Court Opinion

ID: 9771945
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:01:15.815894+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:38:16.468593
License: Public Domain

USCA11 Case: 22-11418    Document: 22-1     Date Filed: 08/29/2023   Page: 1 of 4

                                                  [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                   In the
                United States Court of Appeals
                        For the Eleventh Circuit

                           ____________________

                                No. 22-11418
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                           ____________________

       IRWIN HICKS, JR.,
                                                   Petitioner-Appellant,
       versus
       FLORIDA ATTORNEY GENERAL,
       SECRETARY, DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS,

                                                Respondents-Appellees.

                           ____________________

                 Appeal from the United States District Court
                      for the Middle District of Florida
                   D.C. Docket No. 5:21-cv-00360-JLB-PRL
USCA11 Case: 22-11418         Document: 22-1         Date Filed: 08/29/2023          Page: 2 of 4

       2                          Opinion of the Court                        22-11418

                                ____________________

       Before WILSON, LUCK, and EDMONDSON, Circuit Judges.
       PER CURIAM:
               Irwin Hicks, Jr., a Florida prisoner proceeding pro se, appeals
       the district court’s dismissal of his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition for ha-
       beas corpus. The district court concluded that Hicks’s petition was
       an unauthorized second or successive petition over which the dis-
       trict court lacked jurisdiction. No reversible error has been shown;
       we aﬃrm. *
              We review de novo whether a section 2254 habeas petition is
       second or successive. See Patterson v. Sec’y, Fla. Dep’t of Corr., 849
       F.3d 1321, 1324 (11th Cir. 2017) (en banc). We construe liberally pro
       se pleadings. See Tannenbaum v. United States, 148 F.3d 1262, 1263
       (11th Cir. 1998). We also read liberally briefs ﬁled by pro se litigants.
       See Timpson v. Sampson, 518 F.3d 870, 874 (11th Cir. 2008).
               Before a prisoner may ﬁle a second or successive habeas pe-
       tition, he ﬁrst must obtain an order from the court of appeals au-
       thorizing the district court to consider the petition. 28 U.S.C. §
       2244(b)(3)(A). Absent such an order, the district court lacks

       * On appeal, Hicks seems to raise no argument challenging the district court’s
       second-or-successive determination and focuses, instead, only on the merits of
       his underlying claims. Even if we construe liberally Hicks’s pro se brief as chal-
       lenging the district court’s second-or-successive determination, the district
       court concluded properly that Hicks’s petition was subject to dismissal as an
       unauthorized second or successive petition.
USCA11 Case: 22-11418      Document: 22-1      Date Filed: 08/29/2023     Page: 3 of 4

       22-11418               Opinion of the Court                          3

       jurisdiction to consider a second or successive habeas petition.
       Lambrix v. Sec’y, Dep’t of Corr., 872 F.3d 1170, 1180 (11th Cir. 2017).
              In 2011, Hicks pleaded guilty to ﬁve drug oﬀenses in viola-
       tion of Florida law. Hicks was sentenced to 20 years’ imprison-
       ment, to be suspended upon the completion of 5 years of drug-
       oﬀender probation. Hicks ﬁled no direct appeal.
              In 2014, a probation oﬃcer charged Hicks with violating the
       terms of his probation by committing a new criminal oﬀense. Fol-
       lowing a hearing, the state court found Hicks guilty of violating his
       probation. The state court revoked Hicks’s drug-oﬀender proba-
       tion and imposed a total sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment. The
       judgment was later aﬃrmed on direct appeal; the mandate issued
       in April 2016.
              In February 2015 -- while Hicks’s direct appeal was still pend-
       ing -- Hicks ﬁled his ﬁrst 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition, challenging the
       revocation of his probation and his resulting sentence. Because
       Hicks had not yet completed his direct appeal and state collateral
       attacks, the district court dismissed the petition without prejudice.
              Hicks ﬁled his second section 2254 petition in 2017, challeng-
       ing both his original criminal proceedings and his probation-revo-
       cation proceedings. The district court denied Hicks’s petition and
       dismissed the case with prejudice. This Court denied Hicks a cer-
       tiﬁcate of appealability.
             In 2021, Hicks ﬁled the section 2254 petition at issue in this
       appeal, challenging again his probation-revocation proceedings
       and sentence.
USCA11 Case: 22-11418      Document: 22-1     Date Filed: 08/29/2023     Page: 4 of 4

       4                      Opinion of the Court                 22-11418

              The district court made no error in determining that Hicks’s
       2021 section 2254 petition is second or successive. The record
       demonstrates that Hicks already challenged his probation revoca-
       tion and sentence in his earlier-ﬁled 2017 habeas petition: a petition
       that was dismissed with prejudice. Because Hicks failed to obtain
       authorization from this Court to ﬁle a second or successive peti-
       tion, the district court lacked jurisdiction to consider Hicks’s 2021
       petition. See Lambrix, 872 F.3d at 1180.
             AFFIRMED.