Court bolsters defendant’s right to cross-examine witnesses
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Thursday buttressed a criminal defendant’s right to cross-examine prosecution witnesses, ruling in favor of a New York man who was convicted of killing a 2-year-old boy on Easter Sunday in 2006.
By an 8-1 vote, the justices held that defendant Darrell Hemphill’s constitutional rights were violated when a judge allowed jurors to read another man’s testimony that prosecutors used to undermine Hemphill’s defense. The man, Nicholas Morris, was unavailable at the trial.
Hemphill argued that Morris fired the 9-millimeter handgun whose stray bullet killed the child in the Bronx. Morris had initially been charged with the killing and illegal possession of a 9-millimeter gun. Police searching Morris’ apartment found a 9-millimeter cartridge and .357-caliber bullets on his nightstand.
The trial judge allowed jurors to see a statement Morris made when pleading guilty to the lesser charge of criminal possession of a .357 revolver. The plea deal made no mention of the 9-millimeter weapon.
But without Morris on the witness stand, the judge should not have allowed jurors to see his statement, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote for the court, invoking the constitutional provision that gives defendants the right to confront their accusers.
“For Confrontation Clause purposes, it was not for the judge to determine whether Hemphill’s theory that Morris was the shooter was unreliable, incredible, or otherwise misleading in light of the State’s proffered, unconfronted plea evidence. Nor, under the Clause, was it the judge’s role to decide that this evidence was reasonably necessary to correct that misleading impression,” the Bronx-born Sotomayor wrote.
Justice Clarence Thomas was the lone dissenter.
The state had argued that Hemphill had essentially opened the door to the statement from Morris by mounting a defense that Morris was responsible for the child’s death.
The Supreme Court decision may not be a complete victory for Hemphill. The state could still try to argue in a New York court that there was enough evidence to convict Hemphill anyway, even without Morris’ statement.
Jeffrey Fisher, who represented Hemphill at the Supreme Court, said by email Thursday that “our position is that Hemphill’s conviction must be reversed and he’s entitled to a new trial.”
The case is Hemphill v. New York, 20-637.
U.S. Supreme Court asked to hear Confederate statue case
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Two Richmond residents living near the site where a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee stood for more than a century have asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a ruling by the Supreme Court of Virginia that let state officials remove the towering monument.
In a petition filed with the high court Wednesday, lawyers for the landowners argued that former Gov. Ralph Northam did not have the authority to revoke an agreement to maintain the statue on state-owned land on Richmond’s Monument Avenue.
Virginia promised to forever maintain the statue in 1887 and 1890 deeds transferring its state ownership. But the Supreme Court of Virginia sided with Northam last year, ruling that obligation no longer applied as “values change and public policy changes too” in a democracy.
The statue was removed in September. In their petition asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case, the residents argued that the decision by Virginia’s Supreme Court has implications beyond just the Lee statue.
“The impact of the decision of the Supreme Court of Virginia affirming Governor Northam’s removal order will be widespread and significant,” attorney Patrick McSweeney wrote in the petition.
“If this Virginia decision is followed, every contract entered into by a state government can be abrogated when a governor or a court — not the legislature — decides that the contract violates public policy. This would leave those who contract with state governments at the mercy of judges and executive or administrative officials who have no legitimate role in setting the Commonwealth’s public policy,” the petition states.
Northam announced his decision to remove the statue in June 2020, 10 days after George Floyd’s death under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer sparked protests over police brutality and racism in cities nationwide, including Richmond. The nationally recognized statue became the epicenter of a protest movement in Virginia after Floyd’s death.
The unanimous ruling by the Supreme Court of Virginia cited testimony from historians who said the enormous statue was erected in 1890 to honor the southern white citizenry’s defense of a pre-Civil War life that depended on slavery and the subjugation of Black people.
More than a century later, its continued display “communicates principles that many believe to be inconsistent with the values the Commonwealth currently wishes to express,” the justices said.
It was not clear when the U.S. Supreme Court would decide whether to hear the case.
Richmond was the capital of the Confederacy for most of the Civil War. The city has removed more than a dozen other pieces of Confederate statuary on city land since Floyd’s death, which prompted the removal of Confederate monuments in cities across the country.
Justices seem sympathetic to Cruz in campaign finance case
WASHINGTON (AP) — Members of the Supreme Court’s conservative majority on Wednesday seemed sympathetic to Sen. Ted Cruz in a challenge the Texas Republican brought to a provision of campaign finance law limiting the repayment of federal candidates’ loans to their campaigns.
The issue before the court is limited but could signal how open the six-justice conservative majority may be to other challenges to campaign finance law. A decision is expected in the next few months, just as campaigning for the 2022 midterm elections intensifies.
The case involves a section of the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. The provision says that if a candidate loans his or her campaign money before an election, the campaign cannot repay the candidate more than $250,000 using funds raised after Election Day. The loans can still be repaid with money raised before the election.
Cruz says the provision has the effect of deterring the loans.
The Biden administration argues, among other things, that Congress intended the provision as an anti-corruption measure. But Justice Amy Coney Barrett noted that a lower court found that the government “hadn’t introduced sufficient evidence of corruption coming from these post-election contributions.”
Justices Elena Kagan and Stephen Breyer, two of the court’s three liberals, suggested that what Congress did in enacting the limit was make an appropriate compromise.
“The entire point of this law is that we start getting worried when people start repaying the candidate’s indebtedness because that’s just another way of putting money in his pocket,” Kagan said.
Cruz argues the provision makes candidates think twice about loaning their campaign money because it substantially increases the risk that any candidate loan will never be fully repaid. He says it is unconstitutional and a lower court agreed.
Cruz, who has served in the Senate since 2013 and ran unsuccessfully for president in 2016, loaned his campaign $260,000 the day before the 2018 general election for the purpose of challenging the law.
The administration is arguing that Cruz does not have a right to challenge the law, in part because in his case it does not prevent him from being repaid in full. Even if Cruz can challenge the provision, the government says, it does not violate the Constitution because it is “at most a modest burden” aimed at combating corruption.
The government says the majority of loans candidates make to their campaigns are for less than $250,000 and so the loan repayment limit does not apply.
The case is Federal Election Commission v. Ted Cruz for Senate, 21-12.
Sotomayor, Gorsuch deny report they were at odds over masks
WASHINGTON (AP) — Two Supreme Court justices say a media report that they were at odds over the wearing of masks in court during the recent surge in coronavirus cases is false.
The court on Wednesday issued an unusual three-sentence statement from Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch. It read: “Reporting that Justice Sotomayor asked Justice Gorsuch to wear a mask surprised us. It is false. While we may sometimes disagree about the law, we are warm colleagues and friends.”
Sotomayor is an appointee of former President Barack Obama while Gorsuch was appointed by former President Donald Trump.
Sotomayor, who has diabetes, has been attending arguments remotely from her chambers this month during the surge of the coronavirus’ omicron variant. Her colleagues, with the exception of Gorsuch, have been wearing masks this month while hearing arguments in the courtroom.
Later Wednesday, Chief Justice John Roberts responded to inquiries about whether he had asked his colleagues to wear masks, saying in statement, “I did not request Justice Gorsuch or any other Justice to wear a mask on the bench.” He said he would have no further comment.
Gorsuch has never said why he is not wearing a mask on the bench. He has not responded to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
Both statements from the justices came after NPR’s longtime Supreme Court correspondent Nina Totenberg reported Tuesday on an alleged conflict between Sotomayor and Gorsuch, who normally sit next to each other during arguments at the high court.
Totenberg reported that unidentified court sources said “Sotomayor did not feel safe in close proximity to people who were unmasked” and that “Chief Justice John Roberts, understanding that, in some form asked the other justices to mask up.” She did not elaborate.
Gorsuch’s decision not to wear a mask “has also meant that Sotomayor has not attended the justices’ weekly conference in person, joining instead by telephone,” Totenberg reported. An NPR spokeswoman said in an email Wednesday after the justices released their statements that “NPR stands behind Nina Totenberg’s reporting.”
Following NPR’s story, CNN also reported that “a source familiar with the situation” said Sotomayor didn’t “feel comfortable sitting on the bench near colleagues who are not masked.” Neither NPR’s story nor CNN’s story said Sotomayor had directly asked Gorsuch to wear a mask. The justices’ statement did not say what reporting it was referencing.
Since the justices returned to hearing in-person arguments in October, Sotomayor has worn a mask during arguments at the high court while her colleagues have not. They changed their practice this month during the surge of the coronavirus’ omicron variant.
All the justices have been vaccinated against the coronavirus and received a booster shot. Attorneys who argue before the justices also have to have a negative coronavirus test or argue remotely by telephone, and journalists who attend in person are also asked to have a negative test.
So far, three attorneys have had to argue by phone this month because of positive tests. The public is not currently allowed to attend arguments.
