Hello, this is RJ Deakin, reading the Supreme Court of the United States opinion syllabus in Oliver versus City of Brandon, Mississippi. Certierari to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Argued December 3rd, 2025, and decided March 20, 2026. Petitioner, Gabriel Oliver, is a street preacher in Mississippi who believes that sharing his religious views with fellow citizens is an important part of exercising his faith. His vocation sometimes took him to the sidewalks near an amphitheater in the city of Brandon, where he could find sizable audiences attending events. In 2019, the city adopted an ordinance requiring all individuals or groups engaging in protests or demonstrations at around the time of events were scheduled to stay within a designated protest area. In 2021, Oliver was arrested for violating that ordinance. He pled no contest in municipal court. The court imposed a $304 fine, one year of probation, and ten days of imprisonment to be served only if he violated the ordinance during his probation. Oliver did not appeal, paid the fine, and served no prison time. Because he still wanted to preach near the amphitheater, Oliver filed suit against the city in federal court under 42 USC Section 1983, alleging that the city ordinance violates the free speech clause of the First Amendment by consigning him and other speakers to the amphitheater's protest area. The complaint seeks as a remedy, a declaration that the ordinance infringes the First Amendment and an injunction preventing city officials from enforcing the ordinance in the future. In other words, the relief requested only is only prospective. Oliver seeks neither the reversal of nor compensation for his prior conviction. The parties contested in the lower courts whether this court's decision in Heck vs. Humphrey, which prohibits the use of Section 1983 to challenge the validity of a prior conviction or sentence so as to obtain release from custody or monetary damages, bars the suit from going forward. On the city's view of HEC, a person previously convicted of violating a statute cannot challenge its constitutionality under Section 1983 because success in the suit would cast doubt on the prior conviction's correctness. On Oliver's contrary view, Heck does not apply when a plaintiff seeks wholly prospective relief rather than relief relating to the prior conviction. The District Court agreed with the city's understanding of Heck and found Oliver's suit barred. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed on the same reasoning. The Supreme Court held that Oliver's suit below can proceed. It's a unanimous decision written by Justice Kagan. Oliver's suit seeking purely prospective relief and an injunction stopping officials from enforcing an ordinance in the future can proceed, notwithstanding Oliver's prior conviction for violating that ordinance. HEC does not hold otherwise. Before the court's decision in HEC, the city would have had no plausible basis for claiming Oliver's suit is barred. That type of suit falls within Section 1983's heartland. Assuming a credible threat of prosecution, a plaintiff may bring a Section 1983 action to challenge a local law violating the Constitution and to prevent the law's future enforcement. See, for example, Stifle v. Thompson 415 U.S. 452. In Woolley v. Maynard, 430 U.S. 705, the court held that that rule to apply even when the plaintiff was previously convicted under the challenge law. The court explained that because the suit at issue sought wholly prospective relief only to be free from prosecutions and future violations, and was in no way designated to annul the results of the state trial, Section 1983 provided an avenue for the plaintiff's claim. Were it otherwise, the plaintiffs would have been trapped between the scilia of intentionally flouting the state law and the cherubitis of foregoing what he believes to be constitutionally protected activity. Somebody can email me how I was supposed to pronounce those. That's woolly at 710. The court's decision in Woolley, taken alone, would defeat the city's attempt to prevent Oliver's suit from going forward. But the city argues the court's later decision in Heck requires the opposite result. In HEC, the court held that a state prisoner could not use Section 1983 to seek damages attributable to his allegedly unconstitutional conviction. The court reasoned that such a suit, in truth, mounts a collateral attack on the validity of the conviction and thus intrudes on the habeas statute's domain, that is, 512 U.S. F-485. And such a suit could lead to parallel litigation and conflicting judgments about the same conduct with the Section 1983 suit, suggesting that the plaintiff should be released even as criminal or habeas proceedings found the opposite. Hence the so-called hekbar on Section 1983 damages actions that necessarily required the plaintiff to prove the unlawfulness of his conviction or confinement. When a state prisoner seeks damages in a Section 1983 suit, the court went on, the district court must consider whether a judgment in favor of the plaintiff would necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction or sentence. The court subsequently drew a line between hectic type claims and those seeking forward-looking relief. In Edwards v. Balasak, 520 U.S. 641, the court held that while a state prisoner could not obtain damages for an alleged past violation, a claim for prospective injunctive relief, the use of fairer procedures in the future, may properly be brought under the Section 1983, because it does not depend on showing the invalidity of a previous sentencing decision. In Wilkinson versus Dotson, 544 US seventy four, the court allowed state prisoners to bring a Section 1983 suit requesting an injunction requiring the state to comply with constitutional parole requirements in the future, determining that such a claim for future relief was distant from the core of habeas and so not barred by Heck. As in Balasok and Dotson, Oliver's suit falls outside habeas' core and likewise outside Heck's concerns. Oliver is not challenging the validity of his conviction or sentence for the purpose of securing, releasing, or obtaining monetary damages. Nance vs. Ward. Instead, he seeks wholly prospective relief, only to be free from prosecutions for future violations of the ordinance. That's woolly at 711. Because Oliver's suit does not, as habeas suits do, collaterally attack the old conviction. It cannot give rise to parallel litigation respecting his prior conduct and does not risk conflicting judgments over how that conduct was prosecuted or punished. That's Heck at four hundred eighty four and four hundred eighty five. Unlike in HEC, Oliver's suit merely attempts to prevent a future prosecution. So the HEC bar does not come into play. The city's main argument to the contrary rests on one sentence in HEC that states When a state prisoner seeks damages in a Section 1983 suit, the district court must consider whether a judgment in favor of the plaintiff would necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction or sentence. If it would, the complaint must be dismissed. five hundred twelve US at four hundred eighty seven. Strictly speaking, the necessarily imply language fits if Oliver succeeds in this suit, it would mean his prior convictions was unconstitutional. But general language in judicial opinions should be read as referring in context to circumstances similar to those then before the court. That's uh Turkai Holakasai AS versus United States um five ninety eight US two hundred sixty four. And the circumstances here differ from those in HEC. The HEC language at issue was used to identify claims that were really assaults on a prior conviction, even though involving some indirection. By contrast, there is no looking back in Oliver's suit, both in the allegations made and in the relief sought. The suit is entirely future oriented, even if success in it shows that something in the past should not have occurred. The Heck court did not consider such a suit, and the Heck language was not meant to address it. Heck, properly understood, does not preclude suits that only attempt to prevent future prosecutions. Oliver's suit to enjoin future prosecutions under the city ordinance so he can return to the amphitheater may proceed. Justice Kagan delivered the opinion for a unanimous court. This has been RJ Deakin, reading the Supreme Court syllabus in Oliver versus City of Brandon. If you'd like to reach out, say hi. Uh my email is road scholar80 at gmail.com. That's R O A D S S C H O L A R, and the number 8080 at gmail.com. Um shout out uh to the uh defense counsel in the Afroman suit. Uh if you have not seen that, look it up.