Supreme Court opinions today

Justices Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg announced a dissent from a decision made by the Court to allow a Virginia execution to go through. The VA method of execution is similar to Kentucky lethal injection procedure at issue before the Court this term (and of which the Court eventually approved). The Supreme Court had issued an order stopping the execution last fall while it considered the pending case, and today it lifted that order. That execution is still under consideration by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, and the defendant can go to that court and ask them to stay the execution while it’s being considered, but Justices Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg would have preferred to leave the Supreme Court’s order in place instead.

US v. Rodriquez: Rodriquez was convicted of felony possession of a firearm. Under federal law, he was eligible for a higher sentence if he had been previously convicted of a felony with a 10-year maximum sentence. He had previously been convicted of a drug crime in Washington that would normally only carry a 5-year sentence, but because it was his third conviction that maximum was extended to 10 years. (He was sentenced to 48 months.) The question for the Court was whether they should count the 5-year normal maximum or the 10-year recidivist maximum. The Supreme Court, 6-3 (Alito writing the main opinion), said the 10-year maximum is the one that counts. Souter, Stevens, and Ginsburg dissented.

Kentucky v. Davis: Kentucky says you don’t have to pay income tax on interest from Kentucky state-issued bonds, but you do have to pay such taxes on bonds from other states. Taxpayers claimed discrimination against interstate commerce, in violation of the “dormant Commerce Clause.” 7-2, Supreme Court said the tax was fine, since the tax was not a form of economic protectionism.

US v. Williams: Williams child pornography. He gave it to some other people. He was charged and convicted of possession of child pornography, but he was also charged and convicted of a relatively recent law that criminalized pandering (either offering or asking for) of something you think is child pornography. Under this law, you can be convicted for a separate crime if the material in question actually is child pornography (as it was in Williams’s case), or if it’s obscene (basically something really graphic). Williams argued his offering of the child pornography was free speech, but the Supreme Court, 7-2 (with a Scalia majority (he’s
usually for strong First Amendment rights) and Souter, Ginsburg dissent), said the law was ok, so Williams’s conviction is upheld.

US v. Ressam: Ressam lied to customs officers while attempting to enter the US by ferry in Washington state. A search of his car found explosives that he planned to use to blow up LAX. He was charged under a law that made it a crime to lie to customs while “carr[ying] an explosive during the commission of” that felony.” Even though the explosives weren’t related to his lie, the Supreme Court 8-1 said it was OK to charge him under that law.