Court Opinion

ID: 9927898
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-01-30 16:00:51.232638+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:32:26.128829
License: Public Domain

Appellate Case: 23-7034     Document: 010110991974         Date Filed: 01/30/2024     Page: 1
                                                                                       FILED
                                                                           United States Court of Appeals
                       UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS                              Tenth Circuit

                              FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT                             January 30, 2024
                          _________________________________
                                                                              Christopher M. Wolpert
                                                                                  Clerk of Court
  ROGER DANIEL NASH,

        Petitioner - Appellant,

  v.                                                            No. 23-7034
                                                    (D.C. No. 6:20-CV-00406-JFH-GLJ)
  SCOTT CROW, Director,                                         (E.D. Okla.)

        Respondent - Appellee.
                       _________________________________

             ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY*
                    _________________________________

 Before MATHESON, BALDOCK, and EID, Circuit Judges.
                   _________________________________

        Roger Daniel Nash, an Oklahoma state prisoner proceeding pro se, seeks to appeal

 the district court’s denial of his motion filed under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60.

 We deny a certificate of appealability (“COA”) and dismiss this matter.

                                    I. BACKGROUND

        Mr. Nash was convicted in 2016 in Oklahoma state court of first-degree rape and

 lewd molestation. The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals (“OCCA”) affirmed. After

        *
          This order is not binding precedent except under the doctrines of law of the case,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.
Appellate Case: 23-7034      Document: 010110991974         Date Filed: 01/30/2024      Page: 2

 the state trial court denied his application for postconviction relief, Mr. Nash did not

 appeal to the OCCA.

        Mr. Nash filed a habeas application in federal district court under 28 U.S.C.

 § 2254, attempting to raise 13 claims for relief. The district court granted the

 Respondent’s motion to dismiss, concluding that Mr. Nash had failed to exhaust his

 state-court remedies because he did not appeal the denial of his state-court postconviction

 application to the OCCA. The court held his failure to appeal was not excused, and an

 attempt to exhaust would not be futile because Mr. Nash could apply to the OCCA for an

 appeal out of time under the state-court rules. The district court dismissed his habeas

 application without prejudice and entered judgment in April 2021.

        More than a year later, in June 2022, Mr. Nash filed a Rule 60 motion in the

 district court. He raised four issues.

        First, Mr. Nash argued the district court erred by not reaching the merits of his

 unexhausted habeas claims because it had overlooked attachments to his habeas

 application allegedly proving his factual innocence. The court analyzed this claim under

 Rule 60(b)(1), which provides for relief from judgment based on “mistake, inadvertence,

 surprise, or excusable neglect.”1 It first held this claim was untimely under

        1
          Mr. Nash sought relief under Rule 60(a), which allows the district court to
 correct clerical mistakes. But the court concluded that he did not allege any clerical
 mistake.

                                               2
Appellate Case: 23-7034     Document: 010110991974          Date Filed: 01/30/2024        Page: 3

 Rule 60(c)(1)’s one-year deadline.2 Alternatively, the court determined this argument

 lacked merit because the referenced documents were irrelevant to the court’s dismissal of

 Mr. Nash’s habeas application based on his undisputed failure to exhaust—he had

 conceded his claims were unexhausted, and the court was not persuaded by his futility

 argument. It noted that, although factual innocence can excuse a procedural default,

 Mr. Nash retained the opportunity to have his claims heard on the merits in state court.

        Second, he contended that counsel for the Respondent lied in certain district court

 filings. He relied on Rule 60(b)(3), which provides for relief from judgment based on

 “fraud . . . , misrepresentation, or misconduct by an opposing party.” The court held this

 claim was time-barred under Rule 60(c)(1).

        Third, citing Rule 60(b)(6), which provides for relief from judgment for “any other

 reason that justifies relief,” Mr. Nash argued that his attempts to exhaust his habeas

 claims in state court were futile. The district court held he failed to show the

 extraordinary circumstances necessary to obtain relief under Rule 60(b)(6). It reiterated

 that Mr. Nash had presented no evidence that he had applied for, and was denied, an

 appeal out of time from the denial of his postconviction application.3

        2
          “A motion under Rule 60(b) must be made within a reasonable time--and for
 reasons (1), (2), and (3) no more than a year after the entry of the judgment or order or
 the date of the proceeding.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 60(c)(1).
        3
         There is a “futility exception” to § 2254’s exhaustion requirement. See, e.g.,
 Garza v. Davis, 596 F.3d 1198, 1203 (10th Cir. 2010) (“A narrow exception to the
 exhaustion requirement applies if a petitioner can demonstrate that exhaustion is futile.”).
 Under this exception, a federal court may consider an unexhausted claim when the
 applicant demonstrates that it would be futile to assert the unexhausted claim in state
 court “because either ‘there is an absence of available State corrective (continued)
                                               3
Appellate Case: 23-7034      Document: 010110991974          Date Filed: 01/30/2024      Page: 4

        Fourth, he sought relief under Rule 60(d)(3), which provides that Rule 60 “does

 not limit a court’s power to . . . set aside a judgment for fraud on the court.” The district

 court denied relief because he failed to provide any evidence supporting his claim of

 fraud on the court.

        The district court therefore denied Mr. Nash’s Rule 60 motion. It also denied a

 COA.

                                      II. DISCUSSION

        When a district court denies a Rule 60(b) motion, “the movant [must] obtain a

 [COA] before proceeding with his or her appeal.” Spitznas v. Boone, 464 F.3d 1213,

 1218 (10th Cir. 2006). We issue a COA “only if the [movant] has made a substantial

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

 district court’s denial was based on procedural grounds, “a COA may only issue if ‘the

 prisoner shows, at least, that jurists of reason would find it debatable whether the petition

 states a valid claim of the denial of a constitutional right and that jurists of reason would

 find it debatable whether the district court was correct in its procedural ruling.’”

 Spitznas, 464 F.3d at 1225 (emphasis added) (quoting Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473,

 484 (2000)); see Dulworth v. Jones, 496 F.3d 1133, 1138 (10th Cir. 2007) (holding

 process’ or ‘circumstances . . . that render such process ineffective to protect the
 [applicant’s] rights.’” Selsor v. Workman, 644 F.3d 984, 1026 (10th Cir. 2011) (quoting
 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1)(B)(i), (ii)). “The state prisoner bears the burden of proving . . .
 that exhaustion would have been futile.” Id.

                                               4
Appellate Case: 23-7034      Document: 010110991974         Date Filed: 01/30/2024         Page: 5

 Slack’s two-part COA standard applies to the denial of a Rule 60(b) motion), abrogated

 on other grounds by Harbison v. Bell, 556 U.S. 180, 183 (2009).4

        Although Mr. Nash does not address here all of the issues he raised in his Rule 60

 motion in district court, he continues to assert that he has proof of his innocence and that

 Respondent’s counsel filed false documents. None of these assertions demonstrate that

 reasonable jurists would debate the correctness of the district court’s ruling on any aspect

 of his Rule 60 motion.

        Mr. Nash also points to the Supreme Court’s statement in Slack that “the complete

 exhaustion rule is not [intended] to trap the unwary pro se prisoner,” 529 U.S. at 487

 (quotations omitted). But he ignored the district court’s clear instructions on how to

 exhaust his habeas claims with the OCCA. And he does not demonstrate a debatable

 error in the court’s holding that there is no evidence he has applied for, and that the

 OCCA has denied, an appeal out of time from the denial of his state-court postconviction

 application.

        4
         We also have applied the COA requirement to a district court’s denial of a
 motion brought under Rule 60(d)(3). See Gregory v. Denham, 623 F. App’x 932, 934
 (10th Cir. 2015) (unpublished) (cited for persuasive value under Fed. R. App. P. 32.1;
 10th Cir. R. 32.1(A)). We have said that “it would be illogical that a COA would be
 required to appeal from a habeas judgment, but not from the district court’s order denying
 Rule 60(b) relief from such a judgment.” Spitznas, 464 F.3d at 1218. And a
 fraud-on-the-court claim may be brought under Rule 60(b)(3) or under the savings clause
 in Rule 60(d)(3). See United States v. Baker, 718 F.3d 1204, 1207 (10th Cir. 2013).
 Thus, we apply the same reasoning in requiring a COA for the denial of a motion filed
 under Rule 60(b) or Rule 60(d)(3).

                                               5
Appellate Case: 23-7034    Document: 010110991974         Date Filed: 01/30/2024     Page: 6

                                   III. CONCLUSION

       Because reasonable jurists would not debate the correctness of the district court’s

 denial of Mr. Nash’s Rule 60 motion, we decline to issue a COA and we dismiss this

 matter.

                                             Entered for the Court

                                             Scott M. Matheson, Jr.
                                             Circuit Judge

                                             6