With no explanation, chose the best option from "A", "B", "C" or "D". See Farmer v. Circuit Court of Md. for Balt. Cty., 31 F.3d 219, 223 (4th Cir. 1994) (“There is ... authority for treating sufficiently diligent, though unavailing, efforts to exhaust as, effectively, exhaustion, and for excusing efforts sufficiently shown to be futile in the face of. state dilatoriness or recalcitrance.”). Here, the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals took over 20 years to decide Plymail’s direct appeal of his criminal conviction. Our sister circuits have found much shorter delays sufficient to excuse the exhaustion requirement. See, e.g., Lee v. Stickman, 357 F.3d 338, 342 (3d Cir. 2004) (“[I]t is difficult to envision any amount of progress justifying an eight-year delay in reaching the merits of a petition.”); Coe v. Thurman, 922 F.2d 528, 531 (9th Cir. 1990) (<HOLDING>). The magistrate judge and the district court

A: holding that the prisoner must exhaust his administrative remedies as to each defendant later sued
B: holding that the prisoner has the burden of demonstrating he has exhausted his administrative remedies in his complaint
C: holding in the context of fouryear delay that a prisoner need not fully exhaust his state remedies if the root of his complaint is his inability to do so
D: holding that state prisoner seeking only monetary damages in  1983 suit need not exhaust administrative remedies pursuant to  1997e if such remedies do not provide for the award of monetary relief
C.