We will hear argument this morning in case 24993, Olivier versus City of Brandon.

Ms. Hope.

Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court,

Gabriel Olivier is called to share his Christian faith by preaching in a city park.

He was arrested and charged with violating a city

ordinance that purports to criminalize his religious speech. Olivier has a heartland section

1983 claim to seek prospective relief, protecting him from future prosecution under the ordinance.

That pre-enforcement Section 1983 claim isn't predicated on a past unlawful conviction,

and this Court shouldn't extend heck to bar it.

As this Court recognized nearly 50 years ago in Woolley, when a genuine threat of prosecution exists,

a litigant is entitled to resort to a federal forum to seek redress for an alleged deprivation of federal rights.

Neither the habeas statutes nor hecken its progeny bar Olivier's claims.

The relief he seeks, an injunction and a declaration,

won't annul his conviction or alter his sentence. His claims for future relief are, as this court explained in Dotson, distant from the core of habeas safeguarded by heck.

The Fifth Circuit alone deprives a person of access to a federal forum to vindicate

federal rights solely because he was previously convicted under the law he challenges.

But a prior conviction shouldn't forever bar a claim for future protection.

Olivier's past prosecution makes him a perfect plaintiff because past enforcement is good

evidence that the threat of future enforcement is real.

The Court should confirm that the Federal Court has doors remain open to persons like

Olivier, whose rights have

already been infringed. I welcome the Court's questions.

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