Quick recap of US Supreme Court's major criminal justice opinions for OT 2024

This official webpage with links to the US Supreme Court's merits opinion for its October Term 2024 lists 66 opinions, though less than 60 are what I would categorize as full opinions.  Based on my too-quick review and accounting of these full opinions, there are 13 — just over 20% — that I think are fairly viewed as criminal justice rulings (though a number technically involve civil claims brought by prisoners or those harmed by police action).  Here are the 13 opinions that I have identified as SCOTUS criminal justice opinions for OT 24 listed in the order they were decided, along with the vote count and the prevailing party:

Andrew v. White (7-2 vote in favor of capital defendant)

Glossip v. Oklahoma (6-2 vote in favor of capital defendant)

Thompson v. United States (9-0 vote in favor of fraud defendant)

Delligatti v. United States (7-2 vote against violent defendant)

Barnes v. Felix (9-0 vote in favor of excessive force plaintiff)

Kousisis v. United States (9-0 vote against fraud defendant)

Parrish v. United States (8-1 vote in favor of prisoner plaintiff)

Martin v. United States (9-0 vote in favor of police harm plaintiff)

Rivers v. Guerrero (9-0 vote against prisoner plaintiff)

Perttu v. Richards (5-4 vote in favor of prisoner plaintiff)

Esteras v. United States (7-2 vote in favor of drug defendant)

Gutierrez v. Saenz (6-3 vote in favor of capital prisoner plaintiff)

Hewitt v. United States (5-4 vote in favor of violent defendant)

A lot could be said about this group of cases, but I will start by noting that the individual prevailed against the state in ten of these cases and the state prevailed in only three.  In addition, only a couple of these cases significantly divided the Court.  Of course, these realities are a function of which cases the Court decided to take up; many thousands of defendants and prisoner plaintiff seek certiorari, and the Justices are usually taking up only those cases in which they are troubled by some aspect of the ruling below.  Still, the voting patterns are interesting and arguably cuts somewhat against a narrative that the current Supreme Court is the most conservative in recent history. (Of course, some might reasonably say that a court is being truly conservative when if votes again state power in some/many settings.)

In addition to noting outcomes and voting patters, I am struck by how "minor" so many of these rulings feel.  I am inclined to guess that the Esteras case about supervised release decision-making could have the most practical impact over the most cases, but I suspect most district judges will not need to alter their work in this arena much, if at all.  Nearly all the other cases, likewise, seem to resolve a relatively small doctrinal points or focus on a distinct factual record; I would be surprised if any of these cases make any end-of-Term reviews of the major cases from the Term.  Again, this reality is function of which cases the Court decided to take up, and it makes a sharp contrast to the Court's prior Term where a large group of criminal cases — from Rahimi to Grants Pass to Trump v. US and many others — were closely watched and clearly consequential.