UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT 

_________________________________ 

MATTHEW SCOTT STRICKLAND, 

 Petitioner - Appellant, 

v. 

JIMMY MARTIN, 

 Respondent - Appellee. 

No. 21-6051 

(D.C. No. 5:17-CV-00843-HE) 

(W.D. Okla.) 

_________________________________ 

ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY*

_________________________________ 

Before HOLMES, KELLY, and McHUGH, Circuit Judges. 

_________________________________ 

A jury in Oklahoma state court found Applicant Matthew Scott Strickland guilty 

of three counts: (1) murder in the first degree, in violation of title 21, section 701.7 of the 

Oklahoma Statutes; (2) assault and battery with a deadly weapon, in violation of title 21, 

section 652 of the Oklahoma Statutes; and (3) use of body armor while committing a 

felony, in violation of title 21, section 1289.26 of the Oklahoma Statutes. At issue at the 

trial was whether Mr. Strickland acted in self-defense. The jury found Mr. Strickland 

guilty, and he received sentences of life imprisonment, ten years’ incarceration, and five 

years’ incarceration, respectively. 

*

 This order is not binding precedent except under the doctrines of law of the case, 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 Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 32.1 and Tenth Circuit Rule 32.1. 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

November 30, 2021

Christopher M. Wolpert 

Clerk of Court

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After unsuccessfully appealing his convictions and seeking state post-conviction 

relief, Mr. Strickland applied for relief under 28 U.S.C. § 2554 in the United States 

District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. The district court denied his habeas 

petition. He now seeks a certificate of appealability (“COA”) from this court. See 

28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(A) (requiring COA to appeal denial of relief under § 2254). We 

deny his request and dismiss this matter. 

I. PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 

Mr. Strickland initially appealed his convictions to the Oklahoma Court of 

Criminal Appeals (“OCCA”). He raised two issues: (1) the evidence presented was 

insufficient to support his convictions because the prosecution failed to prove beyond a 

reasonable doubt that he was not acting in self-defense; and (2) prosecutorial misconduct 

deprived him of a fair trial. The OCCA affirmed his convictions. 

Mr. Strickland then filed an application for post-conviction relief in the District 

Court of Oklahoma County, raising three issues: (1) his appellate counsel was ineffective 

by failing to raise a claim that his trial counsel were ineffective for failing to investigate 

mental health records and otherwise conduct a mental health investigation; (2) his 

appellate counsel was ineffective by failing to raise a claim that his trial counsel were 

ineffective for failing to conduct an investigation and present expert testimony 

substantiating his account of the incident; and (3) the cumulative error denied him his 

constitutional rights. 

The day after he filed his application for post-conviction relief in the District 

Court of Oklahoma County, Mr. Strickland filed a pro se habeas petition pursuant to 

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28 U.S.C. § 2254 in the United States District Court for the Western District of 

Oklahoma. He then sought and received a stay pending exhaustion of his state court 

remedies. After the District Court of Oklahoma County denied his application for 

post-conviction relief, and the OCCA affirmed the denial, Mr. Strickland reopened his 

federal habeas case. Now represented by counsel, Mr. Strickland raised several issues in 

his briefing: (1) sufficiency of the evidence; (2) prosecutorial misconduct; (3) ineffective 

assistance of appellate counsel in failing to assert two claims of ineffective assistance of 

trial counsel; and (4) cumulative error. A magistrate judge considered the issues and 

issued a Report and Recommendation, recommending the habeas petition be denied. 

Mr. Strickland objected to the report, but the district court adopted it and denied the 

habeas petition and later denied a COA. Mr. Strickland now seeks a COA from this court. 

II. DISCUSSION 

We may 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). This standard requires “a 

demonstration that . . . includes showing 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) (quoting Barefoot v. Estelle, 463 U.S. 880, 

893 & n.4 (1983)). To put it simply, Mr. Strickland must show that the district court’s 

resolution of the constitutional claim was either “debatable or wrong.” Id. 

Under the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), when 

a claim has been adjudicated on the merits in a state court, a federal court can grant 

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habeas relief only if the applicant establishes that the state court decision was “contrary 

to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established Federal law, as 

determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,” or was “based on an 

unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State 

court proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1),(2). This is a high bar. But “[i]f a claim was 

not decided on the merits by the state courts (and is not procedurally barred), we may 

exercise our independent judgment in deciding the claim.” McCracken v. Gibson, 268 

F.3d 970, 975 (10th Cir. 2001). 

Under the § 2254(d) standard, a federal court may not grant relief simply because 

it concludes in its “independent judgment that the relevant state-court decision applied 

clearly established law erroneously or incorrectly,” but may grant relief only where “the 

ruling [is] ‘objectively unreasonable, not merely wrong; even clear error will not 

suffice.’” Gipson v. Jordan, 376 F.3d 1193, 1196 (10th Cir. 2004) (quoting Williams v. 

Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 411 (2000)); Virginia v. LeBlanc, 137 S. Ct. 1726, 1728 (2017) 

(per curiam) (quoting Woods v. Donald, 575 U.S. 312, 316 (2015)). Mr. Strickland must 

thus “show that the state court’s ruling was so lacking in justification that there was an 

error well understood and comprehended in existing law beyond any possibility for 

fairminded disagreement.” LeBlanc, 137 S. Ct. at 1728 (ellipsis omitted) (quoting 

Harrington v. Richter, 562 U.S. 86, 102 (2011)). 

 In addition to this deferential legal standard, the AEDPA establishes a deferential 

standard of review for the state court’s factual findings. Specifically, the “AEDPA . . . 

mandates that state court factual findings are presumptively correct and may be rebutted 

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only by ‘clear and convincing evidence.’” Saiz v. Ortiz, 392 F.3d 1166, 1175 (10th Cir. 

2004) (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(e)(1)). We must incorporate the AEDPA’s deferential 

treatment of state court decisions into our consideration of Mr. Strickland’s request for a 

COA. See Dockins v. Hines, 374 F.3d 935, 938 (10th Cir. 2004). 

Mr. Strickland seeks a COA on the following grounds: (1) there was insufficient 

evidence to support his convictions; (2) his appellate counsel was ineffective in two 

ways; and (3) the accumulation of errors deprived him of his constitutional rights. We 

address each of Mr. Strickland’s arguments in turn, and ultimately deny his application 

for a COA. 

A. Sufficiency of the Evidence 

 First, Mr. Strickland argues there was insufficient evidence to support his 

convictions. He previously raised this claim as part of his direct appeal to the OCCA, 

which denied relief. He did not raise this claim again until his habeas petition in the 

federal district court, where the court denied it as a ground for relief. 

To evaluate a sufficiency of the evidence claim, a federal court must ask “whether, 

after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the prosecution, any rational trier 

of fact could have found the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.” 

Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 319 (1979) (emphasis in the original). Ultimately, we 

must “accept the jury’s resolution of the evidence as long as it is within the bounds of 

reason.” Grubbs v. Hannigan, 982 F.2d 1483, 1487 (10th Cir. 1993). And we must give 

deference to the findings of the reviewing state court—here, the OCCA. LeBlanc, 137 S. 

Ct. at 1728. 

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After reviewing Mr. Strickland’s application for a COA, his supporting appendix, 

and the relevant legal authority, we conclude for the same reasons as did the district court 

that Mr. Strickland has not made “a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional 

right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2). While Mr. Strickland has shown there was evidence from 

which a jury could have concluded he acted in self-defense, there was also sufficient 

evidence to support the jury’s contrary finding that he was guilty of first-degree murder. 

The jury heard testimony from the surviving victim, Ottie Sides, and was presented with 

evidence regarding Mr. Strickland’s failure to leave the scene when he had the 

opportunity to do so, as well as the complicated history between the parties. While we 

agree with Mr. Strickland that a jury may have concluded he acted in self-defense, we 

will not disturb a state court jury’s decision by reweighing the evidence. Messer v. 

Roberts, 74 F.3d 1009, 1013 (10th Cir. 1996). Instead, we “accept the jury’s resolution of 

the evidence as long as it is within the bounds of reason.” Grubbs, 982 F.2d at 1487. 

Further, because our review is governed by AEDPA, it is doubly deferential. Where the 

jury’s conviction was within the bounds of reason based on the evidence, the OCCA’s 

ruling was not wrong, much less “objectively unreasonable.” LeBlanc, 137 S. Ct. at 1728. 

We therefore deny a COA on this claim. 

B. Ineffective Assistance of Counsel 

Mr. Strickland next argues his appellate counsel was ineffective for failing to 

assert two claims of ineffective assistance by his trial counsel in failing to: (1) investigate 

mental health records or otherwise conduct a mental health investigation and 

(2) investigate and present evidence substantiating Mr. Strickland’s version of events. 

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Ineffective assistance of counsel claims must be analyzed using the approach set forth in 

Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984). Under Strickland, “a defendant must 

show both that his counsel’s performance fell below an objective standard of 

reasonableness and that the deficient performance prejudiced the defense.” United States 

v. Holloway, 939 F.3d 1088, 1102 (10th Cir. 2019) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

There is “a strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls within the wide range of 

reasonable professional assistance.” Strickland, 466 U.S. at 689. 

Because the OCCA previously denied these arguments, we consider whether that 

decision was “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of, clearly established 

Federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United States,” or “was based on 

an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of the evidence presented in the State 

court proceeding.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1),(2). Mr. Strickland must show the district 

court’s conclusion that the state court’s ruling was not contrary to established law was 

“debatable or wrong.” Slack, 529 U.S. at 584. 

As to Mr. Strickland’s first argument—his appellate counsel’s failure to raise his 

trial counsel’s failure to investigate Mr. Strickland’s mental health records or conduct a 

mental health evaluation—the federal district court properly weighed the evidence, the 

legal standard, and Mr. Strickland’s arguments before concluding the trial counsel’s 

failure to conduct a mental health investigation was “well within the range of trial 

counsel’s reasonable professional judgment.” App. Vol. 1 at 223. This conclusion was 

not “debatable or wrong.” Slack, 529 U.S. at 584. While Mr. Strickland argues a mental 

health evaluation and investigation would have benefited his defense, his trial counsel 

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chose to suppress his mental health records because they contained information regarding 

a “hit list” he had prepared of people he would like to kill—including his mother, one of 

the ultimate victims. The OCCA upheld the lower state court’s finding that “it was 

clearly sound strategy on the part of [Mr. Strickland’s] counsel to suppress evidence of 

his mental health treatment so as to prevent his jury from hearing [Mr. Strickland’s] 

statements that he wanted to kill his mother.” App. Vol. 3 at 613. Because Mr. Strickland 

has failed to overcome the “strong presumption that counsel’s conduct falls within the 

wide range of reasonable professional assistance,” we cannot conclude the federal district 

court’s decision was “debatable or wrong.” Slack, 529 at 584. We therefore deny a COA 

on this claim. 

This also holds true on Mr. Strickland’s second ineffective assistance of counsel 

argument—that his appellate counsel should have raised his trial counsel’s failure to 

investigate and present evidence regarding his version of events. Mr. Strickland argues 

his trial counsel should have investigated and presented expert testimony on his account 

that he did not fire the first shot. However, as the OCCA noted, the report submitted by 

Mr. Strickland in support of this claim concludes that the question of who fired first 

“cannot be determined from forensic analysis of the physical evidence in this case.” App. 

Vol. 3 at 615. This conclusion from Mr. Strickland’s proposed expert is the same 

conclusion reached by the state investigators who testified at trial. Therefore, no new 

evidence would have been presented to the jury on this issue, and the question of who 

fired first turned almost solely on the credibility of the surviving victim’s testimony. 

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Under these circumstances, trial counsel’s choice not to pursue this line of defense was 

well within the bounds of professional judgment. 

Because we conclude Mr. Strickland’s ineffective assistance of counsel claims 

fail, the OCCA’s determination is not “obviously wrong.” Kayer, 141 S. Ct. at 520. Nor 

was the district court’s resolution “debatable or wrong.” Slack, 529 U.S. at 484. 

C. Cumulative Error 

Finally, Mr. Strickland argues the accumulation of errors violated his 

constitutional rights. Having concluded there were no errors, we decline to grant a COA 

on this ground.1 Hanson v. Sherrod, 797 F.3d 810, 853 (10th Cir. 2015) (requiring at least 

two errors to engage in a cumulative error analysis). 

1

 In advancing his cumulative error argument, Mr. Strickland asks us to cumulate 

all errors in his § 2554 petition and request for a COA even though he acknowledged 

before the district court that the OCCA viewed his cumulative error argument as only 

encompassing his two ineffective assistance of appellate counsel claims. Although the 

state initially raised an exhaustion defense relative to Mr. Strickland’s cumulative error 

argument, the magistrate judge did not address that defense. And the state did not object 

to the magistrate judge overlooking the exhaustion issue and reaching the merits of all 

claims in Mr. Strickland’s § 2254 petition despite its potential mixed nature. Thus, the 

firm-waiver rule eliminates our need to consider whether Mr. Strickland properly 

exhausted the broad cumulative error claim he presents in his request for a COA because 

the state did not properly preserve that affirmative defense for appellate review. See 

Morales-Fernandez v. INS, 418 F.3d 1116, 1119 (10th Cir. 2005) (observing that Tenth 

Circuit “has adopted a firm waiver rule under which a party who fails to make a timely 

objection to the magistrate judge’s findings and recommendations waives appellate 

review of both factual and legal questions”); Gallegos v. Bravo, 437 F. App’x 624, 625–

26 (10th Cir. 2011) (unpublished) (applying firm waiver rule within § 2254 context); see 

also Day v. McDonough, 547 U.S. 198, 199 (2006) (noting that exhaustion of state 

remedies is an affirmative defense). Finally, where we conclude there are no errors to 

cumulate, it is unnecessary for us to determine whether the OCCA addressed the merits 

of the cumulative error claim Mr. Strickland presents in his request for a COA or if it 

overlooked the scope of this claim such that AEDPA deference would not apply to a 

federal court’s consideration of the claim. 

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III. CONCLUSION 

For the foregoing reasons, we DENY Mr. Strickland’s request for a COA and 

DISMISS this matter. 

Entered for the Court 

Carolyn B. McHugh 

Circuit Judge 

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