UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 15-7333

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff - Appellee,

v.

BRIAN KEITH ROGERS,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western

District of North Carolina, at Charlotte. Frank D. Whitney,

Chief District Judge. (3:10-cr-00235-FDW-1; 3:13-cv-00657-FDW)

Submitted: January 15, 2016 Decided: January 29, 2016

Before NIEMEYER, KING, and WYNN, Circuit Judges.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Brian Keith Rogers, Appellant Pro Se. William A. Brafford, 

Cortney Randall, Assistant United States Attorneys, Charlotte, 

North Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
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PER CURIAM:

Brian Keith Rogers seeks to appeal the district court’s 

order denying Rogers’ Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(b) motion for relief 

from the court’s prior judgment* in light of Johnson v. United 

States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015). The order is not appealable 

unless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate of 

appealability. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(B) (2012). A certificate 

of appealability will not issue absent “a substantial showing of 

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

(2012). When the district court denies relief on the merits, a 

prisoner satisfies this standard by demonstrating that 

reasonable jurists would find that the district court’s 

assessment of the constitutional claims is debatable or wrong. 

Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); see Miller–El v. 

Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336–38 (2003). When the district court 

denies relief on procedural grounds, the prisoner must 

demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural ruling is 

debatable, and that the motion states a debatable claim of the 

denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. at 484–85.

We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that 

Rogers has not made the requisite showing. The district court 

 * The Rule 60(b) motion was filed in Rogers’ 28 U.S.C. 

§ 2255 (2012) postconviction proceeding.
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lacked jurisdiction to deny Rogers’ Rule 60(b) motion on the 

merits because the claim he raised challenged the validity of 

his career offender sentence, and thus the motion should have 

been construed as a successive 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion. See

Gonzalez v. Crosby, 545 U.S. 524, 531–32 (2005) (explaining how 

to differentiate a true Rule 60(b) motion from an unauthorized 

second or successive habeas corpus petition); United States v. 

Winestock, 340 F.3d 200, 207 (4th Cir. 2003) (same). In the 

absence of prefiling authorization from this court, the district 

court lacked jurisdiction to hear a successive § 2255 motion. 

See 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b)(3) (2012). 

Accordingly, we deny a certificate of appealability and 

dismiss the appeal. We also deny Rogers’ motion to amend his 

informal brief to add a new challenge to his sentence that was 

not previously presented to the district court. Rogers remains 

free, however, to pursue the legal issues identified in his Rule 

60(b) motion, and motion to amend his informal brief, in a 

motion pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2244 (2012). We dispense with 

oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are 

adequately presented in the materials before this court and 

argument would not aid the decisional process.

DISMISSED