KARAFILI v. DAVIS (2020)

MEMORANDUM **

California state prisoner Enver Karafili appeals pro se from the district court's order dismissing his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition as successive. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 2253. We review de novo, see Wentzell v. Neven, 674 F.3d 1124, 1126 (9th Cir. 2012), and we affirm.

The district court granted a certificate of appealability on whether Karafili's instant section 2254 petition should have been dismissed as successive under 28 U.S.C. § 2244(b)(3)(A). Karafili fails to make any argument that his petition is not successive in his opening brief, and therefore has waived this issue. See Koerner v. Grigas, 328 F.3d 1039, 1048 (9th Cir. 2003) (“In general, [w]e will not ordinarily consider matters on appeal that are not specifically and distinctly argued in appellant's opening brief” (alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted)). Accordingly, we affirm the district court's dismissal of Karafili's petition as successive.

On appeal, Karafili solely raises arguments related to the merits of his petition, which were not included in the certificate of appealability. We treat these arguments as a motion to expand the certificate of appealability, and deny the motion. See 9th Cir. R. 22-1(e); Hiivala v. Wood, 195 F.3d 1098, 1104-05 (9th Cir. 1999).

AFFIRMED.