Constitutional Law

It Didn't Fit

In an elaboration of Batson v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court held 7-2 Wednesday that the prosecutor's use of five peremptory challenges to strike 5 black jurors (the defendant is black) and proffer of unconvincing "race neutral" explanations was so "unconvincing" and "suspicious" that the trial judge had committed clear error in not inquiring further. The case gained notoriety when the prosecutor referred to it as his "O.J. Simpson case." The two dissenters in Snyder v. Louisiana, Justices Thomas and Scalia, would have deferred to the trial judge. Snyder will get a new trial after having spent twelve years on death row.

Full post as published by ACS Blog on March 21, 2008 (boomark / email).