1. Whether Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act is violated when law enforcement officers fail to provide reasonable accommodations to a suicidal and mentally distressed individual during an active encounter, pursuant to the Fifth Circuit’s categorical “no ADA duty until the scene is secure” rule, an approach rejected by multiple other circuits, and in conflict with this Court’s decision in Barnes v. Felix, 605 U.S. (2025), which requires consideration of “the totality of the circumstances” rather than a narrow “moment-of-threat” after the need for accommodations.

2. Whether the Fourth Amendment permits officers to continue firing lethal rounds at an individual after the individual has_ been incapacitated and no longer poses a threat, in conflict with the holdings of this Court and multiple circuits that each separate use of deadly force must be independently justified under the “totality of the circumstances.”

1

Congress enacted the Railway Labor Act (RLA), 45 U.S.C. §151 et seqg., to govern “all disputes” arising out of “the interpretation or application of’ collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) in the railroad and airline industries. Jd. §151a. For decades, state and federal courts have recognized “where the resolution of a state-law claim depends on an interpretation of the CBA, the claim is pre-empted.” Hawaiian Airlines, Inc. v. Norris, 512 U.S. 246, 261 (1994). But here, the courts below disregarded that rule for certain state- law claims asserted against third parties—rather than signatories—to a CBA. In doing so, these courts departed from core principles of preemption and created a sharp split with courts across the country, including the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The Question Presented is:

Whether the Railway Labor Act preempts state- law claims against a third party that cannot be resolved without interpreting a collective bargaining agreement between an airline and its employees.

Whether federal district and bankruptcy court professional speech local (sic) rules—that create a nationwide patchwork of conflicting licensing standards, effectively imposing nationwide injunctions on the practice rights of qualified attorneys in violation of the Rules Enabling Act’s uniformity requirements and Trump v. Casa’s prohibition on lower court nationwide injunctions and the First Amendment freedoms to speech, association, and to petition the government for the redress of grievances—are subject to rational basis review?

Jacqueline Sterling spent three-and-a-half days in jail for a debt she didn’t owe. The debt was discharged under Chapter 7. Southlake Nautilus & Racquet Club issued an arrest warrant for Sterling on a $500 debt despite the Discharge Injunction. This case is about forcing the defendant to pay all the true consequences of their contempt of the Bankruptcy Discharge Injunction.

When Jacqueline Sterling was arrested she was suspended from her job for ‘suspected criminal activity’. When Sterling sought to renew her Indiana gaming license, she had to again explain the arrest in order to renew her license. When Jacqueline Sterling applied for a gaming license in Colorado a decade later, she had to explain the basis for the erroneous arrest a decade prior.

In a case of first impression, the Bankruptcy court applied comparative tort principles to a contempt hearing and placed half the blame for the writ being issued by Southlake in violation of the Discharge Injunction on Sterling. This was improper.

The first question presented is whether Sterling is entitled to compensation for the decades long effect of this incarceration on her reputation? The second question presented is whether a party in contempt can seek to apportion blame to the victim?

Under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), a plan fiduciary is subject to a “[p |rudent man standard of care,” which requires the fiduciary to “discharge his duties with respect to a plan” with the “care, skill, prudence, and diligence” that a prudent person “acting in a like capacity and familiar with such matters would use.” 29 U.S.C. § 1104(a)(1)). As this Court has recognized, a court’s inquiry into whether a plaintiff has adequately alleged that a fiduciary breached ERISA’s duty of prudence “will necessarily be context specific” because the content of that duty “turns on ‘the circumstances … prevailing’ at the time the fiduciary acts.” Fifth Third Bancorp. v. Dudenhoeffer, 573 U.S. 409, 425 (2014) (quoting 29 U.S.C. § 1104(a)(1)(B)). As a result, “categorical” pleading rules are “inconsistent with the context-specific inquiry that ERISA requires.” Hughes v. Nw. Univ., 595 U.S. 170, 173 (2022).

The question presented is: Whether, for claims predicated on fund underperformance, pleading that an ERISA fiduciary failed to use the requisite “care, skill, prudence, or diligence” under the circumstances and thus breached ERISA’s duty of prudence when investing plan assets requires alleging a “meaningful benchmark.”

IJ. There is clear disarray among the circuit courts regarding the correct causation standard in Family and Medical Leave Act retaliation claims. The question presented is whether an employee must show that her protected conduct was only a motivating or negative factor — rather than the but-for cause — of an adverse employment action under the FMLA?

PARTIES TO THE PROCEEDINGS

Petitioner in this Court is Sandy Mays who was plaintiff in the district court and plaintiff-appellant in the court of appeals.

Respondent in this Court is Newly Weds Foods, Inc., which was the defendant in the district court and defendant-appellee in the court of appeals.

CORPORATE DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

Pursuant to Supreme Court Rule 29.6, Sandy

Mays is an individual.

confinement under the First Step Act of 2018, 18 U.S.C. 83624(g), 18 U.S.C. §3621(b) and §3621(h), the CARES Act of 2020, 18 U.S.C. $3624(c), the Second Chance Act of 2018 reauthorized by the First Step Act of 2018, 34 U.S.C. 860541, and Compassionate Release. The Warden only addressed Maxwell’s CARES Act request and denied relief. The Warden otherwise ignored all Maxwell’s other explicitly pled issues. Maxwell, after exhausting his administrative remedies proceeded in Court, filing a §2241 : habeas. The U.S.D.C. dismissed alleging Maxwell failed to exhaust his administrative remedies for First Step Act relief. Maxwell appealed the decision of the U.S.D.C. to the Fifth Circuit.

| sua sponte, the Fifth Circuit held, contrary to this Court’s decision in Jones v. Hendrix, 216 L.Ed.2d 471, 484 (2022); and contrary to nine other Courts of Appeal – see Woodall v. Fed, Bureau of Prisons, 432 F.3d 235, 241 (3d Cir. 2025); Jiminian v. Nash, 245 F.3d 144, 147 (2d Cir. 2001); Hernandez v. Campbell, 204 F.3d 861, 864 (9th Cir. 2000); United States v. Hutchins, 835 F.2d 185, 186 (8th Cir. 1987); Montez v. McKinna, 208 F.3d 862, 865 (10th Cir. 2000); United States v, Little, 392 F.3d 671, 678- 79 (4th Cir. 2024); McCarthan v. Dir, of Goodwill Indus. - Suncoast, 851 F.3d 1076, 1092-93 (llth Cir. 2007) (en banc); United States v. Barrett, 178 F.3d 34, 50 n.10 (1st Cir, 1999); and Valona v. United States, 138 F.3d 693, 694 (7th Cir. 1998) – _ that its bright-line rule adopted in Melot v. Bergomi, 9/70 F.3d

-i-

1. Whether the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit fails to distinguish between issues raised in the trial court and arguments there made, as this Court and other Courts hold that appellate courts may be limited to the questions of law raised or argued at the trial, but are not limited to the arguments there presented.

2. Whether the Court of Appeals may refuse to hear an argument where, though the issue was raised, a specific case was not cited to the Bankruptcy Appellate Panel, a rule apparently followed in the Ninth Circuit but not elsewhere.

3. Whether on de novo review, an appellate court should make an

“independent determination of the issues.” | | | LIST OF PARTIES 7 All parties appear in the caption of the case on the cover page. | RELATED CASES None. | .

The government prosecuted Petitioners under a statute with undisputed racist origins. Congress criminalized illegal entry, as well as illegal reentry, into the United States in 1929 at the urging of “proud” white supremacists, nativists, and eugenicists to keep the American bloodline “white and purely Caucasian.” The core focus of these provisions has remained substantively the same since 1929. But the Ninth Circuit upheld the law based on a reenactment in 1952 and amendments in the 1980s and 1990s, none of which grappled with the law’s racist past.

This case poses important questions about the role of appellate courts in applying the framework from Village of Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corporation, 429 U.S. 252 (1977), to a federal law used for a large swath of federal criminal prosecutions, along with countless civil rights cases.

The question presented is:

Whether a legislature can cleanse the taint of a racially discriminatory law by silent reenactment or amendment when the law was originally adopted for an impermissible discriminatory purpose.

prefix

Petitioner Stephen Powers uncovered exculpatory evidence that the State failed to disclose prior to trial in violation of Brady ». Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963). The exculpatory evidence includes an original, alternate suspect with a close nexus to the victim as well as exculpatory DNA evidence. Powers was unaware of the evidence that the government actively concealed from him until 2023. Further, even when Powers suspected exculpatory material existed in 2023, the State continued to actively conceal that evidence. The State instructed a locality and the Mississippi Forensics Laboratory not to provide Powers with any evidence. Because of this, Powers was forced to file a motion to compel, which was granted in part.

Once Powers received exculpatory material, he promptly filed his petition for post- conviction relief in the Mississippi Supreme Court—less than two months after disclosure. Rather than directly addressing the merits of Powers’ Brady claims, the Mississippi Supreme Court dismissed the petition without addressing whether the materials had been suppressed or without a determination as to whether Powers was at fault for not presenting the claim earlier.

The questions presented are:

(1) Whether the State’s suppression of exculpatory evidence of an alternate, original suspect with a nexus to the victim deprived Powers of his right to a fair trial in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment?

(2) Whether the State’s suppression of exculpatory DNA material along with misleading statements to the trial court and the jury deprived Powers of his right to a fair trial in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment?

ii