PER CURIAM:
Christopher Watts, a Florida prisoner proceeding pro se, ap- peals the District Court's denial of his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition. We granted a certificate of appealability (COA) limited to the following question:
Whether the district court erred in finding procedur- ally defaulted Watts' claim that counsel was ineffec- tive for failing to secure an expert witness to analyze whether law enforcement tampered with the crime
scene by moving a baseball bat.
After careful review, we answer that question in the nega- tive and affirm.
I. Facts
Watts is serving three life sentences for armed robbery, armed burglary, and sexual battery stemming from a 2014 incident in which he forcibly entered a woman's home and battered her. Ac- cording to the victim, the assailant shattered her sliding glass door, entered with a sawed-off shotgun, took her belongings, and sex- ually battered her. She later noticed the man had a tattoo on his right shoulder and had wrapped his bleeding hand with one of her towels.
A key piece of evidence at trial was a shard of glass with blood on it, discovered after the incident by an acquaintance help- ing to clean up the crime scene. DNA analysis revealed the blood
2
24-10005 Opinion of the Court 3 matched Watts with a statistical frequency of one in 18 quintillion. The State relied heavily on that evidence at trial, along with the victim's testimony and the testimony of law enforcement officers who observed cuts on Watts and his identifying tattoo. The baseball bat in question belonged to the victim, who tes- tified that she typically kept it wedged in the sliding glass door as a security measure. At trial, she recalled that the bat was later found on a nearby table but did not believe the intruder had used or even noticed it. Law enforcement similarly testified that the bat was on the table when they arrived and was never linked to the crime itself.
II. Postconviction Proceedings
In June 2017, Watts filed a pro se motion for postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850. He later filed an amended motion. Relevant here, Watts raised two claims of ineffective assistance of trial counsel.
In Claim One, Watts argued that counsel failed to investigate the physical evidence. He focused on inconsistencies in the testi- mony about the location of the baseball bat and theorized that the door may have been shattered from the inside, contrary to the State's theory of forced entry. He stated that counsel should have hired an expert to assess the trajectory of the glass and evaluate the crime scene.
In Claim Two, Watts argued that counsel was ineffective for failing to retain an expert to show that the crime scene had been contaminated. This second claim focused almost exclusively on the
3
4 Opinion of the Court 24-10005 blood-stained glass and the chain of custody for the DNA evidence. Watts did not mention the baseball bat in this claim. The state postconviction court denied relief without an evi- dentiary hearing. As to Claim One, it held that Watts's theory about the baseball bat and direction of the glass breakage was spec- ulative and unsupported by the trial evidence. On Claim Two, the Court found no evidence of tampering or mishandling of the glass shard and concluded that counsel's decision not to call an expert was not deficient.
Watts moved for a rehearing, which was denied. He then sought a belated appeal, which was granted.
In his appellate brief to Florida's First District Court of Ap- peal (DCA), Watts failed to brief the baseball bat theory. Instead, he wrote that the postconviction court had sufficiently addressed counsel's failure to "contest the bat" but argued that other aspects of the investigation remained unaddressed. The First DCA af- firmed without opinion.
Watts then filed a § 2254 petition in the District Court, which the District Court denied. Relevant here, the District Court ex- plained that Watts claimed that his counsel was ineffective for fail- ing to retain an expert witness to establish that the crime scene was contaminated concerned the discrepancies in the evidence regard- ing the location of the baseball bat and the discovery of the piece of glass containing blood. It noted that Watts's second claim in his state amended motion for postconviction relief had been similar but did not mention a baseball bat.
4
24-10005 Opinion of the Court 5 Watts appealed and we granted the COA that we now con- front.
III. Discussion
A. Legal Standard We review de novo whether a claim has been procedurally defaulted. Judd v. Haley, 250 F.3d 1308, 1313 (11th Cir. 2001). A federal habeas petitioner must exhaust available state court remedies before seeking relief under § 2254. 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)(1). To exhaust a claim, the petitioner must fairly present it to the state courts through one complete round of the state's es- tablished appellate review process. O'Sullivan v. Boerckel, 526 U.S. 838, 842, 119 S. Ct. 1728, 1731 (1999). In Florida, that generally re- quires raising the claim in a Rule 3.850 motion and appealing any denial. See Leonard v. Wainwright, 601 F.2d 807, 808 (5th Cir. 1979).1 A claim is procedurally defaulted if it was not properly ex- hausted and state procedural rules now bar further review. Bailey v. Nagle, 172 F.3d 1299, 1302-03 (11th Cir. 1999).
B. Procedural Default
At the outset, Watts does not challenge the District Court's finding of procedural default. Although he asserts that he "did pre- sent this issue in his very first post-conviction motion as Florida
5
6 Opinion of the Court 24-10005 requires," he does not contend that he raised it on appeal to the state court. That omission forfeits the argument. See Timson v. Sampson, 518 F.3d 870, 874 (11th Cir. 2008) (per curiam) ("While we read briefs filed by pro se litigants liberally . . . issues not briefed on appeal by a pro se litigant are deemed abandoned." (citations and internal quotation marks omitted)).
Nor does any exception excuse the default. In Martinez v. Ryan, 566 U.S. 1, 132 S. Ct. 1309 (2012), the Supreme Court held that, "[i]nadequate assistance of counsel at initial-review collateral proceedings may establish cause for a prisoner's procedural default of a claim of ineffective assistance at trial." Id. at 9, 132 S. Ct. at 1315. But Martinez applies only when two conditions are met: (1) the petitioner lacked counsel or had ineffective counsel during the initial collateral proceeding, and (2) the underlying ineffective-as- sistance claim is substantial. Id. at 14, 132 S. Ct. at 1318. Watts satisfies neither requirement. As to the first, even if he raised the baseball bat theory in his initial Rule 3.850 motion, he failed to pursue it on appeal. Martinez does not extend to failures on postconviction appeal. Lambrix v. Sec'y, Fla. Dep't of Corr., 756 F.3d 1246, 1260 (11th Cir. 2014).
As to the second, Watts's claim is not substantial. To qualify as such, a claim must present a close question about whether coun- sel performed deficiently and whether that deficiency prejudiced the defendant. See Hittson v. GDCP Warden, 759 F.3d 1210, 1269 (11th Cir. 2014); Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 693-94, 104 S. Ct. 2052, 2068 (1984). Watts's theory fails this test.
6
24-10005 Opinion of the Court 7 Although Watts faults his counsel for not retaining an expert to analyze the crime scene, strategic decisions about whether to call or retain expert witnesses are "the epitome of a strategic deci- sion" rarely second-guessed on habeas review. Conklin v. Schofield,
366 F.3d 1191, 1204 (11th Cir. 2004) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Watts offers only speculation that an expert might have testified that law enforcement tampered with the scene by moving the baseball bat. But the trial evidence does not support such an inference. As the state court found, the bat was never linked to the crime, and its location—whether wedged in the door or found on a nearby table—had no bearing on the key evidence at trial.
The State's case rested on overwhelming DNA evidence ty- ing Watts to the scene, physical evidence of his injuries, the victim's testimony, and corroborating law enforcement testimony. No testi- mony suggested the bat was used in the crime or was significant to the prosecution's theory. See Chandler v. United States, 218 F.3d 1305, 1315 (11th Cir. 2000) (en banc) ("Counsel is not required to present every nonfrivolous defense.").
Moreover, Watts cannot demonstrate prejudice. Even as- suming counsel should have retained an expert, he must still show a reasonable probability that the outcome of the trial would have been different. See Strickland, 466 U.S. at 694-95, 104 S. Ct. at 2068. He has not done so. The trial evidence included conclusive DNA results, the victim's testimony identifying key characteristics of her attacker, and testimony confirming Watts's injuries and matching
7
8 Opinion of the Court 24-10005 tattoo. None of this was undermined by the bat's location. See McKiver v. Sec'y, Fla. Dep't of Corr., 991 F.3d 1357, 1365 (11th Cir. 2021) ("The likelihood of a different result must be substantial, not just conceivable." (citation and internal quotation marks omitted)). Watts argues only that an expert "might" have opined that the scene was staged. But he neither identifies what such an expert would have concluded nor explains how such testimony would cast doubt on the trial's outcome. That is not enough to satisfy Strick- land.
IV. Conclusion
Because Watts failed to exhaust his ineffective-assistance claim in state court and has not shown an exception applies, the District Court did not err in denying postconviction relief.
AFFIRMED.
8