U.S. Supreme Court Notebook

Supreme Court won’t hear ­Tennessee death row inmates’ appeal


NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The U.S. Supreme Court won’t consider an appeal that could have delayed an upcoming Tennessee execution.

The appeal involves Tennessee’s midazolam-based lethal injection combination. Inmates claim in a lawsuit that the method causes excruciating pain.

The appeal doesn’t challenge lethal injection directly. Instead it challenges Tennessee secrecy laws surrounding the procurement of execution drugs. Inmates argue the laws prevented them from proving a more humane drug is available.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor agrees. In her dissent on Monday, she says the requirement that prisoners challenging one method of execution prove there is a better method available is “fundamentally wrong.” She adds that state secrecy laws compound the injustice.

Don Johnson is scheduled to be executed Thursday for the 1984 murder of his wife, Connie Johnson.

 

Supreme Court allows lawsuit over iPhone apps
 

WASHINGTON (AP) — A divided Supreme Court ruled Monday that consumers can pursue an antitrust lawsuit that claims Apple has unfairly monopolized the market for the sale of iPhone apps.

New Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined the court’s four liberals in rejecting a plea from Cupertino, California-based Apple to end the lawsuit over the 30% commission the company charges software developers whose more than 2 million apps are sold through the App Store.

iPhone users who must purchase software for their smartphones exclusively through Apple’s App Store filed the suit.

Apple keeps 30% of the sales price, where it is set, Kavanaugh said in a summary he read from the bench. “In other words, Apple as retailer pockets a 30% commission on every app sale,” said Kavanaugh, one of President Donald Trump’s two high court appointees.

That was enough to persuade that at this early stage of the legal fight, the lawsuit can continue, he said.

Justice Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s other pick, wrote a dissent for four conservative justices. The consumers’ complaint against Apple is the kind of case earlier high court rulings said was not allowed under federal laws that prohibit unfair control of a market, Gorsuch wrote.

Apple had argued it’s merely a pipeline between app developers and consumers, and that iPhone users have no claims against Apple under antitrust law.

The suit could force Apple to cut the commission it charges software developers. A judge could triple the compensation to consumers under antitrust law if Apple ultimately loses the suit.

There has been exponential growth in the availability of apps since Apple created the App Store in 2008 with 500 choices.

“’There’s an app for that’ has become part of the 21st-century American lexicon,” Kavanaugh said.

The case is Apple Inc. v Pepper, 17-204.

 

Supreme Court says 1 state  can’t be sued in ­another’s courts


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is ruling that one state cannot unwillingly be sued in the courts of another, overruling a 40-year precedent.

The justices are dividing 5-4 Monday in ending a long-running dispute between California officials and Nevada inventor Gilbert Hyatt.

Hyatt is a former California resident who sued California’s tax agency for being too zealous in seeking back taxes from him. Hyatt won a judgment in Nevada courts.

But Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the court’s conservative justices that the Constitution forbids states from opening the doors of their courts to a private citizen’s lawsuit against another state. In 1979, the high court concluded otherwise.

The four liberal justices dissented.