Amicus Curiae Brief — Juan Matthews, Petitioner v. Louisiana

No. 26-218

IN THE

Supreme Court of the United States

____________

JUAN MATTHEWS

Petitioner,

v.

LOUISIANA,

Respondent.

____________

On Petition for a Writ of Certiorari to the

Louisiana Court of Appeal, Fourth Circuit

____________

BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE REGINALD ADAMS,

JARVIS BALLARD, ET AL., FIFTEEN LOUISIANA BRADY EXONEREES, IN SUPPORT OF

PETITIONER

____________

EVAN J. BERGERON

Counsel of Record

WINSTON BERGERON, LLP

8120 Oak Street

New Orleans, LA 70118

504-577-2500 (telephone)

504-577-2562 (facsimile)

evan@winstonbergeron.com

Counsel for amici curiae

i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS ..................................................... i

TABLE OF CITED AUTHORITIES ..................................... ii

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE.......................................... 1

SUMMARY OF THE ARGUMENT ...................................... 2

ARGUMENT ................................................................... 4

I.

Louisiana Courts Routinely Dispose of Brady

Claims Without Ever Deciding Them. ............ 5

II. When Louisiana Courts Do Reach a Brady

Question, They Recite This Court's Standard

and Then Apply a Different One. .................... 8

A.

B.

Louisiana Courts Ask Whether the

Evidence That Remained Was Enough to

Convict. ........................................................ 9

1.

Robinson II Asked the Right Question;

Robinson III Asked the Question This

Court Prohibits. .................................... 10

2.

The Wrong Question Has Become the

Prevailing Materiality Standard in

Louisiana, Making a Brady Violation

Nearly Impossible to Prove. ................. 12

Louisiana Courts Weigh Suppressed

Evidence One Item at a Time................... 13

ii

C.

Louisiana Courts Require Suppressed

Evidence to Prove Innocence. ................... 15

D.

Louisiana Courts Ask Whether the Defense

Could Have Found the Evidence Itself. ... 18

III. Because the Error Is Never Written Down, It

Cannot Be Corrected One Case at a Time. ... 20

CONCLUSION............................................................... 23

APPENDIX ................................................................... 24

TABLE OF CITED AUTHORITIES

Cases

Banks v. Dretke,

540 U.S. 668 (2004) ........................................... 3, 18

Brady v. Maryland,

373 U.S. 83 (1963) .... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14,

15, 16, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25

Brown v. Louisiana,

143 S. Ct. 886 (2023) ................................. 16, 21, 22

Floyd v. Cain,

62 So. 3d 57 (La. 2011) ...................................... 8, 21

Floyd v. Vannoy,

894 F.3d 143 (5th Cir. 2018) ....................... 7, 19, 25

Floyd v. Vannoy,

No. 11-2819, 2017 WL 1837676 (E.D. La. May 8,

2017) ......................................................................... 8

Kyles v. Whitley,

514 U.S. 419 (1995) . 4, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 17, 18, 20

iii

Mapp v. Ohio,

367 U.S. 643 (1961) ................................................. 5

Mullen v. Blackburn,

808 F.2d 1143 (5th Cir. 1987) ............................... 15

Patton v. Westcott,

25-270 (La. App. 5 Cir. 7/7/25) ................................ 6

Robinson v. Vannoy,

No. 25-6549 (U.S. May 26, 2026) .......................... 22

Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United States,

251 U.S. 385 (1920) ................................................. 5

Skinner v. Louisiana,

No. 25-1 (U.S. Mar. 30, 2026) ............................... 22

Smith v. Cain,

565 U.S. 73 (2012) ................................... 4, 6, 20, 21

State ex rel. Robinson v. Vannoy,

2021-00812 (La. 1/26/24); 378 So.3d 11 ....................

……………………………………………. 9, 10, 11, 14, 17

State ex rel. Robinson v. Vannoy,

2021-00812 (La. 12/13/24); 397 So.3d 333 ................

.................................. 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18

State v. Allen,

2024-01298 (La. 1/28/25); 399 So.3d 403 ................ 6

State v. Ballard,

2020-0617 (La. App. 4 Cir. 7/21/21); 325 So. 3d 450

................................................................................ 24

State v. Bright,

02-2793 (La. 5/25/04); 875 So. 2d 37 ..................... 11

State v. Brown,

2016-0998 (La. 1/28/22); 347 So. 3d 745 ......... 16, 21

iv

State v. Calloway,

2026-00088 (La. 6/25/26), 2026 WL 1830711 ......... 5

State v. Cooks,

2024-01320 (La. 2/5/25); 400 So.3d 95 .................... 6

State v. Eley,

15-1925 (La. App. 1 Cir. 9/16/16); 203 So. 3d 462 16

State v. Floyd,

435 So. 2d 992 (La. 1983) ........................................ 7

State v. Fugler,

97-1936 (La. App. 1 Cir. 5/14/99); 737 So.2d 894 . 10

State v. Harper,

10-0356 (La. 11/30/10); 53 So. 3d 1263 ................. 18

State v. Henry,

2013-0059 (La. App. 4 Cir. 8/6/14); 147 So.3d 1143

................................................................................ 10

State v. Hopkins,

39,258 (La. App. 2 Cir. 3/2/05); 897 So.2d 854 ..... 10

State v. Johnson,

2024-01142 (La. 2/19/25); 400 So.3d 916 ................ 5

State v. Kelly,

2025-00493 (La. 10/14/25); 420 So.3d 676 .............. 5

State v. Lacon,

2019-478 (La. App. 3 Cir. 12/30/19); 2019 WL

7498728 .................................................................. 10

State v. Robinson,

02-1869 (La. 4/14/04); 874 So. 2d 66 ..................... 12

State v. Skinner,

2024-00142 (La. 2/25/25); 401 So. 3d 665 ............. 12

State v. Young,

2025-00588 (La. 10/1/25); 420 So.3d 15 .................. 5

v

United States v. Bagley,

473 U.S. 667 (1985) ............................................... 15

Wearry v. Cain,

577 U.S. 385 (2016) ............. 4, 13, 14, 20, 21, 22, 23

Other Authorities

Brandon L. Garrett & Adam M. Gershowitz, The

Brady Materiality Standard, 78 Stan. L. Rev. 303

(2026) ..................................................................... 20

Brief of Amici Curiae National Association of

Criminal Defense Lawyers, Brown v. Louisiana,

143 S. Ct. 886 (No. 22-77) ..................................... 21

Brief of Amici Curiae Two Louisiana Prisoners,

Skinner v. Louisiana, 146 S. Ct. 1000 (2026) (No.

25-1) ................................................................... 9, 21

Brief of Professor Brandon L. Garrett as Amicus

Curiae Supporting Petitioner, Skinner v.

Louisiana, 146 S. Ct. 1000 (2026) (No. 25-1) ......... 9

Duncan Hosie, Stealth Reversals: Precedent Evasion

in the Roberts Court and Constitutional

Reclamation, 58 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 1323 (2025) . 22

1

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE1

Amici are living examples of the harm a court system unconstrained by the rule of law can cause. Each

was convicted in a Louisiana courtroom. Each had

material evidence concealed from him by the State in

violation of Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963).

Each was told, by a Louisiana court or by no court at

all, that the concealment did not matter. Each was innocent. And each is now free, largely in spite of a system meant to ensure that justice is done.

The fifteen men who join this brief, listed in full in

the appendix, spent a combined 425 years in prison

for crimes they did not commit. They were condemned

through the abdication of duties by prosecutors,

judges, and others who swore to uphold the law but

did not. And while amici cannot recover those years,

they can speak truth in the hope that no one suffers

the same.

These men know Louisiana courts’ hostility toward Brady too well. They have seen judges deny

Brady claims with little more than a sigh. They have

felt the surprise and anger of learning a prosecutor

possessed exculpatory evidence about them but hid it

despite a constitutional duty to produce it. They have

seen what a breakdown of foundational legal norms

1 No counsel for a party authored this brief in whole or in part,

and no person or entity other than amici or their counsel made

a monetary contribution intended to fund the preparation or

submission of this brief. This Brief is filed more than ten days

prior to its due date, so advance notice to counsel of record has

not been provided, in accordance with Rule 37(2).

2

looks like when securing a conviction becomes more

important than adhering to the Constitution. And

they are seeing it again in the courts of this state generally and in Mr. Matthews’ case specifically.

Amici therefore join the growing chorus of scholars, advocates, and practitioners calling on this Court

to correct a state court system that is writing a fundamental due process right out of existence. They ask for

that correction, lest the right that allowed them to

walk free carry a disclaimer: “not available in Louisiana.”

SUMMARY OF THE ARGUMENT

Brady asks one question: whether the evidence the

State concealed undermines confidence in the verdict

it obtained. That’s not what Louisiana courts ask.

They dispose of Brady claims in two ways, and neither involves deciding them.

The first is silence. The Louisiana Supreme Court

denies these claims in a single recycled sentence, and

it has used identical language six times in the last

twenty months. Its lower courts are no different.

When amicus John Floyd finally brought his suppressed fingerprint evidence to a Louisiana judge,

that judge ruled from the bench, gave no reasons, and

wished him luck on appeal. No Louisiana court ever

reached the merits of his claim. He served thirty-six

years.

The second is substitution. Here a Louisiana court

recites this Court’s standard correctly and then decides the case under a different one. The Louisiana

3

Supreme Court demonstrated both halves of that maneuver in a single case. In January 2024 it identified

the precise errors its lower courts had been committing for decades. Eleven months later, on rehearing, it

committed them itself.

Those substitution errors are four, and they are

not idiosyncratic.

First, Louisiana courts ask whether the evidence

that survived the suppression was enough to convict,

though this Court has said for thirty years that materiality is not a sufficiency test.

Second, they weigh suppressed items one at a time

and never add them together.

Third, they require suppressed evidence to prove

innocence, defining “exculpatory” so narrowly that a

third party’s confession to the murder did not qualify.

Fourth, they excuse nondisclosure whenever they

suppose a diligent defense could have found the evidence on its own—a rule this Court rejected in Banks

v. Dretke.

Together, these four faults leave Brady intact on

the page and inoperative in practice.

This Court has corrected Louisiana three times.

Each time, Louisiana courts absorbed the correction,

confined it to its facts, and carried on. A fourth correction of a single judgment will fare no better, because

the error usually appears nowhere on the record. A

court that denies relief in one sentence has stated no

rule to reverse.

4

What is sorely needed instead is a statement of

method. Wearry v. Cain shows the form: a summary

reversal that names the analytical failures rather

than only the outcome. A holding that materiality is

not a sufficiency inquiry, that suppressed evidence

must be weighed cumulatively, that favorable evidence need not exonerate, and that the State’s duty

does not turn on the defense’s diligence would resolve

this case and give Louisiana courts a rule they cannot

dispose of in a sentence.

Amici ask for that rule. They know what its absence costs.

ARGUMENT

A right no court will enforce is not a right. It is a

description of one.

Sixty-three years ago, this Court held that a prosecutor who conceals evidence favorable to the accused

violates due process. Louisiana courts can recite that

holding. Several have. What they refuse to do is apply

it.

This Court has said so three times. Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419 (1995); Smith v. Cain, 565 U.S. 73

(2012); Wearry v. Cain, 577 U.S. 385 (2016). Each case

arose from a Louisiana conviction that Louisiana

courts refused to disturb. Each time, this Court corrected them. And each time, Louisiana courts returned to the same practice.

They return to it because it is not a mistake—it is

a method. This method takes two forms. A Louisiana

court can decline to reach the Brady question, denying

5

relief without reasons or on procedural grounds. Or it

can reach the question, recite this Court’s standard,

and then decide the case on a different one. Either

way, the analysis this Court requires never happens,

and the right becomes “‘a form of words,’ valueless and

undeserving of mention in a perpetual charter of inestimable human liberties.” Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643,

655 (1961) (quoting Silverthorne Lumber Co. v. United

States, 251 U.S. 385, 392 (1920)).2

I. Louisiana Courts Routinely Dispose of Brady

Claims Without Ever Deciding Them.

One way to render a right meaningless is to refuse

to analyze it. This is the preferred method the Louisiana Supreme Court employs in disposing of Brady

cases. Its per curiam opinions may as well be copied

and pasted onto each new case’s caption: “Denied. Applicant fails to show that the state withheld material

exculpatory evidence in violation of Brady v. Maryland . . . .” See, e.g., State v. Johnson, 2024-01142, p.

1 (La. 2/19/25); 400 So.3d 916, 917, cert. denied, 146 S.

Ct. 209 (2025). The court employed this exact language six times in just the past twenty months,3 and

2 The concerns amici raise in this submission are not new. This

brief builds on the work of many others who have sounded the

alarm on the Brady crisis in Louisiana’s courts. See infra Part

III.

3 See State v. Calloway, 2026-00088, p. 1 (La. 6/25/26), 2026 WL

1830711; State v. Kelly, 2025-00493, p. 1 (La. 10/14/25); 420

So.3d 676; State v. Young, 2025-00588, p. 1 (La. 10/1/25); 420

So.3d 15; State v. Johnson, 2024-01142, p. 1 (La. 2/19/25); 400

So.3d 916, 917, cert. denied, 146 S.Ct. 209 (2025); State v.

6

forty-eight times since 2017. Pet. App. 238a-241a. In

Mr. Matthews’ own case it did not manage even that,

denying review in a single word. Pet. App. 1a.

True, these petitions come to the court on discretionary review. But the Louisiana courts of appeal are

equally content to pass over Brady claims summarily.

See, e.g., Patton v. Westcott, 25-270, p. 3 (La. App. 5

Cir. 7/7/25), writ denied, 2025-01003 (La. 2/12/26); 427

So.3d 736.4 In this very case, the Louisiana Fourth

Circuit acknowledged that the district court “did not

recite” the materiality standard and then supposed it

had been applied “in substance.” Pet. App. 5a. Judge

Jenkins dissented. In her view the district court had

“reduced its materiality analysis to a sufficiency of evidence test,” and its ruling was “void of a finding as to

whether the omission of the suppressed evidence ‘undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial.’” Pet.

App. 11a-12a (Jenkins, J., dissenting).

This Court has seen the practice before. In Smith

v. Cain, no Louisiana court at any level made a factual

finding or gave a reason; this Court granted certiorari

on that footing and reversed. 565 U.S. at 75; Pet. 17.

This is not judicial economy. It is a refusal to perform a constitutional duty. And the men asking this

Court to grant Mr. Matthews’ petition are living proof

of the consequences.

Cooks, 2024-01320, p. 1 (La. 2/5/25); 400 So.3d 95; State v. Allen, 2024-01298, p. 1 (La. 1/28/25); 399 So.3d 403.

4 “All of relator’s claims are vague and conclusory, procedurally

barred, and/or without merit. . . . Accordingly, this writ application is denied.”

7

Louisiana failed amicus John Floyd twice. Prosecutors withheld exculpatory physical evidence, and no

state court ever assessed what it meant. He served

thirty-six years.

Mr. Floyd was tried for two murders at once, committed two days and one mile apart in New Orleans

in 1980. Police believed one man did both. Floyd v.

Vannoy, 894 F.3d 143, 149-50 (5th Cir. 2018). A single

judge heard both counts in a single bench trial. Id. at

151. The State had no physical evidence on either; its

entire case was Mr. Floyd's confession. Id.

The trial judge acquitted him of one murder and

convicted him of the other. Id. at 152. The difference

was not the evidence. It was disclosure.

On the count that ended in acquittal, the defense

had physical proof that the killer was someone else,

and the judge found Mr. Floyd’s confession insufficient. State v. Floyd, 435 So. 2d 992, 994 (La. 1983).

On the count that ended in conviction, the State held

comparable proof and did not turn it over. Police had

compared fingerprints from the scene and recorded

that they belonged to neither the victim nor Mr.

Floyd. Floyd, 894 F.3d at 152. That evidence showed

a third person had handled an item the State's own

detective told the judge corroborated Mr. Floyd’s confession. Id. The State also withheld a witness statement contradicting that detective's account of the victim. Id.

Mr. Floyd was sentenced to life without parole. Id.

8

When he could finally bring the suppressed evidence to a Louisiana court in a post-conviction proceeding that became Floyd v. Cain, that court ruled

from the bench without written reasons, finding only

that he had "failed to meet his burden of proof," closing with, "let the Appellate process begin. Good luck."5

The Louisiana Supreme Court denied review, also

without reasons. Floyd v. Cain, 62 So. 3d 57 (La.

2011). One justice dissented, writing that the suppressed evidence was "sufficient to undermine confidence in the outcome of Floyd's trial." Id. at 59 (Johnson, J., dissenting). Hers is the only Brady analysis

any Louisiana judge produced.

Mr. Floyd is free today, but only because federal

courts eventually did what the courts of his own State

would not. See infra Part II.D. No Louisiana court

ever rejected his Brady claim on the merits. None ever

reached it. He spent thirty-six years in Angola waiting

for one to do the analysis this Court has required for

more than sixty.

Juan Matthews is still waiting. So are countless

others.

II. When Louisiana Courts Do Reach a Brady

Question, They Recite This Court's Standard

and Then Apply a Different One.

Another way to cancel a right is to demand that

those invoking it make a showing the law does not require. When Louisiana courts do conduct a Brady

5 The bench ruling is reproduced in part in Floyd v. Vannoy, No.

11-2819, 2017 WL 1837676, at *2 (E.D. La. May 8, 2017).

9

analysis, the burden they impose is so onerous and so

contrary to law that scholars and practitioners question whether the right still exists at all.6

The Louisiana Supreme Court’s most recent substantive Brady case displays four analytical faults,

each common to state courts’ evaluation of such

claims.7 The court first identified and corrected errors

its lower courts had committed for decades. (Robinson

II). Eleven months later it committed the same errors

itself, in the same case. (Robinson III).

These four misapplications have become the cornerstone of Louisiana’s Brady folly and the modus operandi for eliminating the right within its borders.

A. Louisiana Courts Ask Whether the Evidence That Remained Was Enough to Convict.

Louisiana courts’ cardinal sin lies in their application of Brady’s materiality standard. Although this

Court has disclaimed any “sufficiency of evidence test”

6 See, e.g., Brief of Amici Curiae Two Louisiana Prisoners Sup-

porting Petitioner at 10-18, Skinner v. Louisiana, 146 S. Ct.

1000 (2026) (No. 25-1) (the Louisiana Supreme Court “has virtually stopped recognizing Brady violations altogether.”); Brief

of Professor Brandon L. Garrett as Amicus Curiae Supporting

Petitioner at 11, Skinner v. Louisiana, 146 S. Ct. 1000 (2026)

(No. 25-1) (the lower court’s analysis is “a wholesale abdication

of what Brady requires.”)

7 See State ex rel. Robinson v. Vannoy, 2021-00812 (La. 1/26/24);

378 So.3d 11, reh'g granted, 2021-00812 (La. 3/21/24); 382 So.3d

27, and opinion vacated and superseded on reh'g, 2021-00812

(La. 12/13/24); 397 So.3d 333, aff’d on reh’g, 2021-00812 (La.

6/27/25); 413 So.3d 403, cert. denied, 224 L.Ed.2d 853 (2026).

10

in Brady’s materiality standard for more than thirty

years, Kyles, 514 U.S. at 434, Louisiana courts remain

enamored with reciting what the jury did hear and rewarding the prosecution for a job well done. Louisiana’s reports are replete with pages recounting the evidence of defendants’ guilt rather than evaluating the

materiality of what was withheld.8

Therein lies the flaw that writes Brady out of existence. Of course the evidence adduced in a Brady

case is sufficient to sustain a conviction: it is curated

by the State. Suppression means no one who matters

is getting the whole story. The State does not just put

on its case; it is given license to limit the evidence to

its own version of the facts wholly unconstrained by

inconvenient contradictions.

1. Robinson II Asked the Right Question;

Robinson III Asked the Question This

Court Prohibits.

The Robinson saga exemplifies this error. Darrell

Robinson was convicted of four murders and sentenced to death. State ex rel. Robinson v. Vannoy,

8 See, e.g., State v. Fugler, 97-1936 (La. App. 1 Cir. 5/14/99); 737

So.2d 894, 897-98 (affirming after “scrutinizing the overwhelming evidence in this particular case”); State v. Henry, 20130059, pp. 26-29 (La. App. 4 Cir. 8/6/14); 147 So.3d 1143, 115860 (recounting what the jury did hear about a witness’ impeachment rather than the materiality of what was withheld); State

v. Hopkins, 39,258, p. 14-15 (La. App. 2 Cir. 3/2/05); 897 So.2d

854, 864 (discussing the other evidence and witnesses that “directly implicated” the defendant); State v. Lacon, 2019-478, p.

61 (La. App. 3 Cir. 12/30/19); 2019 WL 7498728 at *34 (recounting evidence of the defendant’s guilt).

11

2021-KP-00812 (La. 1/26/24); 378 So.3d 11, 20 (“Robinson II”) . The State's only evidence identifying him

as the killer was a jailhouse informant. Id. at 44. In

post-conviction proceedings, the district court implicitly found that the State had suppressed favorable evidence but denied relief anyway. Id. at 29.

The Louisiana Supreme Court reversed. The lower

court recited the correct materiality test, asking

whether Robinson had received “a fair trial, understood as a trial resulting in a verdict worthy of confidence,” but answered, “in the very next sentence,”

whether the suppressed evidence “would have resulted in a reversal of defendant's conviction.” Id. at

37 (cleaned up).

The court explained the difference. A reviewing

court “does not put the withheld evidence to an outcome-determinative test,” and a defendant “need not

demonstrate that after discounting the inculpatory

evidence in light of the undisclosed evidence, there

would not have been enough left to convict.” Id. (quoting State v. Bright, 02-2793, p. 6 (La. 5/25/04); 875 So.

2d 37, 42, and Kyles, 514 U.S. at 434-35). The district

court, it held, “applied the wrong standard in conducting its materiality analysis.” Robinson II, 378 So. 3d

at 37.

But eleven months later, it reheard the case and

did everything it said no court could do.

State ex rel. Robinson v. Vannoy, 2021-KP-00812

(La. 12/13/24); 397 So. 3d 333 ("Robinson III"), recites

the materiality standard correctly. It quotes Kyles. It

quotes Bright. And then it resolves the case this way:

12

"[h]ere, there was sufficient other evidence upon

which defendant's conviction was based.” Robinson

III, 397 So. 3d at 358.

To establish that sufficiency, the court quoted its

own decision affirming Mr. Robinson's conviction on

direct appeal twenty years earlier: "[t]he circumstantial evidence presented at defendant's trial excluded

any reasonable hypothesis of his innocence." Id. (quoting State v. Robinson, 02-1869 (La. 4/14/04); 874 So.

2d 66, 75).

That reasoning demonstrates the folly perfectly.

The court’s 2004 holding rested on a trial record from

which the suppressed evidence had been removed—

through suppression. A court that measures the

strength of the State's case by the record the State curated will find that case strong every time. The concealment proves its own harmlessness.

2. The Wrong Question Has Become the

Prevailing Materiality Standard in

Louisiana, Making a Brady Violation

Nearly Impossible to Prove.

The question Robinson III asked is not confined to

its pages. It was used to deny materiality to the exact

suppressed evidence this Court deemed material for a

co-defendant in the very same case. See State v. Skinner, 2024-00142 (La. 2/25/25); 401 So. 3d 665 (Griffin,

J., dissenting).

It is the question that decided this case. The court

of appeal held that “[t]he withheld evidence does not

13

meet the threshold of materiality,” Pet. App. 4a, because “impeachment evidence may not be material

where other evidence of guilt is sufficiently strong,”

and then counted the eyewitnesses who testified. Pet.

App. 5a. One judge saw it plainly: the district court

had “reduced its materiality analysis to a sufficiency

of evidence test.” Pet. App. 11a (Jenkins, J., dissenting).

Each of these rulings asks whether enough evidence remained to sustain the conviction. This Court

says that is the wrong question. Kyles, 514 U.S. at

434–35; Wearry, 577 U.S. at 392. The answer arrives

before the analysis begins. A conviction rests, by definition, on evidence a factfinder found sufficient. Ask

whether enough of that evidence survives the suppression, and the answer will almost always be yes.

Ask instead whether the verdict is one in which a

court can have confidence, and the answer may well

be no. Louisiana courts do not reach that answer because they do not ask that question.

B. Louisiana Courts Weigh Suppressed Evidence One Item at a Time.

If the first error asks the wrong question, the second guarantees the wrong answer. This Court has

held that suppressed evidence must be “considered

collectively, not item by item,” Kyles, 514 U.S. at 436,

and has set the sequence: a court evaluates “the tendency and force of the undisclosed evidence item by

item,” but it evaluates “its cumulative effect for purposes of materiality separately and at the end.” Id. at

437 n.10. Louisiana courts perform the first half of

14

that instruction and abandon the second. They dispose of each suppressed item as they encounter it and

arrive at the end with nothing left to add together.

See, e.g., Wearry, 577 U.S. at 394; Robinson III, 397

So. 3d at 383.

The arithmetic is rigged by the order of operations.

A court that finds each item immaterial on its own has

already assigned each a value of zero, and no sum of

zeros will ever total anything. The cumulative requirement exists precisely because evidence that fails

separately may succeed together. If only individually

sufficient items counted, the inquiry would serve no

purpose, because any such item would already have

required relief on its own.

Robinson again supplies the demonstration. In

Robinson II, the Louisiana Supreme Court identified

this as the district court’s second legal error: it had

“analyze[d] the potential prejudice from each category

of undisclosed evidence separately,” when this Court’s

precedent required the opposite. 378 So. 3d at 37-38

(citing Kyles, 514 U.S. at 436; Wearry, 577 U.S. at

394).

In Robinson III, the court declined to perform the

aggregation at all. Having found the individual claims

meritless, it held that “there is no precedent requiring

this Court to consider the cumulative effect of meritless Brady or ineffective assistance of counsel claims

together and we decline to do so here.” Robinson III,

397 So. 3d at 383. Its authority supplied the reasoning

in five words: “twenty times zero equals zero.” Id.

15

(quoting Mullen v. Blackburn, 808 F.2d 1143, 1147

(5th Cir. 1987)).

The dissent identified what had been lost. The

question was “how many of the numerous evidentiary

omissions identified by the district court are constitutionally tolerable,” and “that can only be judged by

weighing their cumulative effect.” Robinson III, 397

So. 3d at 384 (Weimer, C.J., dissenting).

Mr. Matthews received the same treatment. The

suppressed field notes, the suppressed impeachment

of the State’s child eyewitness, and the suppressed

non-identification were each taken up alone and each

set aside alone. Nothing in the rulings below assesses

what they amounted to together.

C. Louisiana Courts Require Suppressed Evidence to Prove Innocence.

The third error is definitional, and it narrows the

State’s disclosure duty to almost nothing. Under

Brady, the State must disclose evidence “favorable to

an accused,” 373 U.S. at 87, and favorable evidence

comes in two forms: exculpatory evidence and impeachment evidence. United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S.

667, 676 (1985). Neither must prove anything. Kyles,

514 U.S. at 434. But Louisiana’s definition of “exculpatory” is so artificially narrow that it excludes all but

the most conclusive evidence of innocence.

Again, Louisiana courts recite this Court’s framework and then narrow it. Robinson III recognizes that

the State’s disclosure duty “applies to both exculpatory and impeachment evidence,” and in the same

16

passage defines evidence as “exculpatory” when it

“tend[s] to establish the defendant's innocence.” 397

So. 3d at 348 (quoting State v. Eley, 15-1925, p. 11 (La.

App. 1 Cir. 9/16/16); 203 So. 3d 462, 473). But requiring evidence to tend toward innocence does not describe the broad category Brady protects; it screens

out every item that weakens the State's case without

pointing to another perpetrator.

State v. Brown shows how much that definition excludes. There, the State suppressed a third party’s

confession to the murder. The Louisiana Supreme

Court held the confession was not favorable because

it did not expressly identify who killed the victim or

who else was involved. 2016-0998, p. 132 (La. 1/28/22);

347 So. 3d 745, 836. Though this Court denied review,

Justice Jackson dissented, writing that the denial

“should in no way be construed as an endorsement of

the lower court’s legal reasoning.” Brown v. Louisiana, 143 S. Ct. 886, 888 (2023) (Jackson, J., dissenting

from denial of certiorari).

A confession by someone else is the paradigm case

of favorable evidence. If it does not qualify, the category has no content.

Robinson III applied the rule to two categories of

evidence at once. Post-conviction DNA testing

matched blood at the scene to another man who had

recently lived with a victim and had a violent history

with him. The court found the evidence immaterial in

part because “[e]ven if someone else was culpable in

the murders, this would not exonerate defendant of

17

his guilt.” 397 So. 3d at 360. Suppressed ballistics evidence indicating more shooters and more shots than

the State’s theory allowed was likewise immaterial

because the defendant “would not be any less guilty

had he enlisted accomplices to assist him rather than

acting alone.” Id. at 363.

Eleven months earlier the same court had said the

opposite, quoting this Court: “Evidence need not be

definitive to be exculpatory.” Robinson II, 378 So. 3d

at 32 (citing Kyles, 514 U.S. at 450-51). The contrary

argument, Kyles held, “confuses the weight of the evidence with its favorable tendency.” 514 U.S. at 45051.

The rule inverts the burden of proof. A defendant

need not prove his innocence at trial, and Brady does

not require him to prove it afterward as the price of

complaining that the State hid the evidence that

might have created reasonable doubt. If evidence

must tend to establish innocence before the disclosure

duty attaches at all, no single statement, document,

or fingerprint will ever qualify. In a circumstantial

case the rule guarantees the State’s victory.

The courts below applied Louisiana’s rule to Mr.

Matthews, reasoning that the suppressed witnesses

were immaterial because neither “saw the shooting

nor specifically identified a shooter.” Pet. App. 14a15a. But suppressed evidence carries Brady value

even when it proves nothing standing alone, because

it may open lines of investigation, supply a defense

theory, or “attack . . . the thoroughness and even the

good faith of the investigation.” Kyles, 514 U.S. at 445.

18

Inaction here risks eliminating entire categories of evidence from Brady disclosure duties.

D. Louisiana Courts Ask Whether the Defense Could Have Found the Evidence Itself.

The fourth error is the most consequential, because Louisiana has written it into its own case law

as a rule of general application. Its courts have announced, and repeatedly applied, the proposition that

the State need not provide a defendant with information he “already has or can obtain with reasonable

diligence.” State v. Harper, 10-0356, p.11 (La.

11/30/10); 53 So. 3d 1263, 1271. Louisiana courts have

since endorsed the suppression of scientific notes,

testing, and conclusions because the defendant had

retained his own expert, was provided access to the

physical evidence, and was offered a tour of the testing lab. Robinson III, 397 So. 3d at 359-61.

This Court has rejected that excuse in plain terms:

“A rule thus declaring ‘prosecutor may hide, defendant must seek,’ is not tenable in a system constitutionally bound to accord defendants due process.” Banks

v. Dretke, 540 U.S. 668, 696 (2004). Rather, the prosecution’s duty runs to all favorable evidence known to

the State, including evidence known only to the police,

and it exists whether or not the defense asks. Kyles,

514 U.S. at 437. Louisiana holds otherwise, and it is

building a system in which a defendant’s access to favorable evidence turns on his resources rather than

his rights.

19

In Robinson, the State withheld fifty-one pages of

serology bench notes documenting blood spatter that

connected an unidentified third party to the killings.

It expected the defense experts to reconstruct what it

was hiding.

The State made the same argument against amicus John Floyd. It claimed that suppressed fingerprint comparisons were effectively disclosed because

the defense could have run its own analysis, and that

a suppressed witness statement was effectively disclosed because a diligent lawyer would have located

the witness himself. The Fifth Circuit held both positions “in direct contrast to clearly-established Brady

law.” Floyd v. Vannoy, 894 F.3d 143, 159, 162, 165

(5th Cir. 2018). Louisiana courts continue to excuse

suppression by blaming defendants for not working

hard enough.

This diligence defense converts a constitutional

disclosure obligation into a discovery contest, and it

rewards concealment in exact proportion to its success. The better the State hides evidence, the more

plausibly it can argue afterward that a diligent defense should have found it anyway. Brady imposes a

duty on the prosecution, and whether that duty was

discharged cannot turn on how hard the defense

looked for what it was never told existed.

Mr. Matthews received a version of the same answer. The State represented that the favorable material was available in the “court record.” Pet. App.

119a. He is one of many defendants Louisiana blames

for the State’s own failure.

20

These four flaws write Brady out of existence in

Louisiana. Rather than ask whether a verdict is worthy of confidence, courts review a curated record and

ask whether evidence a factfinder already found sufficient is sufficient. Rather than ask the cumulative

effect of suppression, courts pick each piece apart and

weigh it in a vacuum. Rather than ask whether suppressed evidence harms the State or helps the defense, courts require it to name an alternate perpetrator. And rather than ask whether the State disclosed,

courts ask whether the defendant searched hard

enough for what he did not know existed. That is a

failure at every step of the analysis this Court has required for decades.

III.

Because the Error Is Never Written Down,

It Cannot Be Corrected One Case at a

Time.

Louisiana courts know the standard. In a recent

survey of more than one hundred rulings dismissing

Brady claims nationwide, researchers found exactly

one in which the court recited the wrong legal test.

Brandon L. Garrett & Adam M. Gershowitz, The

Brady Materiality Standard, 78 Stan. L. Rev. 303, 333

(2026). The failure is not one of knowledge; it is one of

application, and it occurs at the materiality step. Id.

That is why case-specific correction has not

worked. This Court has corrected Louisiana’s Brady

jurisprudence three times, in Kyles, Smith, and

Wearry. Louisiana courts absorbed each correction,

confined it to its facts, and continued. The statistics

confirm that the error is a feature rather than a bug.

21

Since Smith was decided in 2012, the Louisiana Supreme Court has issued 145 opinions or orders citing

Brady, Smith, or Wearry, and has found a violation in

two. Brief of Amici Curiae Two Louisiana Prisoners at

13, Skinner v. Louisiana, 146 S. Ct. 1000 (2026) (No.

25-1); see also Brief of Amici Curiae National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Brown v. Louisiana, 143 S. Ct. 886 (No. 22-77).

Nor is there usually anything for a reviewing court

to correct. A court that denies relief in a sentence, in

a template, or in the word “denied” has stated no rule

and committed no articulable error. Its reasoning cannot be reversed because it was never given. The court

of appeal below proves the point: it acknowledged that

the district court “did not recite” the materiality

standard, then supposed the standard had been applied “in substance.” Pet. App. 5a. A reviewing court

reduced to inferring the analysis from the outcome is

not reviewing anything.

Denials of certiorari have compounded the problem. When this Court declined to review State v.

Brown, Justice Jackson wrote separately to say that

the denial should not “be construed as an endorsement of the lower court’s legal reasoning.” Brown, 143

S. Ct. at 888. But the caution has not held. As one

scholar has observed of that denial, the Court “let the

contravening of settled Supreme Court law become

the settled law of Louisiana,” so that “Brady is still on

the books” while “the failure to rectify a clear-cut

Brady violation destabilizes the canonical precedent

and tacitly approves a new and onerous evidentiary

22

standard.” Duncan Hosie, Stealth Reversals: Precedent Evasion in the Roberts Court and Constitutional

Reclamation, 58 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 1323, 1390 (2025).

Since Brown, this Court has denied review in two Louisiana cases raising the same defect. Robinson v. Vannoy, No. 25-6549 (U.S. May 26, 2026); Skinner v. Louisiana, No. 25-1 (U.S. Mar. 30, 2026) (Sotomayor, J.,

joined by Jackson, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) (“Because the Court refuses to enforce its own

precedents, I respectfully dissent from the denial of

certiorari.”).

Amici do not ask this Court to sit as an error-correcting tribunal for Louisiana. They ask for what is

needed more: a statement of method. Wearry shows

the form it can take. That decision reversed summarily, and it named the errors rather than the outcome.

The state court had “improperly evaluated the materiality of each piece of evidence in isolation rather

than cumulatively,” and it had “emphasized reasons a

juror might disregard new evidence while ignoring

reasons she might not.” 577 U.S. at 394. Those sentences are transferable. The holding this case calls for

is the one the petition seeks: that Brady materiality

turns on whether suppression undermines confidence

in the verdict, not on whether the remaining evidence

was enough to convict. That holding would resolve

this case. It would also reach the errors that travel

with it, because each of the other three substitutions

amici describe is a way of asking the same forbidden

question—whether the defendant looks guilty enough

on the record the State chose to leave behind.

23

Louisiana needs another Wearry. As it did ten

years ago, this Court should grant review and say so

plainly, whether summarily or after argument, again

bringing Louisiana’s courts to heel for straying so far

from its precedents. Only this Court can halt the crisis

amici see repeating itself.

CONCLUSION

A right that is not enforced cannot exist. Amici implore this Court to prevent Brady from being reduced

in Louisiana to “a form of words.” This Court should

grant Mr. Matthews’ petition.

Respectfully submitted,

EVAN J. BERGERON

Counsel of Record

WINSTON BERGERON, LLP

8120 Oak Street

New Orleans, LA 70118

504-577-2500 (telephone)

504-577-2562 (facsimile)

evan@winstonbergeron.com

Counsel for Amici Curiae

AUGUST 31, 2026

24

APPENDIX

LIST AND DESCRIPTION OF AMICI CURIAE

Reginald Adams was convicted of murder in Orleans Parish in 1983 and sentenced to life without parole; he was exonerated in 2014 after a court found

that the State had violated Brady.

Jarvis Ballard was convicted of aggravated rape

in 1999 and exonerated in 2021, after the Fourth Circuit reversed the denial of his Brady claim. State v.

Ballard, 2020-0617 (La. App. 4 Cir. 7/21/21); 325 So.

3d 450.

Gregory Bright was convicted of murder in Orleans Parish in 1976 and exonerated in 2003, after the

district court found that the State had suppressed evidence in violation of Brady.

Glenn Davis, Jr. was convicted of murder in 1993

and exonerated in 2010, after a court found a Brady

violation and the State dismissed the charges against

him.

Jerry Davis was convicted of murder in Orleans

Parish in 1984 and sentenced to life without parole;

he was exonerated in 2024 after a court found that the

State had violated Brady.

Larry Delmore, tried with Glenn Davis, Jr., was

convicted of murder in 1993 and exonerated in 2010,

following the Brady finding in Mr. Davis’s case.

Raymond Flanks was convicted of first-degree

murder in Orleans Parish in 1985 and exonerated in

25

2022, when the district court vacated his conviction on

Brady grounds.

John Floyd was convicted of murder in Orleans

Parish in 1982, denied relief by Louisiana courts without reasons, and exonerated in 2018 after thirty-six

years, when the Fifth Circuit granted federal habeas

relief. Floyd v. Vannoy, 894 F.3d 143 (5th Cir. 2018).

Anthony Johnson was convicted of murder in

1986 and exonerated in 2010, following a judicial finding that the State had violated Brady.

Wilbert Jones was convicted of aggravated rape

in 1973 and exonerated forty-five years later, in 2018,

after a court found that the State had violated Brady.

Jerome Morgan was convicted of murder in Orleans Parish in 1994 and exonerated in 2016, after his

conviction was vacated on Brady grounds.

Larry Moses was convicted of first-degree murder

in Orleans Parish in 1995 and exonerated in 2023, after the district court granted post-conviction relief on

Brady grounds.

Earl Truvia, tried with Gregory Bright, was convicted of murder in Orleans Parish in 1976 and exonerated in 2003 on the same Brady finding.

Sullivan Walter was convicted of forcible rape

and related offenses in Orleans Parish in 1986 and exonerated in 2022; the State had withheld a favorable

report prepared by the police criminalist who testified

at his trial.

26

Michael Williams was convicted of murder in

1997 and exonerated in 2011; the State had withheld

witness statements and police interview records that

would have impeached its case.