Issa L. Lamizana, Jr. v. Louisiana

In a challenge under Ramos v. Louisiana 590 U.S. 83, 140 S. Ct. 1390, 206 L. Ed. 2d 583 (2020), where the record is silent as to the votes on the verdicts, how must the unanimity of the verdict be proved to sustain the conviction? Is the lack of any evidence in the record as to unanimity of the verdict an anomaly or departure that prohibits the presumption of regularity? Does the State have the burden of proving the verdicts were unanimous to sustain the convictions?

Where the uncontroverted defense evidence shows that the verdicts were not unanimous and the per curiam acknowledges that there was nothing in the record to show the verdicts were unanimous, did the Louisiana Court of Appeal and a majority of the Louisiana Supreme Court err in allowing Issa Lamizana’s convictions to stand on less than a unanimous verdict, contrary to Ramos v. Louisiana and in violation of due process of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments?

In a trial based solely on the words of the complainants, were the defendant’s Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments rights to confrontation and to a defense violated when the trial court prevented the child protection investigator from testifying, and prevented the defense from using newly discovered agency records, to impeach and rebut the State’s witnesses’ testimony, contrary to Davis v. Alaska, 415 U.S. 308, 94 S. Ct. 1105, 39 L. Ed. 2d 347 (1974)? Was the defendant denied his right to a defense as held in Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284, 93 S.Ct. 1038, 35 L.Ed.2d 297 (1973); Crane v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 683, 90 L. Ed. 2d 636, 106 S. Ct. 2142 (1986); and Pennsylvania v. Ritchie, 480 U.S. 39 (1987)? Where the State’s case was based solely on the veracity of the claimants, was the exclusion of impeachment, bias and motive evidence harmless? -i-