The Supreme Court's judicial year is coming to a close and opinions will be coming out fast and furious. Opinions were announced today and more will be announced Thurday morning and finally next Monday morning. Info is courtesy of Scotusblog.com. http://www.scotusblog.com/...
Details after the jump.
The Supreme Court issued four opinions today. They didn't issue opinions on Health Care Reform, the Fox case about bad language on broadcasts or say anything about whether the Montana case related to Citizens United will be taken up next term.
Before today, there were 14 cases yet to be decided(if you could health care reform as one case, officially it's four, but that makes the number of remaining cases confusing)
List of remaining cases is here http://www.scotusblog.com/...
The opinions they did release were:
(Plain English Issue part was provided by Scotusblog.com)
Williams v. Illinois
Plain English Issue: Whether a court violates a criminal defendant’s rights under the Confrontation Clause – which provides that in all criminal cases, a defendant has the right “to be confronted with the witnesses against him” – by allowing an expert witness to testify about the results of DNA testing conducted by another analyst who has not appeared as a witness at the trial.
It was ruled that the Confrontation clause was NOT violated by testimony from a different analyst. In this case, DNA evidence was sent by a police department to an outside lab for processing, and at trial, the police analyst testified about the evidence, not someone from the outside company. The defense said this violated their right to confront all witnesses, but the Court disagreed.
http://www.supremecourt.gov/...
5-4 Alito,Roberts,Kennedy,Breyer,Thomas with Kagan, Scalia,Ginsburg,Sotomayor dissenting
Salazar v. Ramah Navajo Chapter
Plain English Issue: When Congress has authorized Native American tribes to take over federal programs from the government and receive reimbursement, but it has also capped the amount of money that can be spent for costs to administer and support the contracts for those federal programs, must a tribe still be fully reimbursed for its costs, or should the federal government instead divide the available funds among the tribes, even if that means that the tribes will receive less than their full costs?
The Court decided 5-4 that the tibes must be fully reimbursed by the Federal government. Sotomayor, Scalia,Kennedy, Thomas, Kagan,
with Roberts, Ginsburg,Breyer, Alito dissenting
http://www.supremecourt.gov/...
Christopher v. SmithKline Beecham Corp.
Plain English Issue: (1) Whether courts should defer to the Secretary of Labor’s interpretation of the “outside sales exemption” of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which excuses companies from having to pay overtime for their “outside salesmen,” and its related regulations; and (2) whether the Fair Labor Standards Act’s “outside sales exemption” applies to pharmaceutical sales representatives.
In this case, the plantiff held that pharmaceutical salesman do not actually sell directly to doctors. they make presentation and try to convince the doctor to prescribe a drug for appropriate cases, but no actual sale is made at that time. So the plantiff argued that aren't actual salesman and shouldn't be exempt from getting overtime.
The Court disagreed and held that they were salesman
5-4 Alito, Roberts, Scalia,Kennedy, Thomas
with Breyer, Sotomayor,Ginsburg,Kagan dissenting
http://www.supremecourt.gov/...
Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish v. Patchak
Plain English Issue: (1) Whether the Quiet Title Act, which provides that the United States may not be sued in disputes about the title to land held in trust for Indian Tribes, applies to all lawsuits involving land in which the United States “claims an interest,” or whether it instead applies only when the plaintiff claims title to the land; and (2) whether an individual’s right to sue under federal law can be based on either (i) his ability to “police” an agency’s compliance with the law or (ii) interests protected by a different federal statute than the one on which suit is based.
An Indian Tribe requested the Federal government to hold a piece of land in trust for them so they could build a casino on it. A neighbor of the land sued to prevent it claimed various harms. The tribe claimed that the Federal government has immunity in a case like this and couldn't be sued.
The Court ruled that the Federal government could be sued is this case.
8-1 Kagan, Roberts,Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas,Ginsburg,Breyer,Alito
Sotomayor dissenting.
One case was granted Certiori (to be heard next term) and about 100 cases were deinied.
11-8976 SMITH, CALVIN, ET AL. V. UNITED STATES was the one granted.
Stay tuned for more opinions on Thursday and Monday. If not here then at Scotusblog.com which does a live blog as they come out, usually starting shortly before 10:00 am Eastern Time.