Milton McCray v. State of Maryland

SOBELOFF, Senior Circuit Judge:

Plaintiff, a Maryland prisoner, brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against John B. Rutherford, Clerk of the Baltimore City Court, alleging that Rutherford’s negligence impeded the filing of his petition for state post-conviction relief.

The court is here limited to deciding whether the complaint states a cause of action. For this purpose, we must accept plaintiff’s allegations as true. Boddie v. Connecticut, 401 U.S. 371, 373, 91 S.Ct. 780, 28 L.Ed.2d 113 (1971); Gardner v. Toilet Goods Assn., Inc., 387 U.S. 167, 172, 87 S.Ct. 1526, 18 L.Ed.2d 704 (1967);…