UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

_________________________________ 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Plaintiff - Appellee, 

v. 

ERIC MADRID, 

 Defendant - Appellant. 

No. 15-2075 

(D.C. Nos. 1:11-CV-01135-LH-KBM and 

1:08-CR-00683-LH-1) 

(D.N.M.) 

_________________________________ 

ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY*

_________________________________ 

Before KELLY, LUCERO, and McHUGH, Circuit Judges. 

_________________________________ 

 Eric Madrid seeks a certificate of appealability (“COA”) to appeal the district 

court’s denial of his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 habeas motion. We deny a COA and dismiss 

the appeal. 

I 

During an investigatory stop, officers discovered a rifle in the back seat of a 

vehicle Madrid was driving. After the stop, Madrid moved to suppress evidence of 

the rifle. The district court denied his motion to suppress. Subsequently, Madrid 

pled guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm in violation of 18 U.S.C. 

 *

 This order is not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the 

case, res judicata, and collateral estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its 

persuasive value consistent with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1. 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals

Tenth Circuit 

August 12, 2015

Elisabeth A. Shumaker 

Clerk of Court
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§ 922(g)(1). Madrid now alleges that his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to 

further impeach the officers during the suppression hearing. 

Although we thoroughly recounted the facts underlying Madrid’s case in his 

direct appeal, United States v. Madrid, 713 F.3d 1251, 1254-55 (10th Cir. 2013), we 

provide further detail about the suppression hearing to clarify the basis of the case at 

bar. Madrid argued that probable cause to search his vehicle was absent because 

Officer Darrell Sanchez, who discovered the rifle, did so only after Lieutenant Chris 

Stoyell detained Madrid for twenty minutes outside the vehicle. 

 At the suppression hearing, Stoyell testified that he arrived at the apartment 

complex about a minute after being dispatched, stopped the vehicle Madrid was 

driving, pointed a spotlight at its driver-side window, and then awaited backup. 

According to Stoyell, Sanchez arrived a minute or two later. The pair of officers 

approached the vehicle and made contact with Madrid. Stoyell testified that while he 

conversed with Madrid at the driver-side window, Sanchez observed a rifle case in 

the back seat through the passenger-side window. At that point, Stoyell averred, he 

asked Madrid to exit the vehicle and handcuffed him. 

 Sanchez similarly testified that he arrived at the apartment complex a few 

minutes after being dispatched, and that by the time he arrived, Stoyell had already 

stopped Madrid. According to Sanchez’s testimony, while Stoyell talked to Madrid 

on the driver side of the vehicle, Sanchez approached the passenger side. There, he 

observed a rifle case in the back seat and informed Stoyell about it, which prompted 

Stoyell to order Madrid to exit the vehicle. 
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Madrid described a different sequence of events. He testified that immediately 

after he was stopped, Stoyell approached the vehicle, ordered Madrid to exit, 

handcuffed him, forced him to remove his shirt, and told him to sit on a curb some 

distance away from the vehicle. According to Madrid, Stoyell questioned him 

outside of the vehicle for about twenty minutes before Sanchez arrived and noticed 

the rifle case in the back seat. 

At the suppression hearing, Madrid’s trial counsel, Cliff McIntyre, attempted 

to impeach Stoyell and Sanchez based on discrepancies between their testimony and 

a dispatch log. The log revealed that Stoyell was dispatched at 7:55 p.m. and 

Sanchez was dispatched one minute later. According to the log, Stoyell reported he 

was “on scene” two minutes later, at 7:57 p.m. But Sanchez did not report he was 

“on scene” until more than twenty minutes later, at 8:20 p.m. 

On direct examination, Sanchez explained that he forgot to report “on-scene” 

when he initially arrived because he was concerned about officer safety. McIntyre 

questioned Sanchez about this explanation on cross-examination, asking him how his 

failure to report could be reconciled with the ability of every other officer, who 

presumably faced similar concerns, to nonetheless report “on-scene” in a timely 

fashion. During his cross-examination of Stoyell, McIntyre further probed into the 

discrepancy between Stoyell’s claims regarding when Sanchez arrived and the timing 

indicated by the dispatch log. Stoyell also admitted, under McIntyre’s questioning, 

that it was “possible” that he asked Madrid to exit his vehicle before Sanchez arrived. 

However, Stoyell remained adamant that he recalled Sanchez arriving and pointing 
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out the rifle case before Madrid was asked to leave his vehicle. Additionally, 

McIntyre cross-examined the police dispatcher, and elicited a concession from her 

that the dispatch log indicated that Sanchez did not arrive on the scene until 8:20 p.m. 

 McIntyre confronted both Stoyell and Sanchez with an inconsistency between 

their testimony and what they told McIntyre’s investigator, LeRoy Sandoval, during 

an earlier interview. While confronting Stoyell with the inconsistency, McIntyre 

stated: “when you talked to my investigator, and I’ve got the tape here if I need to 

refresh your recollection, you told my investigator you weren’t around the vehicle 

when the weapon was discovered. You were away from the vehicle talking to Mr. 

Madrid.” However, McIntyre did not attempt to introduce the tape recording into the 

record, play the relevant excerpt to the court, introduce a copy of Sandoval’s 

memorandum documenting the interview, or call Sandoval as a witness. 

 Some of McIntyre’s impeachment tactics were less successful. He convinced 

the district court to listen to a dispatch tape, which he claimed included a 

conversation between Stoyell and Sanchez that proved Sanchez did not arrive onscene immediately. However, when the district court listened to the tape, it heard no 

such conversation. Rather, it found that the tape contained evidence corroborating 

the testimony of Stoyell and Sanchez, specifically that after dispatch requested that 

Sanchez investigate a reported prowler, Stoyell overrode the request because Sanchez 

was otherwise occupied. 

 After the suppression hearing, the district court found that Stoyell and Sanchez 

were credible, and that Madrid was not. It found that the officers’ version of events 
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was correct, and discounted the allegedly contrary evidence from the dispatch log. It 

found that Sanchez’s explanation that he simply forgot to immediately report onscene was corroborated by Stoyell overriding the request to have Sanchez respond to 

the reported prowler, “indicating that Officer Sanchez was indeed on scene with Lt. 

Stoyell.” Accordingly, the district court denied the motion to suppress. We 

affirmed. Madrid, 713 F.3d at 1262. 

 After Madrid filed the amended § 2255 motion now at issue, his new counsel 

deposed both McIntyre and Sandoval and subpoenaed their records. Neither had 

possession of the tape and both had destroyed their records. A memorandum 

Sandoval drafted for McIntyre summarized an interview in which Stoyell provided a 

version of events that aligned with Madrid’s testimony at the suppression hearing. 

The district court denied the § 2255 claim, Madrid’s request for an evidentiary 

hearing, and a COA. Madrid timely appealed. 

II

Madrid may not appeal the denial of § 2255 relief without a COA. 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2253(c)(1)(B). We will issue a COA “only if the applicant has made a substantial 

showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). To satisfy 

this standard, Madrid must demonstrate “that reasonable jurists could debate whether 

(or, for that matter, agree that) the petition should have 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) (quotation omitted). 
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A

 A petitioner claiming ineffective assistance of counsel must establish “that 

counsel made errors so serious that counsel was not functioning as the ‘counsel’ 

guaranteed the defendant by the Sixth Amendment” and that “the deficient 

performance prejudiced the defense.” Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 687 

(1984). To establish prejudice, a “defendant must show that there is a reasonable 

probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors, the result of the proceeding 

would have been different.” Id. at 694. “The assessment of prejudice should proceed 

on the assumption that the decisionmaker is reasonably, conscientiously, and 

impartially applying the standards that govern the decision. It should not depend on 

the idiosyncracies of the particular decisionmaker . . . .” Id. at 695. “In making this 

determination, a court hearing an ineffectiveness claim must consider the totality of 

the evidence before the judge or jury.” Id. 

 On appeal, Madrid argues that McIntyre rendered ineffective assistance 

because he failed to cross-examine Stoyell in greater detail or to introduce evidence 

of Sandoval’s interview to impeach Stoyell and Sanchez. Assuming arguendo that 

McIntyre’s inactions constituted deficient performance under the first prong of 

Strickland, we nevertheless conclude that Madrid was not prejudiced by McIntyre’s 

inactions. McIntyre made strong arguments about the discrepancy between the 

officers’ account of events and the timeline indicated by the dispatch log. He 

extensively cross-examined Stoyell, Sanchez, and the dispatcher. It is unclear what 

purpose additional cross-examination of Stoyell would have served, as McIntyre had 
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already elicited a concession from Stoyell that it was “possible” that Madrid was 

removed from the vehicle before Sanchez saw the rifle case. Moreover, McIntyre 

confronted both Stoyell and Sanchez with the discrepancy between their testimony 

and the account that Stoyell provided to Sandoval during the interview. We see no 

reason why listening to, or reading an account of, Sandoval’s interview with Stoyell, 

rather than hearing McIntyre recount the interview, would have caused the court to 

reach a different decision. 

 After reading the parties’ briefs, hearing testimony, and listening to the 

dispatch tape and log, the district court found the officers to be credible. It found 

that the dispatch tape corroborated officer testimony that Sanchez forgot to report onscene immediately. Madrid has not shown “a reasonable probability that . . . the 

result of the proceeding would have been different” but for inaction by McIntyre. Id. 

at 694. 

B

 Madrid further argues that the district court erred by failing to hold an 

evidentiary hearing. We review a district court’s denial of an evidentiary hearing for 

abuse of discretion. United States v. Harms, 371 F.3d 1208, 1210 (10th Cir. 2004). 

A district court need not hold an evidentiary hearing if “the case record conclusively 

shows the prisoner is entitled to no relief.” United States v. Marr, 856 F.2d 1471, 

1472 (10th Cir. 1988). 

 The district court granted several of Madrid’s discovery requests during the 

§ 2255 proceeding. Madrid had the opportunity to depose both McIntyre and 
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Sanchez. He subpoenaed them to obtain any records they had failed to turn over. 

That discovery revealed that neither had possession of the tape, and that both had 

destroyed their records. It is therefore unclear what evidence missing from the record 

could be elicited during an evidentiary hearing. Madrid specifically contends that a 

hearing is necessary to demonstrate the accuracy of the information that Sandoval 

gave to McIntyre, particularly in light of the government’s suggestion that McIntyre 

may have been “bluffing” about the existence of the tape. But both McIntyre and 

Sandoval already testified in their depositions about the existence of the tape. And 

the accuracy of the information Sandoval gave to McIntyre can be verified through 

the memorandum Sandoval wrote for McIntyre, which is already in the record. 

Accordingly, the district court did not abuse its discretion by denying Madrid’s 

motion for an evidentiary hearing because the existing record shows conclusively that 

Madrid is not entitled to relief. See Marr, 856 F.2d at 1472. 

III 

For the foregoing reasons, we DENY a COA and DISMISS the appeal. 

Entered for the Court 

Carlos F. Lucero 

Circuit Judge