Court Opinion

ID: 9816615
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 03:23:51.318589+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:38.554332
License: Public Domain

MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I concur in all of the court’s judgment except so much of it as holds that Mr. Williams’s claim that perjured testimony was used against him is barred by Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 114 S.Ct. 2364, 129 L.Ed.2d 383 (1994). Mr. Williams is entitled to damages on this claim if he can prove it, whether or not he would have been convicted without the perjured testimony. A judgment in favor of Mr. Williams on this claim would therefore not “necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction,” id. at-, 114 S. Ct. at 2372, and the claim therefore survives an application of the principles announced in Heck.
I therefore respectfully dissent from this portion of the court’s judgment.