UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT

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ROSCOE CHAMBERS, 

 Petitioner - Appellant,

v.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Respondent - Appellee.

No. 22-3135

(D.C. No. 5:22-CV-03137-JWL)

(D. Kan.)

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ORDER AND JUDGMENT*

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Before MORITZ, BRISCOE, and CARSON, Circuit Judges.

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Roscoe Chambers, a federal prisoner incarcerated in Leavenworth, Kansas, 

proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s dismissal of his petition for a writ of 

habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. 

§ 1291, we affirm.

* After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined 

unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist in the determination of 

this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is therefore 

ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment 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

September 12, 2022

Christopher M. Wolpert

Clerk of Court

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I. Background

In 2013, Mr. Chambers was found guilty of drug-trafficking offenses. A

district court in the Southern District of Iowa (“the sentencing court”) sentenced him 

to 360 months in prison and an 8-year term of supervised release. The Eighth Circuit 

affirmed the judgment on direct appeal. Mr. Chambers subsequently filed a 

28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion, which the sentencing court denied. 

In September 2021, the sentencing court granted Mr. Chambers’ motion for 

compassionate release and ordered his 8-year term of supervised release to 

commence immediately upon his release from incarceration. The sentencing court 

required as a term of supervision that Mr. Chambers reside in a residential reentry 

center for an extended period. But the next month, the sentencing court entered a 

judgment revoking his supervised release for failure to follow the rules of the 

residential reentry center and sentencing him to thirty days in custody, followed by 

an 8-year term of supervised release. Mr. Chambers appealed, but the Eighth Circuit 

summarily affirmed the sentencing judgment.

In May 2022, the sentencing court again revoked Mr. Chambers’ supervised 

release for failing to follow the rules of the residential reentry center. It entered a 

judgment sentencing him to 24 months in prison, to be followed by an 8-year term of 

supervised release. Mr. Chambers appealed that judgment to the Eighth Circuit.1

1 On August 16, 2022, the Eighth Circuit affirmed the sentencing court’s 

judgment (revoking Mr. Chambers’ supervised release and imposing a 24-month 

custodial sentence, followed by an 8-year term of supervised release).

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While his appeal was pending in the Eighth Circuit, Mr. Chambers filed a

§ 2241 petition in the district court in the District of Kansas, which is the district 

where he is confined. In it, he challenged the new sentence imposed upon revocation 

of his supervised release. He argued: (1) he didn’t violate the conditions of 

supervised release; (2) his Sixth Amendment rights were violated because he was not 

able to confront the witnesses who wrote the incident reports that were entered into 

evidence at the revocation hearing; (3) the sentencing court improperly sentenced 

him to a 24-month custodial sentence, which was higher than the sentencing 

guidelines range; and (4) the sentencing court improperly sentenced him to an 8-year 

term of supervised release. In his request for relief, he demanded to be released from 

federal custody. 

In its order, the district court did not reach the merits of the § 2241 petition. 

Instead, it explained that because Mr. Chambers was challenging the validity of his 

sentence, rather than the execution of his sentence, he needed to file a § 2255 motion 

in the court where he was convicted and sentenced, not a § 2241 petition in the 

district of confinement. 

The court further explained that there is a narrow exception where a federal 

prisoner may file a § 2241 petition in the district of confinement, but only if the 

prisoner demonstrates that the remedy provided by § 2255 is “inadequate or 

ineffective to test the legality of his detention,” 28 U.S.C. § 2255(e). Because 

Mr. Chambers failed to show that the remedy in § 2255 was inadequate or ineffective 

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to test the legality of his detention, the district court concluded he could not proceed 

under § 2241. The court therefore dismissed the § 2241 petition. 

II. Discussion

“We review the district court’s dismissal of a § 2241 habeas petition de novo.” 

Brace v. United States, 634 F.3d 1167, 1169 (10th Cir. 2011) (internal quotation 

marks omitted). As we explained in Brace:

A petition brought under 28 U.S.C. § 2241 typically attacks the execution 

of a sentence rather than its validity and must be filed in the district where 

the prisoner is confined. A § 2255 motion, on the other hand, is generally 

the exclusive remedy for a federal prisoner seeking to attack the legality of 

detention, and must be filed in the district that imposed the sentence.

Id. (internal quotation marks, brackets, and citations omitted). A § 2241 petition may be 

appropriate to challenge the legality of detention, but the petitioner bears the burden of 

demonstrating that the remedy in § 2255 is inadequate or ineffective, and such 

circumstances are rare. See id.

In his appellate brief, Mr. Chambers fails to address the district court’s 

determination that § 2241 is not the proper vehicle for his claims and that he must file a 

§ 2255 motion in the sentencing court if he wants to challenge the validity of his sentence

because he has not shown that the § 2255 remedy is inadequate or ineffective. Instead, he

reasserts the claims he raised in his § 2241 petition. See Aplt. Br. at 3 (arguing that 

(1) failure to follow the rules of the residential reentry center is not a violation of 

supervised release and (2) the sentencing court sentenced him higher than the sentencing 

guidelines range). Mr. Chambers has failed to adequately brief how the district court 

erred in dismissing his § 2241 petition, which provides a basis to affirm the district 

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court’s dismissal. See Nixon v. City & Cnty. of Denver, 784 F.3d 1364, 1366 

(10th Cir. 2015) (affirming district court where appellant “fail[ed] . . . to explain what 

was wrong with the reasoning the district court relied on in reaching its decision”). 

Moreover, we agree with the district court that because Mr. Chambers did not 

demonstrate that § 2255 is an inadequate or ineffective remedy to challenge his detention, 

it was proper to dismiss his § 2241 petition.2

III. Conclusion

We affirm the judgment of the district court.

Entered for the Court

Per Curiam

2 The district court stated at the end of its decision that Mr. Chambers may 

seek authorization from the Eighth Circuit to file a second or successive § 2255 

motion in the sentencing court. But we note that Mr. Chambers may not need 

authorization to file a § 2255 motion challenging the new sentencing judgment

because it may not constitute a second or successive § 2255 motion. See Magwood v. 

Patterson, 561 U.S. 320, 341-42 (2010) (in § 2254 context, where “a new judgment 

interven[es] between the two habeas petitions, an application challenging the 

resulting new judgment is not second or successive at all”) (internal quotation marks 

and citation omitted); United States v. McGaughy, 670 F.3d 1149, 1159 n.7 

(10th Cir. 2012) (under Magwood, second § 2255 claim not second or successive 

“because it relate[d] to a new sentence”).

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