As of yesterday about half of America has been exempted from jury duty, at least in capital cases. The US Supreme Court has given prosecutors greater power to exclude potential jurors who express moral reservations about the death penalty. Those who say they would lean in favour of life imprisonment rather than execution can now be bounced.
Experts say the ruling will mean "whiter, brighter" juries in future capital trials which often isn't good news for the large percentage of black defendants who - somehow, don't ask me why - tend to get the death penalty just a whole lot more frequently than white murderers.
Now, in fairness, the US Supreme Court has recently ruled that it's unconstitutional to execute retarded children. See, there is enlightenment after all.
Even prosecutors concede the new test does afford a real advantage to the prosecution. As one law professor put it, "death-qualified jurors are slightly more conviction prone.” Neat, isn't it? That's the term now used, "death-qualified jurors." Damn, does that sound barbaric. Death qualified - do they give them a certificate or something?
And what does a Death Qualified Juror (or "DQJ" as we know them) look like? Professor Brooke Butler of the University of South Florida did a study and the results are - well, predictable:
“'They tend to be white,' she said. 'They tend to be male. They tend to be moderately well-educated — high school or maybe a little college. They tend to be politically conservative — Republican. They tend to be Christian — Catholic or Protestant. They tend to be middle socioeconomic status — maybe $30,000 or $40,000' in annual income.
"In a study to be published in Behavioral Sciences and the Law, a peer-reviewed journal, Professor Butler made an additional finding. 'Death-qualified jurors,' she said, 'are more likely to be prejudiced — to be racist, sexist and homophobic.'”
Now, ain't that swell?
2 comments:
I'm against the death penalty in all cases, but there is perhaps some justification for this; if the death penalty has been legally sanctioned as one of the available punishments for a crime, then one could make the argument that it should be considered by people willing to grant that sentence. People who are against the death.
I guess the issue becomes just "how willing" a prospective juror may be to direct death in order to be classed "Death Qualified". As that study found, the death penalty is particularly popular with racists and homophobes. What object lesson is there to be taken from that? It strikes me that the disproportional anomaly in the fate meted out to black as opposed to white defendants suggests the statistical overflow on the black side of the ledger could be argued to be judicial or state lynching. Just a thought.
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