Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-14-07620/USCOURTS-ca4-14-07620-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Joseph McFadden
Appellee
Demetrius Jarod Smalls
Appellant

Document Text:

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 14-7620

DEMETRIUS JAROD SMALLS,

 Petitioner – Appellant,

v.

JOSEPH MCFADDEN,

 Respondent - Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of 

South Carolina, at Charleston. Richard Mark Gergel, District 

Judge. (2:13-cv-02651-RMG)

Submitted: March 12, 2015 Decided: March 17, 2015

Before GREGORY, DIAZ, and HARRIS, Circuit Judges.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Demetrius Jarod Smalls, Appellant Pro Se. James Anthony Mabry, 

Assistant Attorney General, Donald John Zelenka, Senior 

Assistant Attorney General, Columbia, South Carolina, for 

Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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PER CURIAM:

Demetrius Jarod Smalls seeks to appeal the district court’s 

orders accepting the recommendation of the magistrate judge and 

dismissing as untimely his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (2012) petition and 

denying his Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(e) motion. The orders are not 

appealable unless a circuit justice or judge issues a 

certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(A) (2012). 

A certificate of appealability will not issue absent “a 

substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” 

28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2) (2012). When the district court denies 

relief on the merits, a prisoner satisfies this standard by 

demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that the 

district court’s assessment of the constitutional claims is 

debatable or wrong. Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 

(2000); see Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003). 

When the district court denies relief on procedural grounds, the 

prisoner must demonstrate both that the dispositive procedural 

ruling is debatable, and that the petition states a debatable 

claim of the denial of a constitutional right. Slack, 529 U.S. 

at 484-85. 

We have independently reviewed the record and conclude that 

Smalls has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we deny 

Smalls’ motions for a hearing in district court, to be relieved 

from order of judgment, and to dismiss the district court 

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judgment, deny a certificate of appealability, and dismiss the 

appeal. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and 

legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials 

before this court and argument would not aid the decisional 

process.

DISMISSED

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