Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson on Monday wrote her first opinion since taking workplace over the summer season, objecting to the Supreme Courtroom’s choice not facet with an Ohio dying row inmate’s declare.
Jackson, joined by fellow liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor, mentioned the court docket ought to have dominated for Davel Chinn, who was convicted of a 1989 homicide in Dayton, Ohio, throughout a theft. As a substitute, the court docket rejected Chinn’s attraction.
Chinn’s attorneys argued that prosecutors had withheld proof {that a} key witness, Marvin Washington, was severely mentally disabled, with an IQ of 48. Washington had recognized Chinn because the shooter.
Jackson wrote in an opinion dissenting from the court docket’s choice to reject Chinn’s declare that there was “no dispute” that the state had suppressed proof that will have undermined Washington’s credibility as a witness. Below a 1963 Supreme Courtroom ruling referred to as Brady v. Maryland, such conduct can represent a due course of violation.
Jackson took situation with a February ruling by the Cincinnati-based sixth U.S. Circuit Courtroom of Appeals within the state’s favor, which she mentioned didn’t correctly analyze whether or not the proof about Washington affected the end result at trial.
“As a result of Chinn’s life is on the road , and given the substantial chance that the suppressed information would have modified the court docket at trial … I might summarily reverse,” Jackson wrote.
Jackson, the primary Black girl to serve on the Supreme Courtroom, was appointed by President Joe Biden to switch fellow liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, who retired over the summer season.
