In Williams v. U.S., No. 06-11415 (July 2, 2007), the Court held that, even assuming a Florida inmate’s earlier motion to correct an illegal sentence, recharacterized by the district court as a § 2255 motion, was not counted as a first habeas petition for purposes of the "second and successive" limitation of AEDPA, the inmate’s "second" petition should still be dismissed because it was barred by the statute of limitations.
The Court declined to apply the doctrine of equitable tolling. The Court noted that regardless of whether Williams viewed the dismissal of his first motion to correct sentence as foreclosing, or not foreclosing, other claims, this did not excuse his lack of diligence in filing his § 2255 motion within the limitations period. The Court noted that it had reached a similar result under similar facts in Outler v. U.S., 485 F.3d 1273 (11th Cir. 2007).
