Court Opinion

ID: 9430019
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:28:39.741585+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:22.453676
License: Public Domain

Justice Brennan,
with whom Justice Marshall joins,
dissenting.
The Court today continues its unsettling practice of summarily reversing decisions rendered in favor of criminal defendants, based not on broad principle but on idiosyncratic *458facts and without full briefing or oral argument. See, e. g., United States v. Gagnon, 470 U. S. 522, 530-531 (1985) (Brennan, J., dissenting); Florida v. Meyers, 466 U. S. 380, 383 (1984) (Stevens, J., dissenting); Wyrick v. Fields, 459 U. S. 42, 50 (1982) (Marshall, J., dissenting). Because I find this one-sided practice of summary error correction* inappropriate, I would vote merely to deny this petition for certiorari. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.

There have been summary reversals in 27 noncapital cases involving criminal convictions over the last four Terms. Twenty-four of these favored the warden or the prosecutor. See ante, at 456-457; United States v. Gagnon, 470 U. S. 522 (1985) (per curiam); United States v. Woodward 469 U. S. 105 (1985) (per curiam); Florida v. Rodriguez, 469 U. S. 1 (1984) (per curiam); Massachusetts v. Upton, 466 U. S. 727 (1984) (per curiam); Florida v. Meyers, 466 U. S. 380, 386, and n. 3 (1984) (per curiam) (Stevens, J., dissenting) (collecting cases).