Starting to gear up for lots of criminal law and sentencing cases during SCOTUS OT’25

Over at SCOTUSblog, Rory Little has this notable new post, titled “The hidden prevalence of criminal law at the Supreme Court.” which discusses that many “civil” cases taken up by the Justices have “criminal law implications.”  That post looks back at the SCOTUS Term just completed, OT’24, and details his accounting of “14 ‘pure’ criminal law cases from the Supreme Court’s 2024-25 term [and] another 13 decisions … ‘related to criminal law’,” which together “comprise 40% of the term’s 67 ‘Opinions of the Court’ merits docket.”

Because we are now actually closer to the start of OT’25 than to the end of OT’24, I am giving thought to how many criminal law cases of all types, and especially sentencing cases, are coming before the Justices in the coming Term.  The Supreme Court this week released its OT’25 argument calendar for October and for November, and by my count over half of the 19 cases now scheduled for oral argument are criminal law cases or closely related to criminal law.  Moreover, as detailed below, nearly a third of these opening SCOTUS cases are sentencing cases (descriptions and links from SCOTUSblog):

Barrett v. United States, No. 24-5774 [Arg: 10.07.2025]

Issue(s): Whether the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment permits two sentences for an act that violates 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) and (j).

Ellingburg v. United States, No. 24-482 [Arg: 10.14.2025]

Issue(s): Whether criminal restitution under the Mandatory Victim Restitution Act is penal for purposes of the Constitution’s ex post facto clause.

Rico v. v. United States, No. 24-1056 [Arg: 11.03.2025]

Issue(s): Whether the fugitive-tolling doctrine applies in the context of supervised release.

Hamm v. Smith, No. 24-872 [Arg: 11.04.2025]

Issue(s): Whether and how courts may consider the cumulative effect of multiple IQ scores in assessing an Atkins claim.

Rutherford v. United States, No. 24-820 [Arg: 11.12.2025]

Issue(s): Whether a district court may consider disparities created by the First Step Act’s prospective changes in sentencing law when deciding if “extraordinary and compelling reasons” warrant a sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A)(i).

Fernandez v. United States, No. 24-556 [Arg: 11.12.2025]

Issue(s): Whether a combination of “extraordinary and compelling reasons” that may warrant a discretionary sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A) can include reasons that may also be alleged as grounds for vacatur of a sentence under 28 U.S.C. § 2255.  

I will have a lot more to say about a lot of these sentencing cases and some of the other criminal justice cases in the weeks and months ahead. For now, in the midst of a hot summer weekend, I will just say that sentencing fans should be gearing up for a hot SCOTUS fall.