GOOD JURY SELECTION CASE FROM THE SUPREMES
There are many aspects of this death penalty reversal from the U.S. Supremes worthy of note. The dissenters were only Scalia and Thomas, meaning that Alito and Roberts voted to reverse; Alito was the actual author.
This is a Batson (476 US 79) case. Batson (the California equivalent
is Wheeler, 22 C3d 258) says that the DA can't use peremptory challenges
to discriminate against members of cognizable groups such as
African-Americans.
The U.S. Supremes apply a three-step process on Batson issues. First, the trial court must decide whether you've made a showing that a peremptory was used based on membership in a cognizable group. Second, the DA has to present a race-neutral
explanation. Third, the court must then determine whether you've carried
your burden of showing purposeful discrimination.
Tthe best part of this case is the statement by Alito that your Batson motion must be granted if you show that one juror was improperly excused: "The Constitution forbids striking even a single prospective juror for a discriminatory purpose."
The Supremes then reject the bogus excuses given by the DA in this case. The DA claimed that the African-American juror (one of five on the panel, all kicked off by the DA) was "nervous
to the DA."
The Supremes say that the record doesn't reflect that the judge made a factual finding that the juror was nervous, so they don't have to defer to a factual finding by the trial court. T
The second reason given by the DA was that the juror was a student teacher who would miss work, and so might rush to deliver a verdict of a lesser to avoid a penalty phase and get back to work. But the record shows that they talked to the juror's supervisor, and making up the time wasn't a problem. More importantly, the DA didn't kick off white jurors with
much more serious time constraints.
Snyder v. Louisiana; 2008 DJ DAR 3757; DJ, 3/20/08; US Supremes
