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US Supreme Court Docket

October 1999 Case:
Terry Williams, Petitioner v. John Taylor, Warden (No. 98-8384)

Date:
October 4, 1999

Subject:
Capital case, habeas corpus, ineffective counsel

Question:

  1. Where both the federal district court judge and state trial court judge who had originally sentenced Petitioner to death concluded that counsel's deficient performance was prejudicial under the test this Court articulated in Strickland v. Washington, whether the Fourth Circuit erred in denying relief by reformulating the Strickland test so that:

    1. ineffective assistance of counsel claims may be assessed under the "windfall" analysis articulated in Lockhart v. Fretwell even where trial counsel's error was no "windfall"; and

    2. the petitioner must show that absent counsel's deficient performance in the penalty phase, all twelve jurors would have voted for life imprisonment, even where state law would have mandated a life sentence if only one juror had voted for life imprisonment.

  2. Whether the Fourth Circuit erred in concluding that, under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1), a state habeas court's decision to deny a federal constitutional claim cannot be "contrary to" clearly established Federal law as determined by the Court unless it is in square conflict" with a decision of this Court that is "controlling as to law and fact."

  3. Whether the Fourth Circuit erred in concluding that, under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(l), a state habeas court's decision to deny a federal constitutional claim cannot involve "an unreasonable application of" clearly established Federal law as determined by the Court unless the state court's decision is predicated on an interpretation or application of relevant precedent that "reasonable jurists would all agree is unreasonable."
Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]

    Amicus - Petitioner:

  • American Bar Association [PDF]
  • American Civil Liberties Union [PDF]
  • Former Article III Judge Marvin E. Frankel et al. [PDF]
  • National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers [PDF]
  • Professor Lance G. Banning et al. [PDF]
  • Virginia College of Criminal Defense Attorneys et al. [PDF]

    Amicus - Respondent:

  • State of California et al. [PDF]
  • Criminal Justice Legal Foundation [PDF]

Case:
Antonio Tonton Slack, Petitioner v. Eldon McDaniel, Warden, et al. (No. 98-6322)

Date:
October 4, 1999

Subject:
Habeas corpus

Question:

  1. Do the provisions of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), specifically including 28 U.S.C. 2253(c) and 28 U.S.C. 2244(b) (Supp. III 1997), control the proceedings on appeal?

  2. If AEDPA does control the proceedings on appeal, may a certificate of appealability issue under 28 U.S.C. 2253(c) (Supp. III 1997)?

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]
  • Respondent - Supplemental [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Supplemental [PDF]
  • Respondent - Supplemental - Reply [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Supplemental - Reply [PDF]

    Amicus - Petitioner:

  • National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers et al. [PDF]
  • Rutherford Institute [PDF]

    Amicus - Respondent:

  • State of California et al. (Petition) [PDF]
  • State of California et al. [PDF]
  • Criminal Justice Foundation [PDF]

    Amicus - Neither Party:

  • United States [PDF]

Case:
Jeremiah W. (Jay) Nixon, Attorney General of Missouri, et al., Petitioners v. Shrink Missouri Government PAC, et al. (No. 98-963)

Date:
October 5, 1999

Subject:
Campaign contribution limits

Question:

    Whether the court of appeals erred in declaring that Missouri's campaign contribution limits for statewide office, which exceed the limits expressly approved by this Court for national elections in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1 (1976), violate the First Amendment?

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent Shrink Missouri Gov't PAC and Z.D. Fredman [PDF]
  • Respondent Joan Bray [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]
  • Respondent Joan Bray - Reply [PDF]
  • Respondent Shrink Missouri Gov't PAC and Z.D. Fredman - Supplemental [PDF]

    Amicus - Petitioner:

  • Common Cause et al. [PDF]
  • Norman Dorsen et al. (Civil Libertarians) [PDF]
  • Paul Allen Beck et al. (Political Scientists) [PDF]
  • Public Citizen [PDF]
  • Secretaries of State et al. [PDF]
  • Senator John F. Reed et al. [PDF]
  • States of Ohio et al. [PDF]
  • United States [PDF]

    Amicus - Respondent:

  • American Civil Liberties Union [PDF]
  • First Amendment Project of the Americans Back in Charge Foundation et al. [PDF]
  • Gun Owners of America et al. [PDF]
  • James Madison Center for Free Speech [PDF]
  • National Right to Life PAC State Fund et al. [PDF]
  • Pacific Legal Foundation et al. [PDF]
  • Senator Mitch McConnell et al. [PDF]
  • U.S. Term Limits, Inc. [PDF]

Case:
George Smith, Warden, Petitioner v. Lee Robbins (No. 98-1037)

Date:
October 5, 1999

Subject:
Appeals and ineffective counsel

Question:

    In Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967), this Court held that an indigent criminal appellant could not be denied representation on appeal based on apointed counsel's bare assertion that there was no merit to the appeal. In California, approximately 20 percent of criminal appeals result in the filing of no-merit briefs on behalf of indigent appellants.

  1. Did the Ninth Circuit err in finding that California's no-merit brief procedure–in which appellate counsel who has found no nonfrivolous issues remains available to brief any issues the appellate court might identify–violated the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment Anders right to due process, equal protection and effective assistance of counsel on appeal?

  2. Did the Ninth Circuit err when it ruled that the asserted Anders violation required a new appeal, without testing the claimed Sixth Amendment error under Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984)?

  3. Did the Ninth Circuit violate the rule announced in Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989), which prohibits the retroactive application of a new rule on collateral review, when it invalidated California's well-settled, good-faith interpretation of federal law?

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]

    Amicus - Petitioner:

  • California Academy of Appellate Lawyers [PDF]
  • Criminal Justice Legal Foundation [PDF] [TEXT]
  • State of Arizona et al. [PDF]

    Amicus - Respondent:

  • National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers [PDF]
  • Jesus Garcia Delgado [PDF]
  • Retired Justice Armand Arabian et al. [PDF]

Case:
Janet Reno, Attorney General, Appellant v. Bossier Parish School Board (No. 98-405)

Date:
October 6, 1999 [Consolidated]

Subject:
Voting Rights Act, Redistricting

Question:

    Whether the district court erred in concluding that, because Bossier Parish School Board's 1992 redistricting plan was not enacted with a retrogressive purpose, it was not enacted with "the purpose * * * of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race," within the meaning of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 42 U.S.C. 1973c.

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Appellant United States - Jurisdictional Statement [PDF] [TEXT]
  • Appellant United States - Jurisdictional Statement – Appendix [PDF] [TEXT]
  • Appellant United States - Reply (Petition) [PDF] [TEXT]

  • Appellant United States [PDF]
  • Appellant George Price et al. [PDF]
  • Appellee [PDF]
  • Appellant United States - Reply [PDF] [TEXT]
  • Appellant George Price et al. - Reply [PDF]

  • Appellant United States (Reargument) [PDF] [TEXT]
  • Appellant George Price et al. (Reargument) [PDF]
  • Appellee (Reargument) [PDF]
  • Appellant United States - Reply (Reargument) [PDF] [TEXT]
  • Appellant George Price et al. - Reply (Reargument) [PDF]
  • Appellee - Reply (Reargument) [PDF]

Case:
George Price, et al., Appellants v. Bossier Parish School Board (No. 98-406)

Date:
October 6, 1999 [Consolidated]

Subject:
Voting Rights Act, Redistricting

Question:

    Whether the district court erred in concluding that, because Bossier Parish School Board's 1992 redistricting plan was not enacted with a retrogressive purpose, it was not enacted with "the purpose * * * of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race," within the meaning of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 42 U.S.C. 1973c.

Decisions:

Briefs:

    See above

Case:
Harold F. Rice, Petitioner v. Benjamin J. Cayetano, Governor of Hawaii (No. 98-818)

Date:
October 6, 1999

Subject:
Racial classifications, voting

Question:
Hawaii limits the right to vote for the trustees of the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to the "descendant[s] of the aboriginal peoples inhabiting the Hawaiian Islands which exercised sovereignty and subsisted in the Hawaiian Islands in 1778, and which peoples thereafter have continued to reside in Hawaii." Haw. Const. Art. XII, § 5; Haw. Rev. Stat. § 10-2 (1993). The question presented is whether that voting requirement discriminates on the basis of race in violation of the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution.

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]

    Amicus - Petitioner:

  • Campaign for a Color-Blind America et al. [PDF]
  • Center for Equal Opportunity et al. [PDF]
  • Pacific Legal Foundation [PDF]

    Amicus - Respondent:

  • Alaska Federation of Natives and Cook Inlet Region, Inc. [PDF]
  • Hawai'i Congressional Delegation [PDF]
  • Hou Hawaiians et al. [PDF]
  • National Congress of American Indians [PDF]
  • Office of Hawaiian Affairs et al. [PDF]
  • Kamehameha Schools Bishop Estate Trust [PDF]
  • State Council of Hawaiian Homestead Association et al. [PDF]
  • State of California et al. [PDF]
  • United States [PDF]

Case:
William Fiore, Petitioner v. Gregory White, Warden, et al. (No. 98-942)

Date:
October 12, 1999

Subject:
Habeas corpus

Question:

  1. Does the Due Process Clause obligate the states to apply new state appellate decisions interpreting state law to cases that are final on direct appeal before the new decision is announced?

  2. May the federal courts announce and apply a federal constitutional rule requiring the states to apply new state appellate decisions on questions of state law in a habeas case involving a state prisoner?

Decisions:

Briefs:

    Parties:
  • Petitioner [PDF]
  • Respondent [PDF]
  • Petitioner - Reply [PDF]

  • National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers [PDF]
  • State of Alabama et al. [PDF]

Case:
Friends of the Earth, Incorporated, et al., Petitioners v. LaidLaw Environmental Service (TOC), Inc. (No. 98-822)

Date:
October 12, 1999

Subject:
Clean Water Act

Question:

  1. Whether a citizen suit under Section 505 of the Clean Water Act, 33 U.S.C. 1365, must be dismissed as moot unless the district court
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