Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-13-03410/USCOURTS-ca7-13-03410-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Submitted January 20, 2015*

Decided January 23, 2015

Before

RICHARD A. POSNER, Circuit Judge

MICHAEL S. KANNE, Circuit Judge

DIANE S. SYKES, Circuit Judge

No. 13‐3410

DENNIS MARKS,

Plaintiff‐Appellant,

v.

CITY OF WAUSAU, et al.,

Defendants‐Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District

Court for the Western District of Wisconsin.

No. 11‐cv‐00612

William M. Conley,

Chief Judge.

O R D E R

Dennis Marks appeals the grant of summary judgment against him in this action

under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 asserting denial of access to the courts in connection with his

appeal of his traffic citations. We affirm.   

In 2010 Marks was ticketed twice in Wisconsin for operating a vehicle after its

registration had been suspended and twice for driving with a suspended license. At a

later proceeding in municipal court, Marks agreed to plead no contest to two charges of

                                                 

* After examining the briefs and record, we have concluded that oral argument is

unnecessary. Thus the appeal is submitted on the briefs and record. See FED. R. APP. P.

34(a)(2)(C).

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1

Case: 13-3410 Document: 36 Filed: 01/23/2015 Pages: 3
No. 13‐3410    Page 2

driving without a valid driver’s license. A few days later, Marks requested a copy of the

record of proceedings in order to appeal the municipal court’s judgment. When the

municipal court clerk tried to make a copy of the recording, however, she discovered

that the recorder—a solid state recording device—had malfunctioned and that no

recording existed. Marks appealed to the Marathon County Circuit Court, but failed to

appear at a scheduled pretrial conference and a default judgment was entered against

him.1   

A week before the pretrial conference was to occur, Marks brought this suit in

the Marathon County Circuit Court, alleging that the defendants (the City of Wausau,

the municipal court judge who presided over the underlying case, the city attorney, and

the municipal court’s clerk) blocked his access to state courts and violated his due

process rights. The case was removed to federal court, and the district court granted

summary judgment for the defendants. The court understood Marks to be bringing an

access‐to‐courts claim (based on the defendants’ refusal to file court documents and

otherwise enable him to appeal his municipal court convictions) but concluded that

Marks suffered no prejudice because he had in fact been allowed to proceed with his

appeal to the Marathon County Circuit Court. Default judgment was entered against

him, the court observed, because he failed to appear at the scheduled pretrial

conference. The court also rejected Marks’s remaining state‐law claims for “obvious lack

of merit.”   

On appeal Marks generally challenges the grant of summary judgment against

him and maintains that the defendants intentionally destroyed the municipal court’s

records to “cover up their treachery” and thereby deny him due process and access to

the courts. But as the district court explained, Marks’s claim fails because he has not

shown how he was actually injured. To establish denial of access, a plaintiff must show

that he suffered an actual injury because “official acts frustrated” his right to bring a

“nonfrivolous” legal claim. Christopher v. Harbury, 536 U.S. 403, 415 (2002); In re Maxy,

674 F.3d 658, 661 (7th Cir. 2012). Marks did not show how the lost recording hindered

his appeal; it was his failure to appear at the scheduled pretrial conference that led to

the default judgment.   

                                                 

1 In the district court Marks asserted that he did not receive notice of the conference because the notice

was sent to an outdated address, but he does not press the matter on appeal.   

Case: 13-3410 Document: 36 Filed: 01/23/2015 Pages: 3
No. 13‐3410    Page 3

We AFFIRM the district court’s judgment and DENY Marks’s request for an

order “directing the district court to provide appellant with the complete document

record from the Marathon County Court and the City of Wausau Municipal Court.”

Case: 13-3410 Document: 36 Filed: 01/23/2015 Pages: 3