The Oyez Project at Chicago-Kent has posted audio and transcripts of oral arguments from last week’s six arguments.
(1) Whether the court of appeals was permitted to consider the prisoner's appeal in this federal habeas case; (2) when does the one-year statute of limitations for federal habeas claims start running?
When a criminal defendant turns down a plea offer based on seriously deficient advice from his lawyer, and then receives a harsher sentence after being convicted by a jury after a fair trial, can the defendant later seek to overturn his sentence on the ground that his counsel was unconstitutionally deficient in advising him to reject the more generous plea offer? If so, what is the proper remedy for ineffective assistance of counsel in that situation?
Whether federal inmates may sue employees of a private prison company for violations of the Constitution.
Can a criminal defendant who was convicted after a jury trial later argue that his lawyer was inadequate because he failed to tell him that prosecutors had offered a deal to plead guilty in exchange for a lighter sentence? And, if so, what should courts do to correct the lawyer's error?
In a criminal case, is a court required to exclude eyewitness identification evidence whenever the identification was made under circumstances that make the identification unreliable because they tended to suggest that the defendant was responsible for the crime, or only when the police are responsible for the circumstances that make the identification unreliable?
Whether a government official is absolutely immune from suit for causing an innocent person to be prosecuted by giving perjured testimony to a grand jury.
