further argues barring her from § 2241 relief will violate the Suspension Clause, 

U.S. Const. Art. I, § 9.2

 

II. DISCUSSION

We review de novo whether a prisoner may bring a § 2241 petition under the 

§ 2255(e) savings clause. Bryant v. Warden, FCC Coleman-Medium, 738 F.3d 

1253, 1262 (11th Cir. 2013). When a conviction has become final, a federal 

prisoner usually may challenge the legality of her detention only through a § 2255 

motion. Id. at 1256. When a prisoner previously has filed a § 2255 motion, she 

must apply for and receive permission from this court before filing a successive 

 2 The Suspension Clause provides: “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not 

be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.” 

U.S. Const. Art. I, § 9.

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§ 2255 motion. See 28 U.S.C. § 2255(h) (cross-referencing id. § 2244); Bryant, 

738 F.3d at 1260.

Section 2241 habeas petitions generally are reserved for challenges to the 

execution of a sentence or the nature of confinement, not the validity of the 

sentence itself or the fact of confinement. Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1288. Howard,

however, may file a § 2241 petition if she meets her burden of showing that a 

§ 2255 motion was “inadequate or ineffective to test the legality of [her] 

detention.” 28 U.S.C. § 2255(e). Whether the § 2255(e) savings clause may “open 

the portal” to a § 2241 petition is a jurisdictional issue that must be decided before 

addressing the merits of a petitioner’s claims. Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1262 (citing 

Williams v. Warden, 713 F.3d 1332, 1337-40 (11th Cir. 2013)).

The restrictions on filing successive § 2255 motions do not render a § 2255 

remedy “inadequate or ineffective” for purposes of the § 2255(e) savings clause. 

See id. at 1267 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). To show a prior 

§ 2255 motion was inadequate or ineffective to test the legality of her detention, a

petitioner asserting a sentencing-error claim must establish (1) binding circuit 

precedent squarely foreclosed the claim during the petitioner’s sentencing, direct 

appeal, and first § 2255 proceeding; (2) after the petitioner’s first § 2255 

proceeding, a United States Supreme Court decision overturned that circuit 

precedent; (3) the rule announced in that Supreme Court decision applies 

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retroactively on collateral review; and (4) as a result of that new rule, the 

petitioner’s sentence exceeds the statutory maximum authorized by Congress. See

id. at 1274, 1281. The savings clause does not reach Guidelines-error sentencing 

claims brought by a prisoner whose sentence does not exceed the statutory 

maximum. See Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1264 (citing Gilbert v. United States, 640 F.3d 

1293, 1295, 1301-03 (11th Cir. 2011) (en banc)).

The restrictions on filing successive § 2255 motions also do not violate the 

Suspension Clause, because they (1) simply transfer from the district court to the 

court of appeals a screening function that previously would have been performed 

by the district judge; and (2) do not deprive the Supreme Court of jurisdiction to 

entertain original habeas petitions. See Felker v. Turpin, 518 U.S. 651, 661-62, 

664, 116 S. Ct. 2333, 2339-40 (1996) (addressing successive 28 U.S.C. § 2254 

petitions); see also 28 U.S.C. § 2241(a).

In her § 2241 petition, Howard sought to attack the validity of her sentence, 

and not its execution; therefore, § 2255 was the appropriate statute for her claims. 

See Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1288. To bring her claims via a § 2241 petition, Howard

was required to show § 2255 was inadequate or ineffective to test the legality of 

her detention. See 28 U.S.C. § 2255(e); Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1256, 1262.

After being convicted of one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to 

distribute five or more grams of cocaine base, in violation of 21 U.S.C. 

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§§ 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B), 846, and one count of possession with intent to distribute 

five or more grams of cocaine base, in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), 

(b)(1)(B), Howard was sentenced to concurrent 30-year imprisonment sentences on 

each count. The statutory maximum sentence for a violation of § 841(a)(1), 

(b)(1)(B) committed after one has sustained a prior conviction for a felony drug 

offense is life imprisonment. 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B). Absent a prior felony 

drug conviction, the statutory maximum sentence for a § 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B) 

violation is 40 years of imprisonment. Id. The statutory maximum sentences for 

violations of § 846, where the object of the conspiracy was a violation of 

§ 841(a)(1), (b)(1)(B), are the same. See 21 U.S.C. § 846. Howard’s 30-year 

sentences do not exceed her statutory maximums, regardless of whether the district 

judge erred when he determined she was a career offender, improperly subjected 

her to enhanced sentences for having a prior felony drug conviction, or violated 

Shepard. See 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(b)(1)(B), 846. Therefore, the § 2255(e) savings 

clause does not apply to her sentence-enhancement or career-offender claims.3

 See

 3 Howard also asserts this court’s decisions in Spencer v. United States, 727 F.3d 1076 

(11th Cir. 2013), vacated pending reh’g en banc, (11th Cir. Mar. 7, 2014), and Zack v. Tucker, 

704 F.3d 917 (11th Cir.) (en banc), cert. denied, 134 S. Ct. 156 (2013), support her various 

claims. Contrary to Howard’s arguments, our decisions in Spencer and Zack do not support her 

claim that she was sentenced above the statutory maximums. See Spencer, 727 F.3d 1076 

(addressing, in an initial, timely filed § 2255 motion, a claim that a new, retroactively applicable 

Supreme Court decision rendered the petitioner’s career-offender status erroneous, without any 

discussion of the applicable statutory maximum sentence); Zack, 704 F.3d 917 (recognizing the 

statute of limitations for habeas petitions applies on a claim-by-claim basis, without any 

discussion of statutory maximum sentences).

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Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1264 (“We [have] held definitively that the savings clause does 

not reach a guidelines-error sentencing claim when the prisoner’s sentence does

not exceed the statutory maximum.” (citing Gilbert, 640 F.3d at 1295)). 

Howard’s claims that she is actually innocent of being a career offender and 

was convicted of the “nonexistent offense” of being a career offender also do not 

change the result here. See Bryant, 738 F.3d at 1285 (“[O]ne cannot be actually

innocent of a sentencing enhancement.”); Gilbert, 640 F.3d at 1320 (rejecting the 

petitioner’s claim that he was actually innocent of being a career offender, because

he was neither charged with, nor convicted of, being a career offender). Howard’s 

claim of a purported Suspension Clause violation likewise does not entitle her to 

relief, because the claim ultimately rests on the restrictions on filing successive 

§ 2255 motions. See Felker, 518 U.S. at 661-62, 664, 116 S. Ct. at 2339-40.

Even if a claim based on the FSA were cognizable under the § 2255(e) 

savings clause, the FSA does not apply to defendants, like Howard, who were 

sentenced before its August 3, 2010, enactment. See United States v. Berry, 701 

F.3d 374, 377 (11th Cir. 2012) (per curiam) (affirming the denial of a § 3582(c)(2) 

motion for a sentence reduction). Accordingly, Howard has not shown the district 

judge erred in dismissing her § 2241 petition.

AFFIRMED.

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