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Death Sentence Jury Exclusion

By: Derek Hawkins//December 21, 2015//

Death Sentence Jury Exclusion

By: Derek Hawkins//December 21, 2015//

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Supreme Court of the United States

Case Name: White v. Wheeler

Case No: 14-1372

Practice Area: Death Sentence Jury Exclusion

Exclusion of juror did not violate 6th and 14th amendments.

“The Court of Appeals erred in its assessment of the trial judge’s reformulation of an important part of Juror 638’s questioning. 779 F. 3d, at 372. When excusing the juror the day after the voir dire, the trial judge said that the prosecution had asked whether the juror “couldn’t consider the entire range” of penalties. App. to Pet. for Cert. 139a. The prosecution in fact asked if the juror was “not absolutely certain whether [he] could realistically consider” the entire range of penalties. Id., at 132a. The juror’s confirmation that he was “not absolutely certain whether [he] could realistically consider” the death penalty, ibid., was a reasonable basis for the trial judge to conclude that the juror was unable to give that penalty fair consideration. The trial judge’s decision to excuse Juror 638 did not violate clearly established federal law by concluding that Juror 638 was not qualified to serve as a member of this capital jury. See Witt, supra, at 424–426. And similarly, the Kentucky Supreme Court’s ruling that there was no error is not beyond any possibility for fairminded disagreement. . . The Kentucky Supreme Court was not unreasonable in its application of clearly established federal law when it concluded that the exclusion of Juror 638 did not violate the Sixth Amendment. Given this conclusion, there is no need to consider petitioner’s further contention that, if there were an error by the trial court in excluding the juror, it should be subject to harmless-error analysis. And this Court does not review the other rulings of the Court of Appeals that are not addressed in this opinion”

Full Text

Per Curiam


Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.

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