Welcome back to Supreme Court Preview!
On tap this week, I'm taking a look at another upcoming death penalty case, a case dealing with student loan debt (it seems like we all have `em), and a civil procedure case involving attorney's fees.
Oregon v. Guzek (
Oregon Supreme Court) [Topic: Death Penalty/Eighth Amendment]
Question Presented:
"Does a capital defendant have a right under the Eighth and Fourteenth
Amendments to the United States Constitution to offer evidence and
argument in support of a residual-doubt claim - that is, that the jury in a
penalty-phase proceeding should consider doubt about the defendant's guilt
in deciding whether to impose the death penalty?"
Background and Majority Opinion: [authored by Judge R. William Riggs, appointed by a Democratic governor]
Randy Lee Guzek was sentenced to death for the gruesome murder of two acquaintances during a planned murder/robbery. This began a long series of appeals and remands in which Guzek's death sentence was repeatedly vacated and then re-applied. After the death sentence had already been vacated twice (for differing reasons), the case was appealed again to the Oregon Supreme Court after the trial court failed to instruct the jury about a "true life" sentencing option - in other words, the court didn't tell the jury that they could sentence Guzek to life imprisonment without possibility of parole instead of sentencing him to death. Because of this omission, the Supreme Court vacated Guzek's death sentence a third time and remanded the case back for sentencing again.
At this fourth sentencing trial, Guzek attempted to introduce into evidence transcripts of his mother and grandfather's testimony claiming that Guzek was actually with them when the murders happened, and thus he could not have done them (note that the jury had already found Guzek guilty - this was in the sentencing stage). The trial court rejected Guzek's attempt to introduce this evidence, holding that they had nothing to do with the sentence he should receive. Rather, they went to guilt - which had already been resolved after trial by jury.
The Oregon Supreme Court vacated the Guzek's sentence yet again, holding that Guzek should be allowed to introduce the transcripts. The majority came to this conclusion after examining the statutes making up Oregon's death penalty scheme, which allows "mitigating evidence" in the sentencing phase of a trial. The majority noted that the Oregon legislature specifically intended for the admission of evidence such as Guzek's to come in during sentencing, in order to satisfy its requirements under the US Supreme Court's prior Eighth Amendment jurisprudence which held that mitigation evidence must be considered during the sentencing phase of (at least) certain trials. Because the testimony was "highly relevant to a critical issue" in the penalty phase, it qualified as "mitigating evidence" and must be considered by the sentencing jury.
Dissenting Opinion:[authored by Judge W. Michael Gillette, appointed by a Republican governor]
Judge Gillette wrote a lengthy dissent arguing the transcripts should not be introduced into evidence. Like the trial court, Gillette's argument emphasized that "the question whether the defendant was personally, criminally responsible for the deaths of the two victims had already been established by a separate jury trial" and that the jury in the sentencing trial was to decide only whether Guzek should receive the death penalty.
Gillette noted that the US Supreme Court had not yet addressed the question of whether a defendant should be allowed to claim that he shouldn't receive death during the sentencing phase because he is actually innocent of the crime (notwithstanding the trial jury's finding of guilt). A four-justice (non-binding) plurality of the Court had, however, addressed a similar issue in the 1988 case of Franklin v. Lymaugh. This Franklin plurality was disapproving of the view that a defendant should be entitled to revisit his guilt or innocence as a basis for mitigation during the sentencing phase. Gillette argued that he would adopt the Franklin plurality's analysis, and would hold that the Eighth Amendment does not require juries to consider the sort of "alibi evidence" that Guzek attempted to introduce.
Potential Impact/Prediction:
The question introduced in this case is very interesting and also pretty important. I am also personally divided about this case, since on the one hand I am a death penalty opponent but also believe that as a pure legal matter Gillette's arguments are probably stronger. (After all, if a jury already said you are guilty - the only "objective" way we have to determine this guilt - why should the defendant be allowed to cast doubt on the jury's finding by running another "mini-trial" during the sentencing phase?). I believe we would all would be better served if the death penalty didn't exist at all and the Court didn't have to answer endless and inevitable questions like this, but that's an argument for another place and time. In the meantime, I fully expect (almost guarantee) that the Supreme Court will reverse the Oregon Supreme Court here. It's possible that Bush's pick (Roberts...probably) will make a difference, though it's more likely that this will be 6-3 or 7-2. We'll see.
Lockhart v. United States (9th Cir.) [Topic: Statutory Construction/Debts to Government]
Question Presented:
"Do the Social Security Act and the Debt Collection Improvement Act bar the United States from withholding social security benefits to collect student loan debt that has been outstanding for more than ten years, as the Eighth Circuit has held, or does the Higher Education Act eliminate any such bar, as the Ninth Circuit held below?"
Background and Majority Opinion: [authored by Judge John Noonan, a Reagan appointee]
James Lockhart left several of his federal educational loans unpaid for well over ten years. He received a notice from the US Department of Education stating that it intended to offset a portion of his monthly Social Security benefits to make sure the educational loans were repaid. Lockhart then sued the United States, arguing that the US' claim for his educational loans was barred by a ten-year statute of limitations in the Debt Collection Act of 1982. In other words, his argument was that if the US wanted their money back, they should have sued within 10 years of his first non-payment. The District Court was not convinced, and dismissed Lockhart's claims in their entirety.
The Ninth Circuit agreed. The majority noted that the Debt Collection Act of 1982 did set up a 10-year statute of limitations on recovery of debts owed to the feds, but that as applied to educational loan debt, this limitation period had been altered by later statutes. Specifically, in 1996 Congress passed an amendment to the Debt Collection Act that explicitly authorized the offset of social security payments for unpaid loans, regardless of what any other laws say (this latter provision is often put in bills to cover their tracks...you never really know how one new statute will interact with each one of the billions of other statutes on the books).
Potential Impact/Prediction:
Any case about student loans is sure to pique my interest, since I have a mountain of debt that I'm looking at (I might as well just direct deposit my paycheck to my consolidation loan company...) That said, this seems like a pretty standard statutory interpretation question that the Court likely took up because of a direct split between the 9th and 8th Circuits on this issue. Scalia, et al will argue that the plain language of the later statute trumps the earlier statute, and maybe Stevens and Breyer will find some significance in the fact that Congress did not note the impact that the 1996 amendment would have on the original 1982 Act. In the end, though, I would expect a rare affirmance of the 9th Circuit's holding here, perhaps unanimously.
Martin v. Franklin Capital Corp. (10th Cir.) [Topic: Civil Procedure/Jurisdictional Issues]
Question Presented:
"What legal standard governs the decision whether to award fees and expenses under 28 U.S.C. § 1447(c) upon remanding a removed case to state court?"
Background and Majority Opinion: [authored by Judge Stephanie Seymour, a Carter appointee]
There are a couple of ways to get a lawsuit that was originally filed in state court into federal court (defendants often want to do this, since federal courts tend to be stingier with damage awards to plaintiffs). One is on the basis of "diversity jurisdiction" - when the plaintiffs and defendants are residents of different states. For a case to go to federal court, however, the "amount in controversy" must be above a certain amount (currently, $75,000).
Gerald and Juana Martin brought suit against a finance company in a New Mexico state court for deliberate overcharging in an automobile insurance contract. The finance company removed the case to federal court on the basis of diversity jurisdiction. The Martins filed a motion some time later to put the case back in state court, saying that the "amount in controversy" requirement had not been met. The District Court denied the motion, but the 10th Circuit reversed and had the case remanded back down to state court.
After this case was back in New Mexico, the Martins filed another motion, this time asking for an award of the attorney's fees they accrued getting the case remanded. However, there was some question about the standard applied in order to get these attorney's fees - the Martins argued that plaintiffs should get the fees any time the removal to federal court is later found improper (as in this case). The motion was denied, and the 10th Circuit affirmed.
The majority held that a lower court may deny the plaintiff any attorney's fees if the defendants had a "reasonable basis" for believing that removal would be proper at the time it occurred. Thus, the lower court has a good deal of discretion in determining whether or not to award attorney's fees - the award is not automatic. After establishing this standard, the majority then went on to hold that the lower court properly resolved the fees issue.
Potential Impact/Prediction:
This is another question that divides the Circuit Courts that the Supreme Court now looks to settle. The question is of some importance, since attorney's fees are very often a significant expense to plaintiffs, and can run high when resolving jurisdictional issues such as this one (and these jurisdictional issues come up a lot). An affirmance of the 10th Circuit could, in theory at least, make it a bit more difficult for some plaintiffs to maintain their suits (though ultimately I think the impact will be minimal, since the lower courts will still have wide discretion to make attorney's fees awards - the 10th Circuit's standard does not act as an absolute bar). Indeed, I would expect that this will be the result - the 10th Circuit will be affirmed.