Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20-927_i42k.pdf
Page Number: 7

Cite as:  592 U. S. ____ (2021) 

3 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

I 

The Government will execute Dustin Higgs tonight.  In 
2001,  the  United  States  District  Court  for  the  District  of 
Maryland sentenced Higgs to death for his involvement in
the kidnapping and killing of three people.  The FDPA re-
quires that a federal death sentence be “implement[ed]” “in
the manner prescribed by the law of the State in which the
sentence  is  imposed.”  18  U. S. C.  §3596(a).    If  that  State 
does not allow the death penalty, the FDPA directs courts
to designate an alternate State that does.  Executions were 
legal in Maryland in 2001, so the District Court’s Judgment 
and Order did not designate an alternate State.  See App.
to Pet. for Cert. 18a–21a.  Maryland has since abolished the 
death penalty, however, so the Government cannot imple-
ment the death sentence in accordance with Maryland law
as the FDPA requires. 

In August 2020, the Government asked the District Court
to  amend  its  Judgment  and  Order  to  designate  Indiana,
where Higgs and all other federal death-row prisoners are 
imprisoned, as the alternate State.  Consistent with its cur-
rent practice, the Government set an execution date before
the District Court could rule.  The District Court denied the 
Government’s motion, holding that the court had no author-
ity to modify its original judgment.  See 2020 WL 7707165, 
*4  (D  Md.,  Dec.  29,  2020)  (“The  Government’s  initial,  ex-
traordinary request that the Court amend its original judg-
ment and sentence is something that the Court plainly can-
not do”).  The Government appealed to the Court of Appeals 
for the Fourth Circuit, which scheduled oral argument for 
January 27, 2021.  Unwilling to wait, the Government asks
this  Court  to  grant  certiorari  and  summarily  reverse  the 
District Court without normal briefing or argument, and di-
rect the District Court to designate Indiana as the Govern-
ment requested.

Ordinarily, this Court grants petitions for certiorari be-
fore judgment only “upon a showing that the case is of such