U.S. Supreme Court Declines Humboldt Cannabis Case, Leaving Excessive Fines Challenge Alive

OG Article By Anthony Martinelli in News Watch Today's LIVE Episode on X and Rumble and Youtube October 16 2025

The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear a case brought by Southern Humboldt landowners challenging the county’s cannabis code enforcement system, leaving in place a Ninth Circuit ruling that allowed parts of their lawsuit to proceed. The case, Corrine Morgan Thomas, et al. v. Humboldt County, California, et al., was filed by the Institute for Justice on behalf of property owners who argued the county imposed excessive penalties for alleged cannabis violations, sometimes tied to prior owners, without proper due process. They sought to overturn fines that they said were crushing and unconstitutional.A federal judge dismissed the suit in 2023, but the Ninth Circuit later revived portions of it, finding Humboldt’s penalty structure may violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on excessive fines. The appeals court, however, rejected the claim that the county’s process violated the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial, citing the 1916 Supreme Court case Minneapolis & St. Louis Railroad Co. v. Bombolis, which held the Seventh Amendment does not apply to state-level proceedings.

The Institute for Justice petitioned the high court to revisit that precedent, with support from groups including the Cato Institute and the Buckeye Institute. Justice Neil Gorsuch, while agreeing with the denial, issued a statement calling Bombolis “something of a relic” that has created a “two-tiered system of justice” by allowing state and local governments to avoid jury trials in civil penalty cases. He said the Court should reexamine the issue in a future case.

Following the denial, Institute for Justice attorney Jared McClain said the fight is not over.

“The Supreme Court’s decision not to take this case doesn’t change the fact that Humboldt’s scheme of crushing ordinary people under massive penalties for minor code issues is still unconstitutional,” McClain said. “We’ll continue fighting to stop it.”

The case will continue in lower courts, where the Eighth Amendment claims remain active.