Mark Fletcher v. Carlton Joyner, No. 14-7440 (4th Cir. 2015)

Annotate this Case
Download PDF
UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 14-7440 MARK A. FLETCHER, Petitioner - Appellant, v. CARLTON B. JOYNER, Respondent - Appellee. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina, at Greensboro. Thomas D. Schroeder, District Judge. (1:13-cv-00538-TDS-JEP) Submitted: February 25, 2015 Decided: March 10, 2015 Before NIEMEYER and AGEE, Circuit Judges, and HAMILTON, Senior Circuit Judge. Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion. Mark A. Fletcher, Appellant Pro Se. Clarence Joe DelForge, III, Jess D. Mekeel, NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellee. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. PER CURIAM: Mark A. Fletcher seeks to appeal the district court’s order accepting the recommendation of the magistrate judge and denying relief on his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 (2012) petition. not appealable unless a circuit certificate of appealability. A certificate of justice or The order is judge issues a 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(1)(A) (2012). appealability will not issue absent “a substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2253(c)(2) (2012). relief on the demonstrating district merits, that court’s debatable or a prisoner reasonable assessment wrong. When the district court denies satisfies jurists would of the v. McDaniel, Slack this standard find constitutional 529 U.S. by that the claims is 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 Fletcher has not made the requisite showing. Accordingly, we deny Fletcher’s motion for a certificate of appealability, deny leave to proceed in forma pauperis, and dismiss the appeal. dispense with oral argument because 2 the facts and We legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before this court and argument would not aid the decisional process. DISMISSED 3

Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.