SCM debuts SCOTUS-style orders list
By Steve Klepper (Bluesky @mdappeal)
We rarely cover certiorari denials, but today’s monthly list of denials featured a twist:

Clicking on the link brings you to an order with a familiar look for those who read the U.S. Supreme Court‘s certiorari orders:
Read More…November 2024 Maryland Certiorari Grants
The Supreme Court of Maryland today granted review in four civil appeals and one criminal appeal.
Read More…October 2024 Maryland Certiorari Grants
On Friday, the Supreme Court of Maryland granted review in two civil cases and one criminal case.
Read More…The AI Apocalypse has Likely Already Hit Maryland’s Appellate Courts—What Mischief Can Be Expected, And What if Any Rules Should Apply?
Claude Monet, was considered the Father of the Impressionist movement, beginning in the latter half of the 1800s.[i] Impressionism went against “classic” principles of painting in many renaissance and baroque style works, usually by painters with academy training. Artists of the caliber of Michelangelo or Peter Paul Rubens, would begin art projects, taking years if necessary to painstakingly captured them with full details. Impressionism was on some level, the opposite. The best impressionists like Monet, could do a painting quickly onto a canvas, and without the level of detail that, at least through the end of the 19th Century, was necessary to be considered a masterpiece.
Well, good or bad, (mostly bad), impressionism, to use a metaphor, has come to appellate litigation, in the form of “Generative” AI. And with that sea-change on the horizon, at least without time-sensitive concerns of specific applicable Rules, Maryland appellate courts should expect a rapid increase in the number of appeals, potentially rising to a level reminiscent of the increase in appeals from the 1960s, and overall decrease in quality of appellate briefing. (It was this increase on expanded application of Federal Constitutional rights, that lead to the intermediate appellate courts in the United States, including the Appellate Court of Maryland being formed, to address the upsurge in criminal and post-conviction appeals.)
Read More…September 2024 Maryland Certiorari Grants
On Friday, the Supreme Court of Maryland granted review in one criminal and one civil appeal.
Read More…Five for Five: Five Justices Conclude the five-year Limit to Modify a Sentence is Jurisdictional in a 3-1-2-1 Decision
By: Isabelle Raquin
On August 29, 2024, a three-justice plurality and a two-justice concurrence of the Supreme Court of Maryland (SCM) agreed in State v. Thomas, No. 15 (Sept. Term 2023), that the five-year deadline under Maryland Rule 4-345(e)(1) for a circuit court to hear a motion to modify a sentence was a self-imposed jurisdictional deadline per the court’s rule-making authority. Previously, the SCM had held, in the context of the 30-day time to file a notice of appeal, that a deadline established by the SCM’s rule-making authority is a mandatory claims processing rule; which, of course, the parties may waive or forfeit without divesting the court of the power to act. In reliance on the logical application of the mandatory claims processing rule to the court-imposed five-year time for a circuit court to hold a hearing under Rule 4-345(e)(1), Mr. Thomas appealed the circuit court’s failure to timely schedule a hearing as requested, and its subsequent denial of the motion to modify once the deadline passed.
Read More…Hollins v. State and the Jury’s Role
Tomorrow the Supreme Court of Maryland hears argument in Hollins v. State. Question 1 asks: “Did the ACM erroneously apply a sufficiency of the evidence standard instead of the ‘some evidence’ standard when it upheld the denial of Petitioner’s request for a non-pattern jury instruction regarding the alleged victim’s propensity for violence?”
Denying a criminal jury instruction, on an issue that the defendant seeks to submit to the jury, has the same practical effect that a grant of partial summary judgment has in a civil case. It keeps an issue from the jury, based on a finding that there is not enough evidence for a reasonable jury to rule for the party who seeks to submit the issue to the jury.
Read More…Supreme Court of Maryland Requires New Hearing in Syed Case
The Supreme Court of Maryland today issued a four-to-three opinion affirming in part the decision of the Appellate Court. Justice Biran (joined by Justices Watts, Gould, and Eaves) wrote for the four-justice majority. Justice Hotten (joined by Justices Booth and Battaglia) and Justice Booth (joined by Justices Hotten and Battaglia) authored dissents.
Read More…August 2024 Maryland Certiorari Grants
Today the Supreme Court of Maryland granted review in three appeals, including a case that Chris Mincher covered in his post, Coyle v. State: Ineffective Certiorari Counsel is Inconsequential. Today’s grants follow an earlier grant on August 12. The four grants, with questions presented, appear after the jump.
Read More…ACM Holding: Omitting “Against You” Won’t Be Held Against You
By: Chris Mincher
When it comes to the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), words matter. Although the law is clear that there is no specific mandatory Miranda language, straying from the traditional mantra raises questions. For example, is the notice that “everything that you say can be used on the court day” the same as “anything you say can be used against you in a court of law”? While the former ultimately passed muster in Alvarez-Garcia v. State, the Appellate Court panel split on the significance of omitting the phrase “against you.”
Read More…