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| Supreme Court upends all-white jury verdict, death sentence |
| By stltoday.com |
| Published: 05/24/2016 |
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WASHINGTON • The Supreme Court upended the conviction and death sentence of a black Georgia man Monday because prosecutors violated the Constitution by excluding African-Americans from the all-white jury that determined his fate. The 7-1 ruling in favor of death row inmate Timothy Tyrone Foster came in a case in which defense lawyers obtained strikingly frank notes from prosecutors detailing efforts to keep African-Americans off of Foster’s jury. The decision broke no new ground in efforts to fight racial discrimination in jury selection, but underscored the importance of a 30-year-old high court ruling that took aim at the exclusion of minorities from juries. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court that “prosecutors were motivated in substantial part by race” when they struck African-Americans from the jury pool, focusing on the decision to exclude two black jurors. Two such jury strikes “on the basis of race are two more than the Constitution allows,” Roberts wrote. Read More. |
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