UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 09-7

JIMMIE WAYNE LAWRENCE

Plaintiff - Appellant,

v.

ROY COOPER, Attorney General, North Carolina Department of 

Justice; GAIL E. DAWSON, Special Deputy Attorney General, 

North Carolina Department of Justice; SANDRA WALLACE SMITH, 

Assistant Deputy Attorney General, North Carolina Department 

of Justice; HONORABLE FRANKLIN F. LANIER, Senior Resident 

Superior Court Judge Acting in Harnett County, North 

Carolina Superior Court Judiciary; HONORABLE WILEY F. BOWEN 

(Retired), Retired Senior Resident Superior Court Judge for 

Harnett County, In their Official and Individual Capacities,

Defendant – Appellees,

and

OTHER UNKNOWN ASSISTANT ATTORNEYS GENERAL, North Carolina

Department of Justice; OTHER UNKNOWN SUPERIOR COURT JUDGES 

ACTING IN 11TH JUDICIAL DISTRICT, North Carolina Superior 

Court Judiciary,

Defendants.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern

District of North Carolina at Raleigh. Terrence W. Boyle, 

District Judge. (5:09-ct-03055-BO)

Argued: September 23, 2010 Decided: October 20, 2010

Before MOTZ, KING, and DAVIS, Circuit Judges.
2

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

ARGUED: Heather Lynn Rattelade, HEATHER L. RATTELADE, ATTORNEY 

AT LAW, Pinehurst, North Carolina, for Appellant. Joseph 

Finarelli, NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Raleigh, North 

Carolina, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Amanda S. Zimmer, Bruce T. 

Cunningham, Jr., THE LAW OFFICE OF BRUCE T. CUNNINGHAM, JR., 

Southern Pines, North Carolina, for Appellant. David J. 

Adinolfi, NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Raleigh, North 

Carolina, for Appellees.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
3

PER CURIAM: 

Plaintiff-Appellant Jimmie Wayne Lawrence filed an in forma 

pauperis complaint, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and 28 U.S.C. 

§§ 2201 and 2202, seeking injunctive and declaratory relief for 

alleged deprivations of his due process rights allegedly

occurring in the course of his state post-conviction 

proceedings. The district court determined, sua sponte, that 

Lawrence’s claims were time-barred and dismissed the complaint 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2). 

Lawrence subsequently filed a motion to alter or amend the 

judgment, in which he disputed the statute of limitations 

applied by the district court. On November 24, 2009, the 

district court denied the motion to amend, reiterating its 

ruling that the claims were time-barred, and adding that Count 

IV of Lawrence’s complaint failed to state a claim upon which 

relief could be granted. On appeal, Lawrence contends the 

district court erred (1) in dismissing his complaint sua sponte

on limitations and (2) in dismissing Count IV of his complaint 

for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. 

We reject Lawrence’s contentions and affirm the judgment of the 

district court.

I

In 1997, Lawrence was convicted of first degree murder and 

sentenced to death in a trial presided over by Defendant-
4

Appellee Wiley F. Bowen in the Superior Court of Harnett County, 

North Carolina. Lawrence exhausted his direct appeal of the 

conviction and sentence on January 8, 2001. See Lawrence v. 

North Carolina, 531 U.S. 1083 (2001) (denying petition for writ 

of certiorari). 

Lawrence initiated state post-conviction proceedings by 

filing a Motion for Appropriate Relief (“MAR”) on August 1, 

2001. See N.C. Gen. Stat. § 15A-1420(c)(7). In February 2002, 

the MAR court, also presided over by Judge Bowen, denied relief 

on all claims after denying Lawrence’s motion to reassign the 

MAR to a different judge. Lawrence then appealed the MAR court’s 

rulings. The Supreme Court of North Carolina denied 

discretionary review on November 21, 2002, see State v. 

Lawrence, 356 N.C. 441 (2002), and the Supreme Court of the 

United States denied certiorari, see Lawrence v. North Carolina, 

538 U.S. 987 (2003).

On May 2, 2003, Lawrence timely filed a petition under 28 

U.S.C. § 2254 seeking a writ of habeas corpus in the Eastern 

District of North Carolina. The district court granted the writ, 

finding ineffective assistance of counsel because Lawrence’s 

attorney failed, in the direct appeal, to challenge the use of 

burglary as an aggravating factor for his death sentence. 

Lawrence v. Polk, No. 5:03-HC-0327-BO, at 12-13 (E.D.N.C. filed 

Mar. 19, 2007). However, the district court rejected as non-
5

cognizable under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 Lawrence’s two due process 

claims related to the handling of his MAR. Specifically, the 

district court rejected Lawrence’s challenge to Judge Bowen’s 

involvement in the MAR proceedings and his entry of the order 

denying the MAR without specifying grounds for the denial. Id.

This court reversed, in part, the judgment of the district court

on February 22, 2008, finding that the writ was improperly 

granted because the state court had reasonably applied

Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), in rejecting the 

ineffective assistance of counsel claim. Lawrence v. Branker, 

517 F.3d 700, cert. denied, 129 S. Ct. 162 (2008).

On March 24, 2009, Lawrence filed the complaint underlying 

this appeal, alleging that (1) the defendants violated his 

procedural due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment of 

the United States Constitution; (2) the MAR judge denied his 

state-conferred right to have a thorough and complete review of 

his conviction and death sentence in violation of the due 

process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment; (3) the North 

Carolina Attorney General denied his state-conferred right to 

have a thorough and complete review of his conviction and death 

sentence in violation of the due process clause of the 

Fourteenth Amendment; and (4) the North Carolina Attorney 

General deliberately deprived him of meaningful access to the 

courts in violation of the due process clause of the Fourteenth 
6

Amendment. The district court, acting sua sponte, entered an 

order dismissing the action as time-barred. Lawrence timely 

appealed.

II

The district court concluded that all of Lawrence’s 

purported claims accrued in 2002, when the Superior Court issued 

the order denying his MAR.1 J.A. 143-45, 172-83. Applying the 

North Carolina statute of limitations for personal injury

actions to Lawrence’s § 1983 claims, the district court found 

that Lawrence’s actions were time-barred as outside the 

applicable three-year period and dismissed the action as 

frivolous under 28 U.S.C. § 1915.2

 1 Lawrence appealed the MAR court’s ruling, a process that 

ended when the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari in 

2003. Lawrence v. North Carolina, 538 U.S. 987 (2003). The 

district court found that, even using this later date, 

Lawrence’s action falls outside the three-year statute of 

limitations. J.A. 145.

See Eriline v. Co. S.A. v. 

Johnson, 440 F.3d 648, 655-56 (4th Cir. 2006) (noting that a 

2 Lawrence’s contention on appeal that the district court 

abused its discretion in dismissing his claims under the 

Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2201-02, also fails. The 

statute of limitations bars Lawrence’s claims for both 

declaratory and injunctive relief, and the district court did 

not abuse its discretion in failing to address Lawrence’s claims 

for declaratory relief after finding his action time-barred by 

the applicable statute of limitations. See City Nat’l Bank v. 

Edmisten, 681 F.2d 942, 945 n. 6 (4th Cir. 1982) (stating that 

the Declaratory Judgment Act is “not itself a basis for federal 

subject matter jurisdiction”) (citing Skelly Oil Co. v. Phillips 

Petroleum Co., 339 U.S. 667, 671-72 (1950)). 
7

court may raise the issue of whether an action is time-barred 

sua sponte in cases filed under § 1915); Nasim v. Warden, Md. 

House of Correc., 64 F.3d 951, 956 (4th Cir. 1995) (en banc).

Further, the district court rejected Lawrence’s contention 

that the statute of limitations for his § 1983 action was tolled 

while his federal habeas petition was pending. Noting that the 

two claims involved different causes of action and different 

parties, the district court found that the habeas petition had 

no bearing on Lawrence’s § 1983 claims. J.A. 175-76. See also

Bd. of Regents v. Tomanio, 446 U.S. 478, 486 (1980) (recognizing 

that the statute of limitations is not tolled while “a litigant 

pursues a related, but independent cause of action”).

With regard to Count IV of Lawrence’s complaint, the 

district court discerned no allegation to support Lawrence’s 

claim that he was denied access to the courts. Instead, the 

court noted that Lawrence had filed a habeas petition that had 

been adjudicated by a federal court in a process that was 

“involved” and in which he “had counsel at every step.” J.A.

180. Thus, the district court found that Lawrence had failed to 

state a claim for denial of access to the courts. 

III

We review a district court’s dismissal of a claim on 

statute of limitations grounds de novo. Robinson v. Clipse, 602 
8

F.3d 605, 608 (4th Cir. 2010); Smith v. Pennington, 352 F.3d 

884, 892 (4th Cir. 2003). Similarly, we review a district 

court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim under the Prison 

Litigation Reform Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii), de novo.

De’Lonta v. Angelone, 330 F.3d 630, 633 (4th Cir. 2003).

Having had the benefit of the parties' briefs and their 

oral arguments, and having thoroughly reviewed the record, we 

affirm on the basis of the district court’s well-reasoned orders

in this case. 

AFFIRMED