⚖ Oral Arguments, with Context

The Second Circuit considers whether Derrick White's trial lawyer should have challenged police access to his cellphone location records. White was convicted of assault and weapon offenses after a man was shot in the foot in New York. Two eyewitnesses identified him, and cell-tower records placed his phone near the shooting. Police obtained those records with a court order, not a search warrant. His trial lawyer did not ask to exclude them. The trial preceded Carpenter, the Supreme Court decision recognizing Fourth Amendment protection for historical cellphone location data. The state courts rejected White's ineffective-assistance claim, and a federal district court denied his habeas petition. Federal habeas review challenges a state conviction on federal constitutional grounds, with deference to state-court rulings. White will argue that counsel should have preserved a plausible challenge for appeal, and that the phone evidence mattered to the result. The state will respond that counsel could rely on existing law and that other evidence made any error harmless. Listen for prejudice: whether there is a reasonable probability of a different result, not just a lawyer's mistake.

White v. Wolcott (No. 25-1239) — United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, argued November 10, 2026.