Today the Supreme Court decided Reed v. Goertz. Reed was convicted of murder. Reed asked the prosecutor to conduct DNA testing of certain evidence. The prosecutor granted testing of some, but not all evidence. In state court post-conviction proceedings, Reed requested DNA testing of the remaining evidence. The state trial court denied Reed's motion. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed that ruling, and later denied rehearing. Reed petitioned the Supreme Court for certiorari, which was denied. Then Reed repackaged his cert petition as a Section 1983 motion in federal district court. The District Court found that the claim was barred by the two-year statute of limitations. Specifically, the trial court started the clock from when the state trial court denied relief, not when the Court of Criminal Appeals denied rehearing. A panel of the Fifth Circuit affirmed. Reed then petitioned for certiorari from the Supreme Court.
A six-member majority reversed the Fifth Circuit. Justice Kavanaugh wrote the majority opinion. Justice Thomas wrote a solo dissent. Justice Alito wrote another dissent, which was joined by Justice Gorsuch.
The bulk of the Kavanaugh majority opinion, and the Alito dissent, disagreed about when to start the statute of limitation. Here, I want to focus on Justice Thomas's dissent, which focuses on subject matter jurisdiction.
