Whether it comports with due process for a state court to reject as untimely an evolving-standards claim on a theory that would never allow for such a claim to be reviewed in a successive posture

QUESTION PRESENTED Idaho is currently the only state in the country seeking to execute prisoners who were sentenced to death by judges alone, without the assistance of juries. Based on that fact, Thomas Creech filed a post-conviction petition in state court challenging the practice of judge-sentenced executions under the Eighth Amendment as barred by the evolving standards of decency. The Idaho Supreme Court dismissed the claim as untimely on the ground that “nothing unusual occurred” recently to trigger the claim, without recognizing that this Court’s evolving-standards cases center on the absence of executions and death sentences. The question presented is: Whether it comports with due process for a state court to reject as untimely an evolving-standards claim on a theory that would never allow for such a claim to be reviewed in a successive posture. PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI — Page i