A federal inmate who says the prison system lost track of up to four years of earned credit took his fight to the Supreme Court, where the justices weighed whether he can make a judge move him to a halfway house.
Story Highlights
- The justices heard Maxwell v. Dinis on Monday, November 2, the Court’s seventh case over the First Step Act.
- William Maxwell says the Bureau of Prisons denied him “somewhere between 42 and 48 months” of time credits.
- He is serving 20 years for a racketeering scheme to plunder a Texas mortgage company.
- The government’s lawyer admitted a misstep at the podium: “That was our bad.”
- Both sides urged a ruling before January 22, 2027, his projected release date. No ruling has been issued.
- When the government’s lawyer tried to answer, Justice Sonia Sotomayor cut him off with one word: “Enough.”
What The Justices Are Deciding
The question is whether Maxwell picked the right legal tool. He filed a habeas petition, an old legal path a prisoner uses to ask a judge to rule that he is being held unlawfully. Lower courts said habeas was the wrong way to ask for a transfer, because he wants a change in where he serves his time, not release from it.
Maxwell v Dinis
Crim: Habeas
Hansford (P) – Clarity (3), Mastery (3), Adaptivity (1), Interplay (1)
Barber (SG R) – Clarity (3), Mastery (3), Adaptivity (3), Interplay (3)
Barnes (Amicus) – Clarity (2), Mastery (2), Adaptivity (1), Interplay (1)https://t.co/Q3Y8tDCTPV
— Brian Downing (@brianrdowning) November 3, 2026
Maxwell says the transfer is not a small thing. Under the First Step Act, a 2018 law signed by President Trump, federal inmates earn time credits for programs and work meant to keep them from committing new crimes. Once an inmate earns enough, the law says he moves to a halfway house or home confinement. His lawyer told the justices the law requires a move to “a distinct and lower level of custody,” and that holding him past that point breaks federal law.
Who Maxwell Is And What He Says He Lost
Maxwell is a former Texas lawyer who lost his law license. He was convicted in federal court in New Jersey of racketeering, conspiracy and fraud for his part in a La Cosa Nostra takeover of FirstPlus Financial Group, a Texas mortgage company. La Cosa Nostra is the formal name for the American Mafia. He is serving his sentence in a low-security prison in Texas.
He says the Bureau of Prisons did not count some of the activities that should have earned him credit. By his lawyers’ count, the missing time comes to 42 to 48 months, enough, he says, that he should already have been moved out of prison.
Justice Samuel Alito asked the key question: had Maxwell met all four requirements for prerelease custody? His lawyer, Masha Hansford, said yes. “He has the lowest recidivism rating. He has a qualifying crime. He has satisfied everything,” she said. Recidivism means the risk of committing new crimes.
The Other Side
Brian Barnes, a lawyer the Court appointed to defend the lower court’s ruling, argued that habeas is not the proper method when an inmate wants a change of location. He said Maxwell’s claim belongs, “if at all,” in a civil rights lawsuit. He also warned the justices that a win for Maxwell could open the door to many similar cases.
The government took a different tack. Its lawyer, Kevin J. Barber of the Solicitor General’s office, which argues for the federal government at the Supreme Court, asked the justices to drop the case because it will soon be moot. A case is moot when there is nothing left for a court to fix. After January 22, 2027, there would be no transfer left to order.
Barber admitted the government never raised that point when the Court was deciding whether to hear the case. “That was our bad,” he said. “We apologize for that.” Justice Sonia Sotomayor pushed back: “But you want to win on an argument that you failed to raise on cert?” Cert is the stage when the Court picks which cases it will hear. When he tried to answer, she told him, “Enough.” Justice Neil Gorsuch added, “I haven’t heard ‘my bad’ before at the podium.”
What Comes Next
Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School who followed the argument, said a majority of the justices seemed inclined to side with Maxwell, though any ruling could be written narrowly. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said a narrow ruling “would be helpful because this kind of situation comes up a lot.”
Lawyers on both sides asked the Court to decide before Maxwell’s January 2027 date passes. A ruling for him would tell federal inmates whether they can go straight to a judge when they believe their earned credits were not counted. The Court has not said when it will rule.
Sources:
spectrumlocalnews.com, supremecourt.gov, washingtonexaminer.com, law.cornell.edu, law360.com
