Klein v. Martin

607 U. S. 213 (2026) · 1/26/26

Because the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed the award of a new trial based on reasoning that departed from the strict standards that govern the grant of federal habeas relief to prisoners convicted in state court prescribed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, the Court grants the State’s petition for a writ of certiorari and reverses the judgment below.

Respondent Charles Brandon Martin was convicted in a Maryland court for the attempted murder of one of his girlfriends, who was found unconscious in her apartment with a gunshot wound to the head. Three items found at the crime scene played a key part in the State's case: a shell casing and bullet from a .380-caliber cartridge and a peculiarly modified Gatorade bottle resembling a homemade silencer. Federal frearms records showed that Martin owned a .380-caliber semiautomatic handgun that could have fred the bullet and ejected the casing. As for the bottle, testing revealed DNA evidence that…

Held: Because the state appellate court's decision—that the undisclosed forensic report was not material under Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83—neither was “contrary to” nor “involved an unreasonable applica