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SCOTUS grants certiorari on two pauper defendant criminal justice petitions

By Douglas A. Berman

In addition to handing down a unanimous ruling in the Abbott mandatory minimum case (noted here), the SUpreme Court granted cert this morning to two new cases, Tolentino v. New York and Fowler v. United States.  I believe Tolentino deals with an exclusionary rule issue from the New York state courts, and that Fowler deals with the application of a federal murder statute.  (SCOTUSblog will likely have key papers from this cases up before long.) Though time will tell if either Tolentino or Fowler will be consequential cases, I already find it significant that the Justices decided to take up two cases in which criminal defendants lost appeals below.  This fact along does not ensure a pro-defendant ruling from SCOTUS, but it does suggest that at least four Justices were at least not too pleased with how the government won below in these cases.continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on November 15, 2010 (boomark / email).