Supreme Court of the United States · Official docket →
James Garfield Broadnax v. Texas
Paid petition · Court of Criminal Appeals of Texas, No. WR-81,573-03 · judgment November 6, 2025
Before the decision, well below the 4.1% base rate, with no standout signals pointing toward a grant.
Questions presented
-
Whether the State’s use in a capital sentencing proceeding of rap lyrics composed by a Black defendant to argue to a nearly all-White jury that the Black defendant must be a violent and dangerous person because he wrote the rap lyrics, violates due process, fundamental fairness, and equal protection under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
-
Whether the State’s introduction of a state-employed and out-of-court expert’s serology report and findings at trial, via the testimony of another expert who testified to and relied upon the absent expert’s out-of-court statements as a basis of the second expert’s own findings, violates the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution under Smith v. Arizona, 602 U.S. 779 (2024). (I)
Counsel of record
For petitioner
Steven Craig Herzog
Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP
For respondent
Michele O'Brien Yeatts
Dallas County District Attorney
Proceedings
- Apr 30 2026Application (25A900) referred to the Court.
- Apr 30 2026Application (25A900) for stay of execution of sentence of death presented to Justice Alito and by him referred to the Court is denied as moot.
- Apr 27 2026Petition DENIED.
- Apr 20 2026Reply of applicant James Garfield Broadnax filed.
- Apr 13 2026Response to application from respondent Texas filed.
- Apr 08 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 4/24/2026.
- Mar 31 2026Rescheduled.
- Mar 25 2026DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 4/17/2026.
- Mar 25 2026Reply of petitioner James Garfield Broadnax filed. (Distributed)
- Mar 09 2026Brief amicus curiae of Jacques Bermon Webster II (“Travis Scott”) filed.
- Mar 09 2026Brief of respondent Texas in opposition filed.
- Mar 09 2026Brief amici curiae of Erik Nielson, et al. filed.
- Feb 04 2026Petition for a writ of certiorari filed. (Response due March 9, 2026)
- Feb 04 2026Application (25A900) for a stay of execution of sentence of death, submitted to Justice Alito.