Category: U.S. Supreme Court

Supreme Court Opinions in Criminal and Related Cases, October 2025 Term

by · Jul 25, 2026 4:54 pm

Here are the U.S. Supreme Court opinions in criminal and related cases from the October 2025 term, i.e., October 2025 to July 2026. The case descriptions are from the court’s website.

Pitts v. Mississippi, No. 24-1159, decided November 24, 2025. Opinion Per Curiam
A defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to meet his accusers face to face may not be denied without case-specific findings of necessity, notwithstanding Mississippi’s right-to-screening statute, Miss. Code Ann. §99–43–101(2)(g).

Clark v. Sweeney, No. 25-52, decided November 24, 2025. Opinion Per Curiam
The Fourth Circuit departed from the principle of party presentation and abused its discretion in granting a new trial.

Bowe v. United States, No. 24-5438, decided January 9, 2026. Opinion by Justice Sotomayor
Title 28 U. S. C. §2244(b)(3)(E) does not bar this Court’s review of a federal prisoner’s request to file a second or successive §2255 motion for postconviction relief, and §2244(b)(1) does not apply to second or successive motions filed under §2255(h) by federal prisoners challenging their convictions or sentences.

Case v. Montana, No. 24-624, decided January 14, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kagan
Under the standard set in Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U. S. 398, 400, the Fourth Amendment allows police officers to enter a home without a warrant if they have an “objectively reasonable basis for believing” that someone inside needs emergency assistance; that standard was met here.

Barrett v. United States, No. 24-5774, decided January 14, 2026. Opinion by Justice Jackson
Congress did not clearly authorize convictions under both 18 U. S. C. §§924(c)(1)(A)(i) and (j) for a single act that violates both provisions—therefore, one act that violates both may spawn only one conviction; the part of the Second Circuit’s judgment that held otherwise is reversed.

Ellingburg v. United States, No. 24-482, decided January 20, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kavanaugh
Restitution under the Mandatory Victims Restitution Act of 1996 is criminal punishment for purposes of the Ex Post Facto Clause.

Klein v. Martin, No. 25-51, decided January 26, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
Because the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the award of a new trial based on reasoning that departed from the strict standards that govern the grant of federal habeas relief to prisoners convicted in state court prescribed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, the Court grants the State’s petition for a writ of certiorari and reverses the judgment below.

Villarreal v. Texas, No. 24-557, decided February 25, 2026. Opinion by Justice Jackson
A trial court’s qualified conferral order that prohibits only discussion of the defendant’s testimony for its own sake during a midtestimony overnight recess permissibly balances the defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel against the burden of offering unaltered trial testimony and does not violate the Constitution.

Zorn v. Linton, No. 25-297, decided March 23, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
Because the Second Circuit failed to identify a case where an officer using a routine wristlock on a protester after issuing a verbal warning, without more, was held to have violated the Constitution, Sergeant Jacob Zorn was entitled to qualified immunity; the Second Circuit’s contrary conclusion was erroneous.

Rico v. United States, No. 24-1056, decided March 25, 2026. Opinion by Justice Gorsuch
The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 does not authorize a rule automatically extending a defendant’s term of supervised release when the defendant fails to report to a probation officer.

District of Columbia v. R.W., No. 25-248, decided April 20, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
Because Officer Vanterpool clearly had reasonable suspicion to stop R. W., the judgment of the District of Columbia Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded.

Hamm v. Smith, No. 24-872, decided May 21, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
Certiorari dismissed as improvidently granted.

Pitchford v. Cain, No. 24-7351, decided May 28, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kavanaugh
In Pitchford’s direct appeal of a capital murder sentence, the Mississippi Supreme Court unreasonably applied the clearly established precedents of Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U. S. 79, to determine that Pitchford waived his opportunity to rebut the prosecutor’s asserted race-neutral reasons for the peremptory strikes of four black prospective jurors.

Fernandez v. United States, No. 24-556, decided May 28, 2026. Opinion by Justice Barrett
A prisoner who collaterally attacks the validity of his conviction must proceed through 28 U. S. C. §2255, not 18 U. S. C. §3582; the supposed invalidity of a conviction is not among the “extraordinary and compelling reasons” that justify compassionate release.

Rutherford v. United States, No. 24-820, decided May 28, 2026. Opinion by Justice Barrett
When Congress declines to make a sentencing amendment retroactive—as with the change to 18 U. S. C. §924(c)—the resulting sentencing disparity cannot serve as an “extraordinary and compelling” reason that warrants a sentence reduction under §3582(c)(1)(A)(i).

Whitton v. Dixon, No. 25-580, decided June 1, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
The Court of Appeals erred in considering post-trial DNA evidence when assessing whether the Florida Supreme Court reasonably determined that jailhouse informant Ozio’s testimony was immaterial to the jury’s verdict, because evidence not presented to the jury could not have influenced the jury’s verdict and therefore sheds no light on whether Ozio’s testimony influenced that verdict.

Abouammo v. United States, No. 25-5146, decided June 11, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kagan
A defendant charged with knowingly falsifying a document with the intent to obstruct a federal investigation in violation of 18 U. S. C. §1519 must be tried in the district where the falsification occurred; the defendant cannot be tried in a different district where the investigation was located because no “conduct constituting the offense” happened there.

Hunter v. United States, No. 24-1063, decided June 18, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kagan
An agreement not to appeal a sentence is unenforceable when it would result in a miscarriage of justice—meaning, when it would leave in place the kind of egregious error that would bring the judicial system into disrepute.

United States v. Hemani, No. 24-1234, decided June 18, 2026. Opinion by Justice Gorsuch
Prosecution of Ali Hemani under 18 U. S. C. §922(g)(3)—for knowingly possessing a gun in his home while being an unlawful user of a controlled substance—is inconsistent with the Second Amendment.

McCarthy v. Hernandez, No. 25-748, decided June 22, 2026. Opinion Per Curiam
The Second Circuit exceeded its authority in holding that Hernandez is entitled to habeas relief under 28 U. S. C. §2254(d)(1); no clearly established federal law required the trial court to instruct the jury about the rule that Justice Kennedy adopted in Missouri v. Seibert, 542 U. S. 600, and the Second Circuit erred in holding otherwise.

Landor v. Louisiana Dept of Corrections and Public Safety, No. 23-1197, decided June 23, 2026. Opinion by Justice Gorsuch
State employees may not be held liable in their personal capacities under a Spending Clause statute such as the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 unless those individuals have voluntarily and knowingly consented to answer private suits under the statute; the individual defendants in this case did not do so here, so Landor’s case cannot proceed against them.

Chatrie v. United States, No. 25-112, decided June 29, 2026. Opinion by Justice Kagan
Police officers conducted a Fourth Amendment search when they acquired Okello Chatrie’s location data from Google because an individual has a reasonable expectation of privacy in his cell-phone location information.

SCOTUS Monday Orders and Opinion

by · Apr 20, 2026 7:22 am

The U.S. Supreme Court issued its Monday orders list this morning with the results from last week’s conference. The high court sent one law enforcement civil case back to the court of appeals and took up one criminal case on sentencing guidelines.

The court also summarily reversed a D.C. Circuit opinion in a Fourth Amendment case regarding the suspiciousness of people fleeing at the sight of police.

Continue reading . . .

Attorney-Client Communication During an Overnight Break

by · Feb 25, 2026 7:30 am

When a defendant in a criminal case chooses to testify, and there is an overnight break in the middle of the testimony, can the trial judge forbid the lawyer to talk to the client about the testimony, even while allowing discussion of other topics?

Yes, the U.S. Supreme Court held today in Villareal v. Texas.

The decision drew the line between two bookend cases, Geders v. United States (1976) and Perry v. Leeke (1989). Continue reading . . .

Emergency Entry and the Fourth Amendment

by · Jan 14, 2026 2:24 pm

Here is a bit deeper dive on Case v. Montana, the U.S. Supreme Court emergency entry case that I noted briefly this morning. Although the high court affirmed the judgment of the Montana Supreme Court, it did so with a more limiting standard than the state court used. Three standards have been used by various courts, and the U.S. Supreme Court chose the middle one. The standard is unique to emergency cases, rejecting both looser and more restrictive standards derived from criminal investigation cases.

The emergency in this case was created when Case’s former girlfriend reported that Case had said during a phone call that he intended to kill himself. This was followed by a click that may have been a gun being cocked, a pop that may have been a discharge, and then dead air. This information, combined with Case’s history, make it hard to see how the state could have lost this case under any standard. The strong possibility that he had already shot himself but might be still alive and in need of emergency aid to save his life seems compelling.

The Montana Supreme Court thought that the “community caretaking” function of the police permits entry of a home in emergency situations “when ‘objective, specific and articulable facts’ would lead an ‘experienced officer [to] suspect’ that a person inside ‘is in need of help or is in peril.’ ” That is the minimal standard needed for the police to briefly detain someone on the street, known as a “Terry stop” for the 1968 case of Terry v. Ohio. The defendant wanted the much more restrictive standard needed for search warrants: probable cause. He cited cases from the D.C., Second, and Eleventh Circuits supporting that view.

In the 2006 case of Brigham City v. Stuart, the Supreme Court set out a rule for entry to a home in an emergency: “Police may enter a home without a warrant when they have an objectively reasonable basis for believing that an occupant is seriously injured or imminently threatened with such injury.” Is the Brigham City standard equivalent to either the Terry standard or the probable cause standard? Continue reading . . .

SCOTUS Decides Double Punishment and Emergency Entry Cases

by · Jan 14, 2026 8:54 am

The U.S. Supreme Court decided two criminal cases today. In Barrett v. United States, the court decided that if a single act violates two provisions of a notoriously complex federal firearms statute the defendant can only be punished for one of them. In Case v. Montana the court confirmed that entry into a home for the purpose of emergency assistance requires only “an “objectively reasonable basis for believing that someone inside needs emergency assistance.” Probable cause is not required. “The probable-cause requirement is rooted in, and derives its meaning from, the criminal context, and we decline to transplant it to this different one.”

Both decisions are unanimous, although Justice Gorsuch declines to join one subpart of the Barrett opinion.

SCOTUS Softens Limits on Repeat Petitions by Federal Prisoners (But Not Much)

by · Jan 9, 2026 9:03 am

In the landmark Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, Congress cracked down hard on repeated attacks on criminal judgments by state prisoners. It also cracked down on such attacks by federal prisoners, but whether the rules for federal prisoners are quite as severe as those for state prisoners is not clear from the language of the statute. Today the U.S. Supreme Court decided two lingering questions on the state-federal distinction in Bowe v. United States. The defendant won on both points.

The outcome is not too surprising. The Government agreed with the defendant on one of the points, and the court had to appoint an amicus to argue in support of the lower court decision. It is an honor to receive this kind of appointment, but victory is rare.

The crackdown on state prisoners is found in subsection (b) of 28 U.S.C. 2244. Paragraph (1) flatly bars any do-over of a claim made in a previous habeas corpus petition. Paragraph (2) allows new claims, not previously made, only under very limited circumstances. Paragraph (3) requires a state prisoner seeking to file a second or successive petition to first get permission from the court of appeals, and subparagraph (3)(E) forbids petitions for rehearing (by either the panel or full court of appeals) or certiorari (in the Supreme Court) to review the decision on whether to grant it.

Federal prisoners file under a different statute, 28 U.S.C. 2255. Subsection (h) is the repeated attack crackdown. It requires a second or successive motion to be “certified as provided in section 2244 by a panel of the appropriate court of appeals to contain” either newly discovered evidence proving innocence or a new, retroactive rule of constitutional law. The distinction between do-overs and new claims in section 2244(b)(1) and (2) is absent. Does the language “as provided in section 2244” incorporate that section’s flat bar on all do-overs? Does it incorporate the bar on Supreme Court review of the certification decision? No and no. Continue reading . . .

Supreme Court Refuses to Lift Bar on President Using National Guard in Illinois

by · Dec 23, 2025 3:27 pm

Today the U.S. Supreme Court issued a brief decision in Trump v. Illinois, No. 25A443. The Court held that 10 U.S.C. § 12406(3) does not authorize the President to federalize the Illinois National Guard for the purpose of protecting federal personnel and property in Illinois.

I noted in this post some problems with that particular statute, including its requirement that orders be issued through the state governor. The Supreme Court’s decision focuses on a different aspect of the statute, the condition that “the President is unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.” Today’s opinion holds that the reference to “regular forces” limits the statute to laws that the military can enforce, and those are few and far between given the Posse Comitatus Act.

My previous post noted that using military forces to enforce laws in recalcitrant states is better done under one of the surviving remnants of the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871.

As is common in these summary cases, the opinion of the court is brief and not designated as authored by any justice. Continue reading . . .

SCOTUS Monday

by · Dec 8, 2025 10:17 am

Today’s big SCOTUS news is the oral argument over whether Congress can prevent the President from firing officials of independent agencies. This has been a big debate in constitutional law going back at least as far as the administration of President Andrew Johnson (1865-1869). Update: Most observers of the argument expect the Administration position to prevail. See, e.g., this article in the WSJ.

There is far less action in criminal law. The court’s orders list today took no new cases, criminal or civil. Last Friday, the court issued a short list taking up four cases. The most newsworthy of these is the civil case on how broadly to construe the citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” In particular, which children born to noncitizen parents are “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States? Continue reading . . .

Supreme Court November Arguments

by · Nov 3, 2025 11:32 am

The U.S. Supreme Court’s November argument calendar begins today. It is Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday this week and next except for Veterans’ Day, next Tuesday.

Here are the criminal and law-enforcement-related civil cases on the docket:

Today, Nov. 3: Rico v. United States.  Whether the fugitive-tolling doctrine applies in the context of supervised release.

Next Monday, Nov. 10: Landor v. La. Dept. Corrections:  Whether an individual may sue a government official in his individual capacity for damages for violations of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000.

Next Wednesday, Nov. 12: Fernandez v. United States:  Whether a combination of “extraordinary and compelling reasons” that may warrant a discretionary sentence reduction under 18 U. S. C. §3582(c)(1)(a) can include reasons that may also be alleged as grounds for vacatur of a sentence under 28 U. S. C. §2255.

Next Wednesday, Nov. 12: Rutherford v. United States and Carter v. United States:  Nonretroactive changes in sentencing law as grounds for sentence reduction. Continue reading . . .