Supreme Court grants cert on a dozen new cases, a couple of which involve criminal law issues

As reported here at SCOTUSblog, the Supreme Court today added 12 new cases to its docket.  A couple of these cases involve criminal law issues, and here is part of the SCOTUSblog accounting:

The Supreme Court on Friday issued orders from its so-called “long conference” – the justices’ private conference in the last week of September, at which they met for the first time since the end of June to add new cases to their docket. This year the long conference yielded 12 new grants, on topics ranging from controversial laws seeking to regulate social media companies to property rights and bankruptcy fees.

The cases granted on Friday will likely be argued in January or February 2024, with a decision to follow by summer [and they include]…

• Smith v. Arizona – Whether the Sixth Amendment, which guarantees a defendant the right to confront the witnesses against him, allows prosecutors to use expert testimony about evidence – here, a report prepared by a different crime lab analyst who no longer worked at the lab and did not testify at trial – that was not itself admitted into evidence, on the grounds that the testifying expert was simply offering his own opinion and that the defendant could have subpoenaed the original analyst.
• McIntosh v. United States – Whether a district court can enter a criminal forfeiture order when the time limit specified in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure has already passed – here, when the government did not submit a preliminary forfeiture order until more than two-and-a-half years after the defendant was sentenced.

Neither of these cases seem especially monumental, nor of particular interest to sentencing fans. Other than Pulsifer, Rahimi and due process/forfeiture cases, there is not that much getting me jazzed about the coming Supreme Court Term.  Yawn.