Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-857_4357.pdf
Page Number: 33

Cite as:  599 U. S. ____ (2023) 

1 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

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No. 21–857 
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MARCUS DEANGELO JONES, PETITIONER v. 
DEWAYNE HENDRIX, WARDEN 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF 
APPEALS FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT 

[June 22, 2023] 

JUSTICE JACKSON, dissenting. 
Today,  the  Court  holds  that  an  incarcerated  individual
who has already filed one postconviction petition cannot file 
another one to assert a previously unavailable claim of stat-
utory  innocence.1    The  majority  says  that  result  follows 
from a “straightforward” reading of 28 U. S. C. §2255.  Ante, 
at 10, 12.  But the majority reaches this preclusion decision
by “negative inference.”  Ante, at 10.  And it is far from ob-
vious that §2255(h)’s bar on filing second or successive post-
conviction  petitions  (with  certain  notable  exceptions)  pre-
vents a prisoner who has previously sought postconviction
relief from bringing a newly available legal innocence claim 
in court.  See Part II, infra. 

In  any  event,  putting  aside  its  questionable  interpreta-
tion  of  §2255(h),  the  majority  is  also  wrong  to  interpret
§2255(e)—known as the saving clause—as if Congress de-
signed  that  provision  to  filter  potential  habeas  claims 
through the narrowest of apertures, saving essentially only
those that a court literally would be unable to consider due 
to something akin to a natural calamity.  See Part I, infra. 
This stingy characterization does not reflect a primary aim 

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1 I  use  the  terms  “statutory  innocence”  and  “legal  innocence”  in  this 
opinion interchangeably.  Both refer to a situation where an individual 
was convicted under a statute that, properly interpreted, did not reach 
his conduct.