4th Circuit: District Court must determine when inmate received notice of order

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Where the record was unclear on when an inmate received notice of the District Court’s order denying his habeas ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the case was remanded for this determination.

Background

In 2020, the District Court denied Millanyo Woody’s habeas ineffective assistance of counsel claim. The District Court docket shows that the order was placed in the mail that same day and sent to the facility where Woody was housed. According to the docket, though, Woody didn’t respond to the opinion for roughly three months. As all this was happening, COVID-19 was spreading rapidly through the prison, and Woody was placed in quarantine.

On Sept. 7, 2020, Woody filed a motion for appointment of counsel. Two days later, Woody petitioned for bail. On Oct. 6, 2020, Woody moved for what he called an “extension of time to reopen the time to file an appeal.” The District Court did not rule on any of these three motions.

On Dec. 12, 2020, having heard nothing from the District Court, Woody wrote to this court, asking for an update on what was happening in his case. This court construed that letter as a notice of appeal. On April 27, 2021, this remanded the case to the District Court for it to rule on Woody’s Rule 4(a)(6) motion. One day later, the District Court issued an opinion and order denying Woody’s Rule 4(a)(6) motion to reopen the appeal period.

Rule 4

Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(a)(1)(A) relevantly requires that a party file a notice of appeal within 30 days after the District Court enters judgment. However, Rule 4(a)(6) allows a litigant to move to reopen the time to file an appeal for 14 days if three conditions are met.

The parties agree that Woody received notice of the certificate of appealability by at least Sept. 7, 2020. The parties also agree that if Woody could show that he received notice only after July 10, then he would meet the first criteria of Rule 4(a)(6).

The parties disagree about whether Woody offered a “specific factual denial” that he had received timely notice. Woody did say that he did not receive notice. But he said this after acknowledging in his Sept. 7 letter that he received the certificate of appealability, i.e., notice. The question then is what, exactly, this statement meant: (1) Woody did not receive notice that would have allowed him to appeal the judgment, i.e. timely notice or (2) Woody received notice in the form of a certificate of appealability but did not understand that this constituted notice of his right to appeal.

The warden claims that even if Woody did not receive the certificate of appealability within 21 days, and therefore meets Rule 4(a)(6)(A)’s requirement, Woody fails to meet one of Rule 4(a)(6)’s other requirements. Woody concedes that the docket does not show any filing within that timeframe that was styled as a motion to reopen. But he argues that that ought to construe his Sept. 7 motion to appoint counsel as a motion to reopen.

To the court’s knowledge, this is the first time it has been asked to hold that a motion to appoint counsel can be construed as a motion to reopen. The District Court did not reach this issue because it held that Woody’s motion to reopen was barred for a different reason.

On remand, if the District Court finds that Woody received notice of the certificate of appealability more than 21 days after it was entered, the District Court can resolve this issue in the first instance. And if the District Court finds that Woody did receive notice of the certificate of appealability within 21 days of its entry, the court need not reach this issue at all.

Rule 60

This court’s initial remand was limited to the Rule 4(a)(6) issue; the District Court therefore did not err or abuse its discretion by not considering other issues. But in the interest of judicial economy, on remand, the court must decide as a question of law whether either the October or January filings can be read as Rule 60 motions for relief from judgment, and if so, whether Woody’s circumstances — being placed in confinement during the COVID-19 pandemic and denied access to the law library and the ability to pull up the docket in this case—are “exceptional or unique.”

Vacated and remanded.

Woody v. Nance, Case No. 21-6088, July 17, 2024. 4th Cir. (Gregory), from DSC at Charleston (Lydon). Margaret Kruzner for Appellant. Julianna Battenfield for Appellee. 15 pp.