Per Curium Roundup:

Laboratory Corp. of America Holdings v. Metabolite Laboratories, Inc.

Diamond v. Diehr prohibits patents on “laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas,” a rule which “reflects a basic judgment that protection in such cases, despite its potentially positive incentive effects, would too often severely interfere with, or discourage, development and the further spread of useful knowledge itself.” In this case the patent holding company brought suit when a licensee switched to a “far superior” method for measuring certain amino acids, arguing its patent on any method of testing those amino acids was enforceable. The Court had granted certiorari to address whether a patent on a scientific relationship was valid. This Per Curium dismisses the writ as improvidently granted since the argument was not raised in the lower court. Justices Breyer, Stevens, and Souter dissent from that dismissal, arguing that no matter how narrowly you construe the ‘laws-of-nature’ rule, this patent is unenforceable even as a process (which the patent holder argues is what the patent covers). Even if it were a patentable process, that process is a natural one and therefore excepted

Youngblood v. West Virginia

Youngblood was found guilty of abducting three women and forcing oral sex with one at gunpoint. He later moved to have his conviction set aside because one of the investigators had found a note supporting his argument that the sex was consensual. The note, written by the other two women, said he had been played for a fool, mockingly thanked him for the oral sex, and mentioned vandalizing the house where he had taken them. A trooper told the investigator to forget it and destroy the note. Youngblood contends that the note was exculpatory and that the state did not live up to its constitutional obligation to provide him with evidence favorable to the defense. The state argues that since the note was never in the possession of the prosecution it cannot be faulted for that failure. The trial court found the note a basis for impeachment but not exculpatory. The dissenting opinion of the Appeals court called the trooper’s instruction a Brady violation (where the state fails to disclose evidence favorable to the defense) and argued that it was material.

In United States v. Bagely the Court held that Brady extended to impeachment evidence as well as exculpatory evidence. According to Kyles, Brady applies even where police, but not the prosecutor, are aware of the evidence. Evidence is material if “there is a reasonable probability that, had the evidence been disclosed to the defense, the result of the proceeding would be different.”

Justices Scalia and Thomas dissent from the Per Curium, arguing that the Court should not be remanding the case as it does without finding clear error, or without an intervening circumstance. Scalia argues that the Court remands on the basis that it would benefit from the input of the lower court, though without presenting the Court with anything new to consider in a decision it has already rendered. Justice Kennedy agrees.

Whitman v. Department of Transportation

Lower courts held that because the Civil Service Reform Act does not grant “federal jurisdiction over employment-related claims by the negotiated grievance procedures of federal employees” that jurisdiction was lacking. The Court here notes that 28 U.S.C §1331 grants federal jurisdiction over “all civil actions arising under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States” and argues that federal courts would only lack that jurisdiction if an act expressly divested it.