As calls increase for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor to resign from her position ahead of the 2024 presidential election (thereby allowing President Joe Biden to choose a younger successor to serve on the bench), polling has demonstrated that a plurality of Americans don’t want Sotomayor to quit the Court just yet. According to an Economist/YouGov poll published this week…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday issued a rare rebuke of Arizona’s criminal justice system as the majority ruled in favor of a death row inmate who has called for a resentencing, saying the state ignored legal precedents during his trial.
In a 5-4 decision, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined with the court’s three liberal judges in Cruz v. Arizona, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor writing the majority opinion.
The majority ruled that lawyers who prosecuted John Montenegro Cruz for the murder of a police officer in 2003 failed to inform jurors during his sentencing that if Cruz was not executed by the state, he would be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Instead, the prosecutors falsely told the jury that Cruz would be able to walk free unless he was sentenced to death.
As the Associated Press reported, at least one juror said after the trial that if she had been informed that Cruz would be sentenced to life in prison without parole, she “would have voted for that option.”
Cruz is not the only Arizona death row inmate whose life could be spared by the ruling. For nearly two decades, the state has ignored a previous Supreme Court ruling that required jurors in certain death penalty cases to be informed that the alternative to capital punishment is a life sentence without parole.
Wednesday’s ruling could overturn the death row sentences of roughly 30 inmates in Arizona, including Cruz, who may be granted new penalty phases of their trials.
Supreme Court observers including Mark Joseph Stern at Slate and Steve Vladeck of the University of Texas noted that post-conviction relief for an inmate is “rare” at the high court.
\u201cOh wow: The Supreme Court’s third and final opinion of the day is in Cruz v. Arizona, and it’s a 5\u20134 win for a prisoner seeking postconviction relief. Extremely rare these days. Roberts and Kavanaugh joined the liberals, with Sotomayor writing. https://t.co/VQL01Jk2Fp\u201d— Mark Joseph Stern (@Mark Joseph Stern)
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By allowing jurors to go uninformed of the option of a life sentence without parole, the majority said, Arizona violated the 1994 Supreme Court case Simmons v. South Carolina. In that case the court said prosecutors cannot tell jurors that a defendant will pose a threat to society if they’re not actually eligible for parole.
Arizona did not apply that ruling to its death penalty cases, and Cruz’s lawyers argued the state continued to ignore the ruling even after the court directly told officials to comply with Simmons in another 2016 ruling in the case Lynch v. Arizona.
“Arizona courts refused to apply the Supreme Court’s decision in Lynch to cases that had already been decided,” University of Michigan law professor Leah Litman explained at Slate. “They refused to apply Lynch on the grounds that state law allowed defendants to challenge their convictions or sentences on the basis of ‘new’ Supreme Court rules. And, Arizona continued, Lynch did not announce a ‘new’ rule. Lynch had simply applied an existing rule (from Simmons) to Arizona without actually changing the law in the process.”
“Arizona’s position would have effectively left Arizona defendants with no remedy at all,” Litman continued.
Justice Elena Kagan expressed bewilderment at Arizona’s position when the case was argued:
Cruz loses his Simmons claims on direct appeal because the Arizona courts say point-blank Simmons has never applied in Arizona. And then he loses the next time around because the Arizona courts say Simmons always applied… I mean, tails you win, heads I lose, whatever that expression is?
Litman noted that the Supreme Court has recently ruled in favor of states that want permission to ignore rulings that officials oppose.
“It’s basically what the Supreme Court allowed Texas to get away with on abortion in the S.B. 8 case before the court ultimately overruled Roe v. Wade last term,” wrote Litman. “In 2021, the Texas Legislature adopted S.B. 8, a novel abortion restriction that was designed to shut down abortion access without allowing abortion providers to challenge the law in court. In the case challenging S.B. 8, five justices (the five justices who would later overrule Roe) let Texas get away with that gambit while Roe was still standing. The five justices allowed Texas to effectively nullify a Supreme Court decision that Texas didn’t care for, and that six justices on the court didn’t care for either.”
“Had the court allowed Arizona to do the same in Cruz v. Arizona,” she added, “it would have facilitated even more legal machinations that deprive people of their constitutional rights.”
On Tuesday, the United States Supreme Court decided – along partisan lines – against hearing an appeal from a Black man on death row in Texas who was found guilty by an all-white jury with at least three members who espoused racist views.
In 2005, Andre Thomas was convicted of killing his white wife, his son and his stepdaughter. Thomas, who has a long history of mental illness, alleges his lawyers at the time allowed the inclusion of jurors who expressed misgivings about the idea of interracial marriages.
Thomas pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. When he confessed to the murders, he said he had killed his family to “free them from evil.” While awaiting trial, he gouged out one of his own eyeballs. Years later, he gouged out his other eyeball and ate it.
Despite the clear signs and a long history of mental illness — Thomas began hearing voices well before he was a teenager, and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and active psychosis — Thomas’s lawyers at the time did a poor job of presenting evidence to back up his insanity plea, his current lawyers allege. They also failed to oppose the appointment of the racist jurors.
One juror seated at his trial stated in a questionnaire that they “vigorously” opposed interracial marriage, adding that they didn’t believe “God intended” such unions to occur. Another juror stated, “We should stay within our bloodline,” when asked about interracial marriages.
Prosecutors in Texas also apparently used the jurors’ bigoted viewpoints to their advantage. “Are you going to take the risk about [Thomas] asking your daughter out or your granddaughter out?” one of the prosecutors asked the panel of white jurors during the trial.
Thomas’s lawyers, hoping to impede the death sentence given to him, appealed his case to the Supreme Court. All six conservative justices decided against hearing his appeal, in spite of the evidence demonstrating racial bias and the ineptitude of his original lawyers. They gave no reasoning as to why they voted against allowing the appeal to move forward.
All three liberal justices stated that they would have granted Thomas’s appeal, with Justice Sonia Sotomayor writing why the High Court should have done so.
“This case involves a heinous crime apparently committed by someone who suffered severe psychological trauma. Whether Thomas’ psychological disturbances explain or in any way excuse his commission of murder, however, is beside the point,” Sotomayor said. “No jury deciding whether to recommend a death sentence should be tainted by potential racial biases that could infect its deliberations or decision, particularly where the case involved an interracial crime.”
Sotomayor also blasted Thomas’s former lawyers, adding:
By failing to challenge, or even question, jurors who were hostile to interracial marriage in a capital case involving that explosive topic, Thomas’s counsel performed well below an objective standard of reasonableness. This deficient performance prejudiced Thomas by depriving him of a fair trial.
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Since last Friday afternoon, Justice Neil Gorsuch has refused to wear a mask during in-person hearings at the Supreme Court, a decision that could impact the health of his fellow justices — especially given that the highly contagious Omicron variant of the virus continues to push COVID hospitalization rates into record high levels.
NBC News has reported that on Tuesday Gorsuch appeared without a mask on. All other justices in attendance were wearing masks, while two justices, Sonia Sotomayor and Stephen Breyer, attended via remote video communication.
All nine justices are vaccinated, including with boosters, for protection against coronavirus.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) still recommends that everyone over the age of 2 years wear masks in indoor settings, as certain individuals with underlying health conditions may be at greater risk of contracting the virus even if they’re vaccinated.
Sotomayor has diabetes, and is therefore considered at greater risk of serious complications if she contracts COVID. It’s possible that her decision to work remotely this week came in response to Gorsuch’s refusal to wear a mask, as the two sit next to each other on the Court’s bench.
Breyer did not attend on Tuesday out of “an abundance of caution” after a rapid test result showed he was positive for COVID. A second PCR test showed he was negative, and physicians believe his first test was a false positive.
Breyer, who sits on the other side of Sotomayor at the Court — one seat away from Gorsuch — is also considered at high risk of experiencing severe complications from the virus, as he is 83 years old.
Gorsuch’s decision not to wear a mask comes as the Court is considering whether or not to block a rule established by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) that would require workers at companies that have more than 100 employees on their payrolls to either get vaccinated or get tested weekly for coronavirus. Earlier this month, the conservative bloc of justices, which comprise a majority of the Court’s bench, appeared ready to block those new rules during oral arguments.
Coronavirus cases, hospitalizations, and death rates are increasing in the wake of the Omicron variant’s continued spread across the country and the world. More than 140,000 Americans have been hospitalized each day, on average, over the course of the past week, with more than 1,700 Americans dying on each of those days.
In Washington, D.C., where the Court meets in person, the hospitalization rate has gone up by 162 percent over the past week, figures from The New York Times show.
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
The United States Supreme Court has announced that it will vacate lower court rulings and allow abortion providers to sue the state of Texas over a highly restrictive abortion bill that bans the procedure after six weeks of pregnancy.
Although that process will be allowed to move forward, the Court said it won’t stop enforcement of the law in the meantime. The decision not to halt the law means that the restrictions will remain in place unless a lower court issues a ruling that would place a stay on the law sometime in the future.
The Friday morning decision, issued with eight justices in agreement, took note of a 1908 Supreme Court precedent that says petitioners can challenge state laws by suing state officials. Justice Clarence Thomas was the only dissenter.
Texas lawmakers sought to avoid challenges to the abortion law by placing the onus of enforcement on private individuals, allowing them to sue abortion providers or anyone who helps someone get an abortion in the state for sums of up to $10,000. The law bans abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy and makes no exceptions for rape or incest, making it the most restrictive anti-abortion measure in the U.S.
Although most of the justices agreed that abortion providers should be able to sue the state over the law, some dissented with allowing the law to remain in place, including Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
In her dissent, Sotomayor referenced the Court’s failure to block enforcement of the law back in September.
“The Court should have put an end to this madness months ago, before [Texas’s law] first went into effect,” Sotomayor wrote. “It failed to do so then, and it fails again today.”
By refusing to place a stay on the law, “the Court effectively invites other States” to use Texas’s restrictive law as a “model for nullifying federal rights,” Sotomayor said, adding that “the Court thus betrays not only the citizens of Texas, but also our constitutional system of government.”
The Court’s opinion on the Texas law comes shortly after it heard arguments on a Mississippi abortion law, which restricts abortion access after 15 weeks of pregnancy. In that case, the Court is considering overturning the abortion rights protections established in the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973. Observers of the case’s proceedings have suggested that the conservative bloc justices, who currently comprise a majority of the High Court’s bench, are prepared to undo those precedents.
The Court’s ruling on the Texas law comes just a day after a separate ruling by a Texas judge, who found that the law was not compliant with the state constitution. In an opinion issued on Thursday, Texas District Court Judge David Peeples wrote that the statute was an “unlawful delegation of enforcement power to a private person.”
Peeples also noted that the law’s unique and strategic framework could be used to curtail a number of other constitutionally protected rights, including marriage rights, gun ownership and freedom of speech.
“We are a diverse and creative people and it seems naïve to hope that these procedures will be cabined voluntarily,” Peeples said.
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
The United States Supreme Court appears ready to completely undo or drastically weaken decades of established precedent protecting abortion rights.
On Wednesday, the High Court heard arguments regarding a restrictive Mississippi law that bans abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. In filing its initial briefs earlier this year, Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch laid out a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, a Supreme Court ruling from nearly 50 years ago that recognized the right to abortion access in every U.S. state.
The Court’s conservative majority spent much of their time on Wednesday discussing whether to take a narrow view of the case — that is, deciding whether the 15-week abortion ban was constitutional — or to take a broader consideration by exploring whether Roe should be upended completely.
Chief Justice of the Court John Roberts opined that upholding the 15-week ban would not be a “dramatic departure” from the stipulations in Roe, and called for keeping the case focused on the ban. Meanwhile, Justice Brett Kavanaugh signaled that he might vote to dismantle the decades-old decision, arguing that the Court should leave the issue to states — a scenario which could leave millions of Americans unable to access a routine medical procedure that has the potential to be life-saving.
Justice Samuel Alito, one of the most conservative members of the Court, said “the only real options” for him and his colleagues to consider rested on whether to affirm or overrule Roe, which he firmly believes should be overturned.
While those considerations were taking place, U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar argued on behalf of the federal government in favor of keeping Roe in place, warning that the Supreme Court has never revoked a constitutional right it had previously extended. All three liberal bloc justices also voiced their opposition to undoing or weakening Roe, with Justice Sotomayor saying that doing so would destroy the reputation and integrity of the Court.
“Will this institution survive the stench that this creates in the public perception that the Constitution and its reading are just political acts?” Sotomayor asked. “I don’t see how it is possible.”
Undoing Roe would have a devastating effect on reproductive rights and abortion access in the United States, endangering people who are seeking abortions across the country. If Roe were undone, analysts have concluded, it’s likely that 22 states would either ban abortions completely or put dangerously restrictive limits on the procedure.
Social media users were quick to express their anger at the Court, with many noting that Democrats in Congress should act now to ensure that reproductive rights are protected.
“Democrats could pass national legislation to protect abortion rights,” said journalist Judd Legum, “but will not because several Senators don’t want to make an exception to the filibuster so they will let Supreme Court justices (who were only confirmed via an exception to the filibuster) gut abortion rights.”
Washington Post opinion writer Jennifer Rubin said that if the Court strikes down Roe, it is imperative that Democrats end the filibuster to immediately pass a law protecting abortion access.
“Once the Court eviscerates abortion rights (as it did with voting rights) perhaps the Dem Senate will create an exception to the filibuster for protection of constitutional rights, put Roe into statute and pass voting rights,” Rubin tweeted. “Biden better use famed negotiating powers on [Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe] Manchin.”
Other journalists noted that none of this would have been possible were it not for the reckless way that former President Donald Trump was able to appoint anti-abortion justices to the Court.
“It’s wild that a third of the Supreme Court was appointed by a man who attempted to overthrow the United States government, and we just continue to let those judges hand down decisions,” wrote Ian Millhiser, senior correspondent for Vox.
Reproductive rights activists expressed dismay after arguments wrapped up — and warned about the possibility that conservative justices wouldn’t stop at abortion.
“They are coming for all of it — and quickly,” wrote Katie Buie, national communications director for pro-choice organization NARAL. “Every aspect of reproductive freedom is at stake.”
Writer Jill Filipovic also noted that anti-abortion laws — including restrictions like the ones Mississippi lawmakers have been trying to enforce — are typically associated with places that have worse health outcomes.
“The states with the strongest anti-abortion laws also boast the highest rates of infant mortality,” Filipovic wrote. “A woman who lives in a ‘pro-life’ state is much likelier to die during pregnancy, in childbirth, or soon after than a woman in a pro-choice state.”
With arguments now completed, the Supreme Court will meet in private conference over the next few days, taking a vote amongst themselves to determine the case’s outcome. After that, a senior justice in the majority opinion will assign someone to write the opinion of the Court, or take writing duties themselves, with dissenting opinions by other justices being assigned as well.
In most cases, it takes the Supreme Court about three months to issue a decision. However, given the gravity of this case in particular, the Court will likely issue its final order in June or July.
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
In a split decision issued late on Wednesday night, the United States Supreme Court ruled that it would not place a stay on a Texas law designed to limit abortion in the state to no later than six weeks after a person becomes pregnant.
Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative, joined all three liberal bloc justices in dissenting with the majority opinion. The five remaining justices — including all three appointees of former President Donald Trump, who vowed to nominate anti-choice picks to the Court — simply said that they were unable to decide on the Texas law, based on its framework.
The law in Texas is unique in that it doesn’t put the state in charge of the enforcement of the highly restrictive ban. Rather, any individual is allowed to sue someone in the state if they believe that the person provided abortion services or otherwise helped another person to access them.
The design of the law, in theory, allows Texas to say it cannot be sued over it because it would be a civil suit brought by one person against another — the state itself would not be involved in enforcing the law. The Supreme Court’s conservative majority sided with that belief.
The opinion of the Court was a single paragraph long and not signed by any of the justices who ruled against intervention in the Texas law. It stated that a case had not been made by litigants to address the “complex and novel” procedural questions regarding the new statute.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, penning a blistering dissent for the Court, objected to those views from the majority.
“The Court’s order is stunning,” Sotomayor wrote. “Presented with an application to enjoin a flagrantly unconstitutional law engineered to prohibit women from exercising their constitutional rights and evade judicial scrutiny, a majority of Justices have opted to bury their heads in the sand.”
Texas’s law “flouts nearly 50 years of federal precedents” set by the Supreme Court and other lower courts, the associate justice added, noting that the ruling on Wednesday night “rewards tactics designed to avoid judicial review,” and suggesting that other states in the future might try to replicate it.
Prior to their decision on Wednesday, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) appeared on MSNBC to speak about the High Court’s refusal to act on the Texas law, noting that it was likely to have different effects on different people.
“I lived in an America in which abortion was illegal, when I was young, before Roe v. Wade. And when abortion is illegal, rich women still get abortions,” Warren said. “Women with resources still get abortions, women who have time and who have friends in other places will still get abortions. What this law is really about is not stopping abortions across the board. This is about bearing down on the most vulnerable among us.”
The Massachusetts senator said it was time for the legislative branch of government to do something about the issue.
“Let’s remember that 70 percent of Americans want to see Roe v. Wade as the law of the land,” Warren said. “The Supreme Court is not the only one who can provide that. Congress could pass Roe v. Wade.”
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.