Court Opinion

ID: 1022622
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2013-07-04 23:25:02.977278+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:16:19.810762
License: Public Domain

UNPUBLISHED

                   UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                       FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

                             No. 07-6100

VICTOR ROBERTS,

                                              Petitioner - Appellant,

          versus

GENE M. JOHNSON, Director     of   the   Virginia
Department of Corrections,

                                               Respondent - Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Norfolk. Jerome B. Friedman, District
Judge. (2:06-cv-00104)

Submitted: May 10, 2007                             Decided:   May 14, 2007

Before MOTZ and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior
Circuit Judge.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Victor Roberts, Appellant Pro Se. Leah Ann Darron, Assistant
Attorney General, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.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

               Victor Roberts, a state prisoner, seeks to appeal the

district       court’s   order        accepting    the    recommendation      of    the

magistrate judge and dismissing as untimely his 28 U.S.C. § 2254

(2000) petition.         The order is not appealable unless a circuit

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

§ 2253(c)(1) (2000). 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) (2000).                A prisoner satisfies this

standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that

his constitutional claims are debatable and that any dispositive

procedural rulings by the district court are also debatable or

wrong.     See Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336 (2003);

Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); Rose v. Lee, 252 F.3d

676, 683 (4th Cir. 2001).                We have independently reviewed the

record    and    conclude      that    Roberts    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    contentions       are    adequately     presented     in   the

materials       before   the    court     and     argument     would   not    aid   the

decisional process.

                                                                             DISMISSED

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