BETHLEY
v.
LOUISIANA
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
The Supreme Court denied the petition for certiorari in this case, and Justice Stevens noted in a concurring statement that the denial did not constitute a ruling on the merits, while observing a potential jurisdictional problem in that the petitioner had not been convicted or sentenced for any crime, which may have prevented the state court judgment from meeting the finality requirement necessary for Supreme Court review.
© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
Sup. Ct. La. Certio-rari denied.
Statement of
Justice Stevens,
with whom Justice Ginsburg and Justice Breyer join,
respecting the denial of certiorari.
It is well settled that our decision to deny a petition for writ of certiorari does not in any sense constitute a ruling on the merits of the case in which the writ is sought. United States v. Carver, 260 U. S. 482, 490 (1923). See Singleton v. Commissioner, 439 U. S. 940, 942 (1978) (opinion of Stevens, J., respecting denial of certiorari); Maryland v. Baltimore Radio Show, Inc., 338 U. S. 912, 919 (1950) (opinion of Frankfurter, J., respecting denial of certiorari). That is certainly true of our decision to deny certiorari in this case. It is worth noting the existence of an arguable jurisdictional bar to our review. Our consideration of state-court decisions is confined to “[fjinal judgments or decrees rendered by the highest court of a State in which a decision could be had.” 28 U. S. C. § 1257(a). Petitioner has been neither convicted of nor sentenced for any crime. As we have indicated, “in the context of a criminal prosecution, finality is normally defined by the imposition of the sentence.” Flynt v. Ohio, 451 U. S. 619, 620 (1981). See Baltimore Radio, 338 U. S., at 918 (noting one reason for denial of certiorari is that “judgment of the lower court may not be final”).
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- United States v. Carver, 260 U.S. 482 (U.S. 1923)
- Maryland v. Baltimore Radio Show, Inc., 338 U.S. 912 (U.S. 1950)
- Flynt v. Ohio, 451 U.S. 619 (U.S. 1981)
- Singleton et ux. v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, 439 U.S. 940 (U.S. 1978)