Court heard oral arguments in Gloria Johnson v. Grants Pass, focusing on whether homeless people have a right to sleep outside.
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, during oral arguments in a homelessness case on Monday, asked if cities would be permitted to kill homeless people.
The Gloria Johnson v. Grants Pass case focuses on whether homeless people have a right to sleep outside. The Oregon city was sued by homeless people who said the government illegally banned sleeping bags, blankets, pillows and cardboard boxes to prevent them from sleeping on the streets, even as no other space or shelter was available.
In September 2022, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals deemed the local law outlawing sleeping bags and other materials to be «cruel and unusual punishment» and therefore was in violation of the Constitution.
Brown Jackson asked attorney Theane D. Evangelis, who is representing Grants Pass, what the legal implications would be if the city decided to execute homeless people. Evangelis said it would be found to be «cruel and unusual punishment.»
Justice Sonia Sotomayer then asked the attorney: «What about cities without compassion? Where are they supposed to sleep? Are they supposed to kill themselves?» according to The Economist reporter Steven Mazie on X, formerly Twitter.
Sotomayer then said that cities can still enforce bans on defecation or fires in public, but it wouldn’t be able to criminalize the bare act of sleeping in public, as the debate continued.
Depending on what the court rules, major cities like San Francisco and Los Angeles might be impacted by the decision as they face high numbers of homelessness and have large areas occupied by people living on the street.
«There is a lot at stake here,» Elizabeth Bowen, an associate professor and homelessness expert at the University at Buffalo, told Newsweek.
