United States of America v. George Steven Scantland

The Hon. Jerom e Farris, Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit,
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sitting by designation.
NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
File Name: 08a0218n.06
Filed: April 24, 2008
06-2544
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
GEORGE STEVEN SCANTLAND,
Defendant-Appellant.
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ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN
Before: DAUGHTREY, COOK, and FARRIS , Circuit Judges.*
PER CURIAM. In this direct appeal from his convictions on multiple counts of drug
possession with intent to distribute, possession of firearms by a convicted felon, and
maintenance of a drug-involved premises, defendant George Steven Scantland raises only
a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel. Specifically, he alleges that his trial counsel
was ineffective in negotiating a plea bargain, preparing him to testify, pursuing defense
theories that ultimately failed, and failing to bring a pre-trial motion to challenge the police
search warrant. Because most of these allegations concern questions of defense strategy
and because the trial record clearly provides an insufficient basis upon which to review
them, we decline to address the various claims of ineffective assistance of counsel set out

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in the defendant’s appellate brief. We further note that these issues are more
appropriately addressed in a post-conviction motion to vacate, filed pursuant to 28 U.S.C.
§ 2255. Indeed, with regard to such claims, we have repeatedly observed:
“As a general rule, a defendant may not raise ineffective assistance of
counsel claims for the first time on direct appeal, since there has not been
an opportunity to develop and include in the record evidence bearing on the
merits of the allegations.” United States v. Wunder, 919 F.2d 34, 37 (6th Cir.
1990); see also United States v. Brown, 332 F.3d 363, 368 (6th Cir. 2003).
This court has “‘routinely concluded that such claims are best brought by a
defendant in a post-conviction proceeding under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 so that
the parties can develop an adequate record on this issue.’” Brown, 332 F.3d
at 369 (quoting United States v. Aguwa, 123 F.3d 418, 423 (6th Cir. 1997));
see also Massaro v. United States, 538 U.S. 500, 504-05 (2003).
United States v. Martinez, 430 F.3d 317, 338 (6th Cir. 2005). In Martinez, we further
pointed out that because of “the fact-specific nature of [ineffective assistance of counsel]
claims and the absence of a record directed at whether counsel’s performance was
deficient,” a defendant is better served by fleshing out his claims in a post-conviction
motion and submitting the evidence to support those claims at a hearing in district court,
rather than by having us attempt to rule on allegations that have little support in the record
as presented. Id.
In the absence of any currently reviewable challenges to the validity of the
defendant’s convictions, we AFFIRM the judgement of the district court.

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