“Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, “.prosecutors were motivated in substantial part by race”.
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The name of each potential black juror was highlighted on four different copies of the jury list and the word “black” was circled next to the race question on questionnaires for the black prospective jurors.
In its decision, the high court focused on two prospective black jurors – Marilyn Garrett and Eddie Hood – who were struck by prosecutors during jury selection.
The justices ruled in favor of Georgia death row inmate Timothy Foster by a vote of 7-1, with Justice Clarence Thomas, the court’s only African American member, dissenting. With the Supreme Court win, Foster’s conviction is not vacated but he will be able to seek a new trial.
Despite the new evidence, the Georgia courts refused to grant a new trial for Tyrone Foster, the man convicted of the 1986 murder.
“What we’ve seen since the case was decided is that that prosecutors continue to strike African-Americans, Hispanics from the juries and then just make up reasons, as long as they’re not race reasons”, he said, adding, “What we really found was an arsenal of smoking guns”.
Finally, in an employment discrimination case, the court made it easier for federal employees to file employment discrimination claims. Turning then to the merits, Thomas argued the Court should have shown more deference to the prosecution.
But Foster’s judge said that the prosecution’s actions weren’t racist, and the trial court and the Georgia Supreme Court previously declined Foster’s appeals. A prosecution note labeled “definite NO’s” included the last five potential black jurors with their own rankings, in case “it comes down to having to pick one of the black jurors”. In closing arguments, the district attorney told the jury it needed to give the death penalty to Foster to “deter other people out there in the projects”.
In notes, prosecutors had highlighted the African Americans on several different lists of potential jurors. Notes in the prosecutors’ file indicated that they focused on the race of the jurors from the outset, as Roberts points out in his opinion.
The Supreme Court’s decision may have overturned the jury’s verdict, but it did not rethink peremptory strikes, the reason black potential jurors were kept off Foster’s jury in the first place.
On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court reached back three decades to right a racial wrong. The prosecution struck the other four from the pool. The New York Times’ Linda Greenhouse noted a year ago that since the court adopted its rules prohibiting discrimination in jury selection in the 1980s, “Prosecutors have learned to game the system by providing explanations that are accepted as persuasive to judges who appear all too eager to be persuaded”. “Foster was charged with capital murder of a 79-year-old widow after a brutal sexual assault”.
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“This decision by the court was beyond extremely important”, he said. But Supreme Court precedent – reaffirmed in 1986 – says, however, that jurors can not be struck due to their race. “Two peremptory strikes on the basis of race are two more than the Constitution allows”, he said.
