US v. Benjamin Lee, No. 13-7956 (4th Cir. 2014)
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UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 13-7956 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff - Appellee, v. BENJAMIN LEE, Defendant - Appellant. Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore. Ellen L. Hollander, District Judge. (1:09-cr-00551-ELH-1; 1:12-cv-01321-ELH) Submitted: June 10, 2014 Decided: August 5, 2014 Before NIEMEYER, MOTZ, and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges. Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Benjamin Lee, Appellant Pro Se. Peter Marshall Nothstein, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Baltimore, Maryland; Sujit Raman, Assistant United States Attorney, Greenbelt, Maryland, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. PER CURIAM: Benjamin Lee seeks to appeal the district court s order denying relief on his 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (2012) motion. The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice or judge issues a certificate (2012). of appealability. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(B) 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). relief on the demonstrating district merits, that court s debatable or a When the district court denies prisoner reasonable assessment wrong. Slack satisfies jurists this would of the v. McDaniel, standard find U.S. that the claims constitutional 529 by is 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 claim of the denial of a constitutional right. a debatable Slack, 529 U.S. at 484-85. We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that Lee has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal. moves to seal the entire case. Lee While we see no compelling reason to seal everything, see In re State-Record Co., 917 F.2d 124, 129 (4th Cir. 1990) (docket 2 entry sheet not likely to contain information prejudicial to the criminal defendant), we will grant the motion insofar as it pertains to his informal brief and the motion to seal. 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 3
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