GEORGE ZIMMERMAN MURDER TRIAL UPDATE: RACE PLAYS ROLE IN JURY SELECTION PROCESS
- Details
- Category: Justice
- Published: Sunday, 16 June 2013 16:23
- Written by Attorney Jerry Girley
The purpose of the jury selection process, ostensibly, is to choose individuals that are impartial and who will be able to weigh the evidence and to make a reasoned decision based upon the evidence presented during the trial. In reality, each side is looking for jurors that are receptive to their theory of the case. Normally prosecutors attempt to select persons that are older, law and order oriented and conservative in their philosophical perspective. Defense attorneys typically prefer jurors that are open minded, perhaps younger and who may possess a higher level of education than the average person. Admittedly, these are broad generalizations and each case is fact specific, but generally these are the default starting positions of each side. But, the strategies are reversed in the Trayvon Martin murder trial. In this case the ideal juror for the state is a person who is younger, more educated and more open minded.
Why are the jury selection strategies reversed in this case? Three reasons come to mind: the location of the trial, the race of the victim and the race of the defendant. Southern juries, chiefly white in composition, have historically been resistant to convicting Defendants for a homicide if the victim is an African American. This is especially true when the alleged killer is white. Florida is a southern state, Tayvon Martin is African American and George Zimmerman is a White Hispanic. What this all means is that the state is at a disadvantage starting out. Florida is not always viewed by the rest of the nation as a southern state. However, depending upon where you are in the state there is a definite southern flavor and a southern philosophical perspective. In truth, Florida is three states in one. The southern part of the sate is similar to New York. The northern part of the state is like southern Georgia. But the middle part of the state has counties that are liberal and conservative. Orange County and Seminole County are both located in Central Florida. They are contiguous (connected) to each other, yet, they are politically and philosophically worlds apart. Orange County tends to be moderate. African Americans make up 21% of the population there. By contrast, African Americans make up just 11% of the population in Seminole County.
Seminole County's philosophical leanings are decidedly conservative. The Trayvon Martin murder trial is being held in Sanford, Florida. Sanford is the county seat for Seminole County. The jury pool in Seminole County is overwhelmingly white and conservative. If it were not for the race factor, the certainty of a conviction would be well over 75%. However, when we factor in all that we have discussed, the likelihood of a conviction is appreciably less. Race should not matter when the prosecutor decides whether to formally charge or not to charge a person with a crime, but it does. Race should not matter when the prosecutor decides what type of punishment he/she will pursue, but it does. Similarly, race should not matter when the State and/or the Defense try to identify ideal candidates to serve on a jury, but it matters greatly.
Some will dismiss this assertion as nothing more than African American paranoia. However, there is a fair amount of empirical data that supports the notion that race matters in the criminal justice system. A 2007 study of death sentences in Connecticut conducted by Yale University School of Law revealed that African-American defendants receive the death penalty at three times the rate of white defendants in cases where the victims are white. In addition, killers of white victims are treated more severely than people who kill minorities, when it comes to deciding what charges to bring. A recent study published in the May 2012 issue of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, produced indisputable evidence that the racial composition of a jury affects conviction rates. The study looked at 750 Felony trails in Florida, from 2000-2010. It found that ALL white juries convict African Americans 81% of the time compared to white defendants who were convicted only 66% of the time. In short the study revealed or reaffirmed that white jurors are more inclined to convict than African American jurors. Also, a January 2003 study released by the University of Maryland concluded that race and geography are major factors in death penalty decisions. Specifically, prosecutors are more likely to seek a death sentence when the race of the victim is white and are less likely to seek a death sentence when the victim is African-American.
What these studies reveal is that race matters at every significant step in the criminal justice process. These studies also inform us that the race of the victim and the race of the defendant heavily influences how the jurors, and all other actors in the criminal justice system, will respond to an alleged crime. Moreover, we can see that there is a presumption of criminality that attaches to African Americans whenever and however the criminal justice system takes up their cause. This presumption infects the entirety of the criminal justice system, from the patrol officer on the streets to the suburban juror that has very limited personal interaction with African Americans. Those that make negative presumptions about African Americans are also likely to conclude that they got what they deserved, when they are victimized by crime. In this case the State does not want people who think that way on the jury, but the Defense very likely does.
What do you think?