Christopher Stepp v. Leroy Cartledge

Filing 920100428

UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 10-6264

CHRISTOPHER DALE STEPP, Petitioner - Appellant, v. LEROY CARTLEDGE, Warden, McCormick Correctional Institution, Respondent ­ Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at Anderson. Sol Blatt, Jr., Senior District Judge. (8:09-cv-00522-SB)

Submitted:

April 22, 2010

Decided:

April 28, 2010

Before TRAXLER, Chief Judge, and KING and AGEE, Circuit Judges.

Dismissed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

Christopher Dale Stepp, Appellant Pro Se. Melody Jane Brown, Assistant Attorney General, Donald John Zelenka, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

PER CURIAM: Christopher Dale Stepp seeks to appeal the district court's judge order and accepting the recommendation his 28 of the § magistrate (2006)

denying

relief

on

U.S.C.

2254

petition. or judge

The order is not appealable unless a circuit justice issues a certificate of appealability. 28 U.S.C.

§ 2253(c)(1) (2006). issue absent "a

A certificate of appealability will not showing of the denial A of a

substantial 28

constitutional

right."

U.S.C.

§ 2253(c)(2).

prisoner

satisfies this standard by demonstrating that reasonable jurists would find that any assessment of the constitutional claims by the district court is debatable or wrong and that any

dispositive procedural ruling by the district court is likewise debatable. Miller-El v. Cockrell, 537 U.S. 322, 336-38 (2003);

Slack v. McDaniel, 529 U.S. 473, 484 (2000); Rose v. Lee, 252 F.3d 676, 683-84 (4th Cir. 2001). We have independently

reviewed the record and conclude that Stepp 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 2