Jordan v. Mississippi

(1) Whether the Mississippi Supreme Court, in conflict with this court’s decisions in Ake v. Oklahoma and McWilliams v. Dunn (but consistent with that court’s prior decisions refusing to enforce Ake according to its terms), denied petitioner due process by refusing to provide expert mental health assistance sufficiently independent of the prosecution and available to the defense to assist him in developing and presenting his sentencing mitigation case, and in rebutting the state’s case against him; and (2) whether the Mississippi Supreme Court, in conflict with this court’s decision in Cruz v. Arizona and in disregard of the supremacy of federal law, departed from its longstanding interpretation of the intervening-law exception to the state’s bar on successive habeas petitions to deny petitioner the benefit of this court’s clarification of Ake in McWilliams.