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N8CCRG t1_j9klsml wrote

Interesting. He challenged the sentencing in 2003 based on a 1994 Supreme Court ruling (basically his lawyer wanted the jury to know that if they chose a life sentence it was without parole, but the court wouldn't let the lawyer tell the jury that), but the Arizona Supreme Court claimed the Supreme Court ruling didn't apply in Arizona. In 2016 the Supreme Court ruled on a different case that it does apply in Arizona, so he challenged again, but this time the Arizona Supreme Court said he wasn't allowed to appeal because the Supreme Court ruling wasn't a "significant change in the law". Supreme Court says Arizona is wrong, he is actually allowed to appeal.

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MalcolmLinair t1_j9ln32a wrote

>the Arizona Supreme Court claimed the Supreme Court ruling didn't apply in Arizona.

In other words, the Arizona Supreme Court doesn't understand how the US Federal Justice System works.

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DentateGyros t1_j9ludsb wrote

On the contrary, the Arizona Supreme Court knows exactly how the federal justice system works. They just don’t care.

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Most_Ruin_3005 t1_j9nka90 wrote

This is, unfortunately, almost every state-level high court these days. They know the the federal government doesn't have real teeth to enforce anything, judicially, right now, so a lot of state courts are just flagrantly ignoring federal rulings.

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HugoRBMarques t1_j9lwxu4 wrote

And 4 out of 9 in SCOTUS don't neither.

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Rork310 t1_j9nvzeg wrote

Pretty fucking bizarre we've got a situation where 4 of the 9 Supreme Court judges are ok with saying "Nah you don't actually have to listen to the Supreme Court"

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Miss_Speller t1_j9mes1s wrote

Or, to quote Justice Elena Kagan:

>I think Kafka would have loved this. Cruz[the defendant] loses his Simmons claims on direct appeal because the Arizona courts say point-blank Simmons has never applied in Arizona. And then he loses the next time around because the Arizona courts say Simmons always applied in California. I mean, tails you win, heads I lose, whatever that expression is? I mean, how—how can you run a railroad that way?

(PDF Source)

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