Court Opinion

ID: 856865
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2013-04-01 19:06:58.049673+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:28:25.852014
License: Public Domain

UNPUBLISHED

                  UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                      FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

                              No. 12-7893

THOMAS MITCHELL STUTTS,

                Petitioner - Appellant,

          v.

ROBERT M. STEVENSON, III, Warden of Broad River Correctional
Institution,

                Respondent - Appellee,

          and

STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA,

                Respondent.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
South Carolina, at Anderson.   Timothy M. Cain, District Judge.
(8:11-cv-00191-TMC)

Submitted:   March 28, 2013                 Decided:   April 1, 2013

Before NIEMEYER, KING, and KEENAN, Circuit Judges.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Thomas Mitchell Stutts, Appellant Pro Se. Donald John Zelenka,
Senior Assistant Attorney General, Melody Jane Brown, Assistant
Attorney General, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:

              Thomas Mitchell Stutts seeks to appeal the district

court’s    order     accepting       the    recommendation       of    the    magistrate

judge and dismissing as untimely Stutts’ 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (2006)

petition.      The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice

or    judge   issues      a     certificate      of   appealability.          28    U.S.C.

§ 2253(c)(1)(A) (2006).             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) (2006).               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 Stutts has not made the requisite showing.                        Accordingly, we

deny a certificate of appealability and dismiss the appeal.                              We

dispense      with       oral    argument     because     the     facts       and    legal

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contentions   are   adequately   presented   in   the   materials   before

this court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

                                                               DISMISSED

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