Category: U.S. Supreme Court

Splintered High Court Requires Unanimous Juries

by · Apr 20, 2020 5:24 pm

All but two states require juries to be unanimous in serious criminal cases, and one of those states has already amended its constitution to require unanimity going forward. In a pair of cases nearly half a century ago, Apodaca v. Oregon and Johnson v. Louisana, the Court upheld these two state’s non-unanimous jury laws by a 5-4 vote, but the 5 could not agree on a single rationale.

Today in Ramos v. Louisiana, No. 18-5924, the Court decided otherwise by a 6-3 vote. Part of Justice Gorsuch’s opinion is joined by four other Justices, making it the opinion of the Court, and part is not. The divisions over precedent strike me as more interesting than the divisions over jury trial. Continue reading . . .

Splintered DC Circuit Vacates Injunction Against Federal Executions

by · Apr 7, 2020 10:10 am

Last November, a federal district judge in DC enjoined all federal executions based on a statute requiring use of the “manner” of execution provided by the law of the state where the conviction was rendered. See this post. Today, a splintered three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit vacated the injunction, for now. The division on the panel clearly requires further review, and the court on its own motion stayed the issuance of its mandate to allow it. Continue reading . . .

Parsing the Three Opinions in Kansas v. Glover

by · Apr 6, 2020 4:17 pm

Initially, the 8-1 vote in Kansas v. Glover, noted earlier today, was somewhat surprising. Reading through the three opinions in the case, we see some important differences that go beyond the result on the sparse facts of this case.

The Decision

Procedurally, the case was unusual in that the defendant’s motion to suppress evidence was decided on stipulated facts without a hearing. The officer ran the license plate, found that the registered owner had a revoked (not suspended) license, made no effort to identify the driver, and made the stop. That’s it. Continue reading . . .

Stopping a Car Whose Owner Has a Revoked License

by · Apr 6, 2020 9:58 am

The U.S. Supreme Court today decided Kansas v. Glover, No. 18-556, by an 8-1 vote:

This case presents the question whether a police officer violates the Fourth Amendment by initiating an investigative traffic stop after running a vehicle’s license plate and learning that the registered owner has a revoked driver’s license. We hold that when the officer lacks information negating an inference that the owner is the driver of the vehicle, the stop is reasonable.

Continue reading . . .

Successive Petitions and Federal Prisoners

by · Mar 25, 2020 1:48 pm

In the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, Congress cracked down on prisoners making repeated collateral attacks on their convictions and sentences. AEPDA included a very strict rule for successive petitions by state prisoners in 28 U.S.C. §2244(b)(1)&(2). A less stringent rule for federal prisoners was added to the end of the separate section for federal-prisoner collateral review, §2255, language that is now designated subdivision (h) of that section.

Does the rule for state prisoners also apply to federal prisoners? Of course not. I’m surprised anyone ever thought it did. Yet it appears that six federal courts of appeals have so held. On Monday, the Supreme Court turned down a case attempting to raise the issue, but Justice Kavanaugh noted the Court should address it soon. Continue reading . . .

An Insanity Debate Goes to the Dogs

by · Mar 23, 2020 3:57 pm

This morning I noted the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Kahler v. Kansas, upholding a Kansas statute that limits the insanity defense to inability to know what one is doing, omitting the traditional alternative of inability to know that what one is doing is morally wrong. There are many interesting aspects of the debate between Justice Kagan’s opinion for the Court and Justice Breyer’s dissent, but for this post I will focus on just one. The hypothetical that Justice Breyer invokes repeatedly in his argument makes no sense.

Continue reading . . .

Constitution Does Not Require Morality-Based Insanity Defense

by · Mar 23, 2020 7:47 am

The U.S. Supreme Court today rejected the claim that the Constitution requires a State to recognize an insanity defense based on the defendant’s inability to know his conduct is wrong. It is sufficient, if a State so chooses, to limit the defense to the defendant’s inability to know what he was doing. Justice Elena Kagan wrote the opinion of the Court in Kahler v. Kansas, No. 18-6135.

Continue reading . . .