1. Whether the Ninth Circuit erred in denying a certificate of appealability where the petitioner alleged a violation of the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause pursuant to Hicks v. Oklahoma, 447 U.S. 348 (1980), based on the trial court’s arbitrary refusal to comply with a state statute which created a protected liberty interest?

2. Whether a certificate of appealability was warranted where the petitioner raised a substantial question as to a federal habeas court’s duty to review the legitimacy of a state’s invocation of a procedural rule subject to virtually unlimited discretion to preclude federal review of constitutional claims?

3. Whether the Ninth Circuit’s denial of a certifi- cate of appealability was in error as reasonable jurists could debate that the state court’s application of Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307 (1978) was objec- tively unreasonable where the conviction was necessarily based on speculative testimony and in disregard of clear and certain exculpatory evidence?

Section 144 of the Patent Act directs the Federal Circuit to decide appeals from the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) by issuing “opinion{s].” 85 U.S.C. § 144. Congress had also required the Federal Circuit’s predecessor to issue opinions in patent agency appeals. And it made sense for Congress to retain that reasoning-giving directive when it created the Federal Circuit: the court’s man-date was to clarify the legal standards for invention patents. Uncertainty _ stifles innovation. The Federal Circuit’s first Chief Judge, the Honorable Howard T. Markey, thus said: “In our Court there will be an opinion explaining enough to tell you what the law is in every case.” He added: “We do not just render a one-worded decision and go away. In recent years, though, the Federal Circuit has routinely issued one-word “judgment[s] of affirmance without opinion” under Federal Circuit Rule 36(a), saying only “AFFIRMED” rather than issuing an opinion. That happened here. The PTAB invalidated claims in SurfCast’s issued patents through inter partes review, a process that flouts due-process principles; and the Federal Circuit summarily affirmed. SurfCast has thus been deprived of vested property rights, yet no court has ever explained why, despite the guidance of § 144.

The question presented is: Whether 35 U.S.C. § 144, which requires the Federal Circuit to issue “opinion[s]” in PTAB appeals, 1s a reasoning- giving directive that prohibits the Federal Circuit’s practice, under Federal Circuit Rule 36(a), of summarily affirming PTAB decisions without issuing opinions.

Whether Article III, the Rules of Decision Act, and the Erie doctrine mandate that federal courts sitting in diversity must certify novel state law questions to State supreme courts — rather than substituting their own admitted “best guess” interpretation — when the State’s highest court has not interpreted the statute, certification procedures are available, and the interpre- tation eliminates federal constitutional rights, regardless of whether the parties requested certification.

(1)

The Fourth Amendment protects citizens in public spaces from being seized by law enforcement without reasonable suspicion that they have committed a crime, unless there is an objective basis to believe that they are armed, dangerous, and the officer’s safety is at issue. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 888. Ct. 1868, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889 (1968). When a citizen is present in a historic “high crime” area, and located near another individual who is viewed by police committing a minor misdemeanor (here possession of an open container of alcohol), does this permit a seizure of the citizen?

ii

(1) Whether the Sixth Circuit erred by prohibiting fact-finders in a criminal trial from considering the in-court appearance of the defendant as it compares to photographic and video evidence in the record, or whether the Sixth Circuit should permit such consideration, as the Fifth and Ninth Circuits do.

(2) | Whether the Sixth Circuit failed to follow its own precedential case of United States v. Hickman, 592 F.2d 931 (6th Cir. 1979), when analyzing whether the district court’s interjections during testimony deprived the defendant of a fair trial pursuant the the Sixth Amendment.

LIST OF PARTIES

All parties appear in the caption of the case on the cover page. A list of all parties to the proceeding in the court whose judgment is the subject of the Petition is as follows:

Marchello Moore, Petitioner United States of America, Respondent 2