Justice Brett Kavanaugh, left, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, center, and retired Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy listen as US President Donald Trump addresses a joint session of Congress. (REUTERS)
Two Supreme Court justices stepped away from two cases on Monday, as Newsweek reported.
Amy Coney Barrett and Samuel Alito decided to sit out federal appeals cases involving firearm convictions and pension payments, though it isn't entirely clear why.
The federal recusal statute (28 U.S. Code § 455) demands that federal judges and top justices must recuse themselves if their impartiality might reasonably be questioned or if their spouse has a financial or other interest that could be substantially affected by the outcome of a proceeding. Over the past several years, there have been several questions about cases the public and judicial critics believe justice should have recused themselves from.
Both appellate rulings were affirmed by the high court. It means the lower-court decisions were upheld in full.
The case that Barrett recused herself from came from the Seventh Circuit over an inmate named Eural Black. The case Alito recused himself from was a Fourth Circuit Court case about retirement benefits between employees and the companies DuPont and Corteva.
In Black's case, the lower court ruled that he was serving a longer sentence because of a "stacked" firearms conviction. Under the First Step Act his sentence should be reduced. "Black argued that the gap between his sentence and what he would receive today should qualify as an 'extraordinary and compelling' reason for early release," said Newsweek.
The lower court decided that its own precedent still barred "using those sentencing reforms as a basis for compassionate release, even after a new policy from the U.S. Sentencing Commission suggested otherwise."
In the case Alito recused himself from, the Fourth Circuit sided with corporations.
Plaintiff David Gasper sued, alleging that his monthly retirement benefits were reduced after his divorce. The corporation said that it spread the costs of survivor benefits across the total pension, which the court said was valid. The lower court also found that Gasper's claim for penalties "over delayed document disclosures," but there was no evidence of bad faith or harm.