In Wearry v. Cain, 577 U.S. 385 (2016) (per curiam), this Court summarily reversed a Louisiana postconviction court and vacated Michael Wearry’s murder conviction. This Court determined that the State withheld evidence that would have seriously impeached the State’s star witnesses. “Beyond doubt,” this Court held, withholding that evidence violated Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963). Wearry, 577 USS. at 392.

Petitioner James Skinner was convicted of the same crime as Mr. Wearry on the basis of the same star witnesses’ testimony. The State withheld the same evidence as in Wearry, indeed, Mr. Skinner has since uncovered still more evidence that the State did not turn over. Mr. Skinner thus petitioned Louisiana courts for the same relief as Mr. Wearry: vacatur of his conviction. In response, the Louisiana postconviction trial court wrote only: “[Tlhe Weary [sic] case is distinguishable enough from the instant case that its decision does not compel this Court to follow suit.”

This petition presents the following question:

Did Louisiana courts err in refusing to apply Wearry to Mr. Skinner’s Brady claims?

For most of our Nation’s history, it has been bedrock law that “it is the legislature, not the Court, which is to define a crime, and ordain its punishment.” United States v. Wiltberger, 18 U.S. (5 Wheat) 76, 95 (1820) (Marshall, C.J.). But for nearly a century, Pinkerton v. United States, 328 U.S. 640 (1946), has marked a stark departure from that foundational rule. Under Pinkerton, an individual may be convicted of crimes he did not commit—or even participate 1n—so long as they are the foreseeable result of a conspiracy he joined. That is not because Congress, or even the common law, embraced that dubious form of vicarious hability. It 1s because this Court invented it out of whole cloth in Pinkerton. Yet Pinkerton continues to be the law today—and federal prosecutors continue to take full advantage of it. This is a case in point. The sovernment charged and tried petitioner on the theory that he used a firearm to commit a robbery and shoot the victim. Yet Pinkerton enabled the government to convict him of those crimes even though the jury plainly rejected that theory and concluded that it was an alleged co-conspirator, not petitioner, who committed the crimes. In other words, petitioner has been deprived of his liberty not for engaging in conduct that violates a statute in the U.S. Code, but via a guilt- by-association theory manufactured by this Court.

The question presented 1s:

Whether this Court should overrule Pinkerton v. United States, 328 U.S. 640 (1946).

In an explicit effort to establish a uniform national standard for motor vehicle rental and leasing liability, Congress enacted the Graves Amendment, 49 U.S.C. § 30106, which expressly preempts state laws that impose vicarious liability on rental and leasing companies for the negligence of renters and lessees involved in accidents.

Under Section 30106(a), “[aln owner of a motor vehicle that rents or leases the vehicle to a person * * * Shall not be liable under the law of any State * ** by reason of being the owner of the vehicle * * * , for harm to persons or property that results or arises out of the use, operation, or possession of the vehicle during the period of the rental or lease.” /d. Section 30106(b) excludes state “financial responsibility laws” from preemption.

Courts have long held that Section 30106(a) mandates dismissal of state law claims seeking to hold rental or leasing companies liable for damages caused by renters and lessees. And, until the decision below, courts also held that statutes imposing vicarious liability—including through insurance provisions—are not “financial responsibility laws” that are excluded from preemption under Section 30106(b).

In direct conflict with decisions of the Supreme Courts of Connecticut, Florida, Minnesota, and Rhode Island, as well as numerous federal decisions, the Nevada Supreme Court held that a state statute imposing vicarious liability on vehicle rental and leasing companies is a “financial responsibility law” and thus not preempted.

The question presented is:

Whether a state statute that imposes vicarious liability on rental and leasing companies through a provision governing insurance can evade Graves Amendment preemption under its exception for “financial responsibility laws.”

(I)

This case concerns the power of federal courts to ad- judicate purely state-law claims pursuant to diversity subject-matter jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1832.

In Navarro Savings Association v. Lee, 446 U.S. 458 (1980), this Court held that all eight co-trustees of an express trust were “real parties to the controversy” because they were “active trustees” who shared the same powers to hold and manage trust property and to sue and be sued in their own names. As a result, the Court held that together they could sue in diversity based solely upon the citizenship of the eight co-trustees, ignoring the citizenship of trust beneficiaries.

The question presented 1s:

Whether diversity jurisdiction may be created by having one diverse co-trustee bring the lawsuit, strategically excluding all nondiverse co-trustees as parties; or if the citizenship of the nondiverse, non- party co-trustees must be counted because they all are “real parties to the controversy” by virtue of their equally shared powers to hold and manage trust prop- erty and to sue and be sued in their own names — which here would destroy diversity.

Judicial estoppel 1s an equitable doctrine designed “to protect the integrity of the judicial process’ by ‘prohibiting parties from deliberately changing positions” to gain an unfair advantage. New Hampshire v. Maine, 532 U.S. 742, 749-50 (2001). The doctrine targets those who “deliberately” mislead courts, not those whose inconsistent positions stem from “inadvertence or mistake.” Jd. at 750, 753.

Courts regularly apply judicial estoppel when a debtor-plaintiff pursues a claim he failed to disclose to the bankruptcy court. The Eleventh, Ninth, Seventh, Sixth, and Fourth Circuits require courts to look at the totality of the circumstances and find that a debtor subjectively intended to mislead the bankruptcy court before applying judicial estoppel to bar a claim outside of the bankruptcy. In stark contrast, the Fifth and Tenth Circuits have embraced a “rigid” and “unforgiving” judicial estoppel rule in the bankruptcy context that bars claims regardless of whether there is evidence that a plaintiff actually intended to mislead. App. 55a. In those circuits, a debtor’s failure to disclose a lawsuit to a bankruptcy court triggers judicial estoppel whenever the debtor knew the facts relevant to the undisclosed claim and had a potential motive for concealment—which is virtually always present in the bankruptcy context.

The question presented is:

Whether the doctrine of judicial estoppel can be invoked to bar a plaintiff who fails to disclose a civil claim in bankruptcy filings from pursuing that claim simply because there is a potential motive for nondisclosure, regardless of whether there is evidence that the plaintiff in fact acted in bad faith.

A police officer recovered a firearm when he conducted a warrantless search of the passengers of a car stopped for a registration violation. Was it error for a the California Court of Appeal to dispense with the usual requirement that the State is obliged to justify a warrantless search, and instead place the burden on the defendant to demonstrate the illegality of the search?

Did the Fifth Circuit misapply its restrictive interpretation of the mandate rule which does not permit de novo resentencing, but limits to resentencing to only those discrete particular issues identified by the appeals court for remand, when it affirmed petitioner’s conviction for count one, vacated and remanded for resentencing on count two, but then permitted the district court to impose a different sentence for count one at resentencing?

1

This Court has made clear that competent criminal defense counsel are free to make strategic decisions to end lines of inquiry as part of reasonable trial preparation. But the Court has also emphasized that “strategic choices made after less than complete investigation are reasonable” only “to the extent that reasonable professional judgments support the limitations on investigation.” Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668, 690-91 (1984). The question presented 1s:

In a capital murder case focused on the circumstances of

the decedent’s death, where forensic evidence is known to

comprise the State’s main evidence, and where counsel’s

avowed strategy is to endorse the defendant’s post-arrest

description of events, does defense counsel perform

deficiently when they “chose” not to consult with or utilize

any forensic experts, even where forensic experts exist that

would validate the defendant’s account, when such a choice

was premised on no investigation at all?

1

Whether a determinative response by the trial court to a jury question posed during deliberation regarding a question of fact results in prejudice to a defendant, violating the defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial.

Whether the government’s suppression of direct evidence of a defendant’s mental state results in prejudice, requiring reversal of a conviction.

Whether the cumulative effect of these errors resulted in a prejudice that | warrants reversal of the petitioner’s conviction.

(1)

When a criminal defendant in the middle of a direct appeal seeks relief that first becomes available as a result of an intervening decision from this Court, he gets the benefit of the new analytical framework; “the failure to raise the claim in an opening brief reflects not a lack of diligence, but merely a want of clairvoyance.” Joseph v. United States, 574 U.S. 1038, 1039. (2014) (Kagan, J., concurring in denial of certiorari); see also Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314, 322 (1987); United States v. Smithers, 92 F.4th 237, 247 (4th Cir. 2024). But the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit summarily refused to consider Petitioner Fredrick Johnson’s as- applied Second Amendment challenge to his convictions, which he raised after his opening brief to that court on the strength of this Court’s intervening decision in United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), and the Sixth Circuit’s application of Rahimi in United States v. Williams, 113 F.4th 637 (6th Cir. 2024). So the question presented is:

Must a federal circuit court address the merits of a defendant’s Second

Amendment as-applied challenge to a firearm-possession charge under

Rahimi and intervening circuit precedent when those precedents first

became available while the defendant’s federal appeal was in the

pipeline?

When a criminal defendant in the middle of a direct appeal seeks relief that first becomes available as a result of an intervening decision from this Court, he gets the benefit of the new analytical framework; “the failure to raise the claim in an opening brief reflects not a lack of diligence, but merely a want of clairvoyance.” Joseph v. United States, 574 U.S. 1038, 1039. (2014) (Kagan, J., concurring in denial of certiorari); see also Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314, 322 (1987); United States v. Smithers, 92 F.4th 237, 247 (4th Cir. 2024). But the Supreme Court of Ohio summarily refused to consider Petitioner Fredrick Johnson’s as-applied Second Amendment challenge to his conviction, which he raised in his jurisdictional petition to that court on the strength of this Court’s intervening decision in United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), and the Sixth Circuit’s application of Rahimi in United States v. Williams, 113 F.4th 637 (6th Cir. 2024). So the question presented is:

Must a state-court appellate system address the merits of a defendant’s

Second Amendment as-applied challenge to a firearm-possession charge

under Rahimi and intervening circuit precedent when those precedents

first became available while the defendant’s state-court appeal was in

the pipeline?