Petitions of the week

This week we highlight three cert petitions pending before the Supreme Court that address offender-registration laws and the ex post facto clause; state sovereign immunity in the context of Rule 23 class settlements; and what the Constitution requires of a court on habeas review in capital cases.

The petitions of the week are:

Boyd v. Washington
18-39
Issue: Whether the requirement of frequent, in-person reporting renders an offender-registration law punitive, such that applying the law retroactively violates the ex post facto clause.

GlaxoSmithKline LLC v. Louisiana
18-42
Issue: Whether state sovereign immunity bars a federal court from binding a state to a Rule 23 class settlement as an absent class member plaintiff based on the state’s failure to opt out of the class.

Carty v. Texas
18-50
Issues: (1) Whether the Constitution requires a court on habeas review in a capital case to assess cumulatively the prejudice caused by multiple constitutional errors at a criminal trial; and (2) whether the state’s intentional suppression of evidence in violation of Brady v. Maryland prejudiced the petitioner by itself or in combination with the objectively unreasonable performance of her trial counsel.