UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 12-4397

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff – Appellee,

v.

LARRY RODGERS, JR.,

Defendant - Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern 

District of North Carolina, at Raleigh. Malcolm J. Howard, 

Senior District Judge. (5:11-cr-00218-H-1)

Submitted: April 16, 2013 Decided: August 12, 2013

Before NIEMEYER, DIAZ, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Judge Diaz wrote a 

separate concurring opinion.

Kelly L. Greene, GREENE & WILSON, P.A., New Bern, North 

Carolina, for Appellant. Thomas G. Walker, United States 

Attorney, Jennifer P. May-Parker, Joshua L. Rogers, Assistant 

United States Attorneys, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.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

Larry Rodgers, Jr., appeals his conviction after a 

jury convicted him of one count of conspiracy to commit armed 

bank robbery, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371 (2006); one count 

of armed bank robbery and aiding and abetting, in violation of 

18 U.S.C. §§ 2113(a), (d) (2006), and 2 (2006); and one count of 

using and carrying a firearm during and in relation to a crime 

of violence and aiding and abetting, in violation of 18 U.S.C. 

§§ 924(c)(1)(A)(ii) (2006) and 2. Rodgers was sentenced to 209 

months’ imprisonment. On appeal, Rodgers argues that the 

district court erred in allowing him to represent himself 

because he was not competent to act as his own counsel, and 

denied him a fair trial in its management of courtroom 

proceedings. 

The Sixth Amendment guarantees not only the right to 

be represented by counsel but also the right to 

self-representation. Faretta v. California, 422 U.S. 806, 819 

(1975). The decision to represent oneself must be knowing and 

intelligent, id. at 835, and courts must entertain every 

reasonable presumption against waiver of counsel. Brewer v. 

Williams, 430 U.S. 387, 404 (1977). Because Rodgers contends he 

was not competent to waive counsel, we review the record to 

ensure that the waiver was voluntary, knowing, and intelligent. 

United States v. Bernard, 708 F.3d 583, 588 (4th Cir. 2013). 
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This issue, raised for the first time on appeal, is reviewed for

plain error. United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 732 (1993); 

Bernard, 708 F.3d at 587-88.

While a trial court must determine if a waiver of 

counsel is knowing and intelligent, no particular interrogation 

of the defendant is required, so long as the court warns the 

defendant of the dangers of self-representation so that “‘his 

choice is made with his eyes open.’” United States v. King, 582 

F.2d 888, 890 (4th Cir. 1978) (quoting Faretta, 422 U.S. at 

835). “The determination of whether there has been an 

intelligent waiver of the right to counsel must depend, in each 

case, upon the particular facts and circumstances surrounding 

that case, including the background, experience, and conduct of 

the accused.” Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464 (1938); see

United States v. Singleton, 107 F.3d 1091, 1097-98 (4th Cir. 

1997).

We conclude that the district court did not err in 

granting Rodgers’ request to waive counsel and proceed pro se. 

Our examination of the record as a whole demonstrates that 

Rodgers’ election to proceed pro se was knowing, intelligent, 

and voluntary. At the time he elected to proceed pro se, 

Rodgers was fully aware of the nature of the charges against him 

and the potential punishments he faced if convicted. The 

district court also informed Rodgers of the perils of 
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self-representation and stated its belief that he was making a 

mistake. 

Rodgers contends that his history of depression and 

learning disabilities, combined with the fact that he spent his 

school years in special education classes, made him incompetent 

to represent himself, and argues that the district court erred 

in failing to sua sponte terminate his self-representation when 

it became apparent he was unqualified to represent himself. To 

support this argument, Rodgers points to the Supreme Court’s

decision in Indiana v. Edwards, 554 U.S. 164, 171 (2008), and 

states that “the right of self-representation is not absolute.” 

Unlike the defendant in Edwards, however, Rodgers did not suffer 

from a severe mental illness, but merely displayed some 

difficulty communicating with the court and jury. We conclude 

that these difficulties were insufficient to require the court 

to terminate Rodgers’ self-representation. 

Rodgers next contends that he was deprived of a fair 

trial by the district court’s allegedly prejudicial conduct. He 

asserts that the court interfered with his ability to put on a 

case, truncated his cross-examination of witnesses as well as 

his own testimony, and ultimately forced him to rest his case. 

We review these allegations for abuse of discretion. United 

States v. Castner, 50 F.3d 1267, 1272 (4th Cir. 1995). 
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Generally, “[q]uestions of trial management are 

quintessentially the province of the district courts.” United 

States v. Smith, 452 F.3d 323, 332 (4th Cir. 2006). The 

district court has two responsibilities in trial oversight —

ensuring that “matters are clearly presented to the jury” and 

preventing “trials from becoming protracted and costly affairs.” 

Id. The court “must exercise reasonable control over the 

interrogation of witnesses and the presentation of evidence in 

order to ensure the effective determination of the truth [and] 

to avoid needless waste of time in the presentation of a case.” 

Castner, 50 F.3d at 1272 (internal quotation marks omitted). We 

will grant a new trial only if the district court’s actions 

denied the appellant “a fair, as distinguished from a perfect, 

trial.” United States v. Villarini, 238 F.3d 530, 536 (4th Cir. 

2001) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

Here, the district court did not excessively interfere 

with Rodgers’ exercise of his right to proceed pro se, but 

properly required Rodgers to observe the rules of criminal 

procedure and evidence and exercised its discretion to limit 

repetitive and cumulative examination of witnesses. Thus, the 

district court’s interventions into Rodgers’ case were for the 

purpose of clarifying the evidence for the jury and ensuring 

that evidence was properly presented without undue delay. 
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Therefore, we conclude that Rodgers has failed to demonstrate 

that the district court’s conduct resulted in an unfair trial. 

Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s judgment. 

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.

AFFIRMED
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DIAZ, Circuit Judge, concurring:

I continue to doubt the wisdom of applying plain error 

review to the appeal of a pro se defendant alleging a defective 

Faretta waiver on the basis of mental incompetency, for “it is 

paradoxical to expect a defendant to recognize his own ‘gray 

area’ competency, and then object to his own motion to proceed 

pro se.” United States v. Bernard, 708 F.3d 583, 596 (4th Cir. 

2013) (Diaz, J., dissenting). But because the facts of this 

case demonstrate no error in Rodgers’s Faretta waiver under any 

standard of review, I concur in the judgment.