SCOTUS update: whoops; I goofed

I was horribly wrong in my earlier post when I wrote that there aren't any pending military justice cert petitions at the Supremes. When I wrote that there were two and now there are three (not counting Salvador Diaz's petition for rehearing).

The case of Pena v. United States, No. 06-1340, will go to conference on Friday, 10 May. CAAF's opinion rejects an argument that mandatory supervised release impermissibly increases an accused's sentence.

A second pending case is Washington v. United States, No. 06-10628. Washington is an IFP filing, but not pro se. Washington is represented by an attorney from the Widener University School of Law's Veterans Assistance Program. But Washington seeks cert to review CAAF's denial of a writ appeal, see Washington v. United States, __ M.J. ___, No. Misc. No. 07-8006/AF (C.A.A.F. Jan. 23, 2007) (summary disposition), reconsideration denied, __ M.J. ___ (Feb. 22, 2007) -- which doesn't fall within the Supremes' statutory cert jurisdiction over CAAF. See 28 U.S.C. § 1259. Washington is scheduled to be denied at the 10 May conference.

The final case is brand new: Perez v. United States, No. 06-10998. Perez is an IFP pro se filing which means -- you guessed it; it's an Army case. (See my previous rant on the subject of Army DAD not filing a cert petition since 18 November 2002 here.) Hey, Army Lurker! Are you still lurking out there? If so, could you let us know whether Army DAD has a policy regarding the filing of cert petitions and, if so, what it is? Perez was granted by CAAF and summarily affirmed -- which CAAF usually does when the approved confinement is extremely long but there is no grant-worthy issue in the case. See United States v. Perez, __ M.J. ___, No. 06-0594/AR (C.A.A.F. Feb. 1, 2007) (summary disposition). The SG's response is due by 1 June 2007, though he will likely waive response well before then.