In all the noise about the gun case (Heller v. District of Columbia), SCOTUS's opinion in Snyder v. Louisanaopinion in Snyder v. Louisana seems to have passed without comment here, though it was issued yesterday. It's not a big or particularly closely watched case, but I think it's interesting in that it reveals that there are fissures within the more conservative block of the court on criminal justice issues in particular. The case was 7-2, with Alito writing the majority. Thomas dissented, joined by Scalia. So what's the case about? We'll start there after the break.
The Facts
Allen Snyder, an African-American was convicted of first degree murder in a Lousiana state court and sentenced to death. The crime in question was committed in 1995, and trial began in August 1996. During jury selection, 85 people were questioned. All but 36 were excused for cause or inability to serve--work committments, bias, and the like. Of those 36 potentials, 5 were African-American. The prosecution exercised preemptory challenges against all 5. After the guilty verdict, a direct appeal ensued and bounced back and forth through various state courts through the present case, including a previous vacatur of the conviction for reconsideration in light of prior SCOTUS precedent. Ultimately, the Supreme Court of Louisiana affirmed the conviction 4-3, finding that the prosecutor's conduct did not warrant vacating the conviction.
Snyder's argument was that the jury selection tactics of the prosecutor violated Batson v. Kentucky, which forbids purely racially based use of preemptory challenges, but only if the prosecutor can offer no other reason but race when asked to explain preemptory challenges, with a great deal of deference to the trial court's finding of a lack of bias. The explanation provided by the prosecutor for one of the strikes was
"Number 1, the main reason is that he looked very nervous to me throughout the questioning. Number 2, he's one of the fellows that came up to me at the beginning [of voir dire] and said he was going to miss class. He's a student teacher. My main concern is for that reason, that being he might, to go home quickly, come back with guilty of a lesser verdict so there wouldn't be a penalty phase. Those are my two reasons.
The Opinion
The Supreme Court, in Justice Alito's opinion, concluded that neither of these reasons passed muster, even under the loose Batson standard. First, the court found no record evidence that the trial court had made any finding as to the juror's demeanor or credited that reason, rendering that reason ineffective.
Alito's opinion also finds that the second proffered reason was not sufficient. Quoting at length from the voir dire, SCOTUS finds that the trial court considered whether the juror would be able to serve when determining whether recusal for cause was appropriate, and therefore, the second reason proffered by the prosecutor for striking the juror was insufficient, especially in light of the fact that the trial was inordinately short (2 days). Indeed, Justice Alito points out that the prosecutor did not exercise a preemptory challenge on a pair of white jurors who had similar employment situations.
Finally, Justice Alito concluded that in light of the apparent pretextual explanation offered by the prosecutor gave rise to an inference of discriminatory intent. Therefore, the conviction was reversed and sent back to Lousiana, likely for a new trial or potentially a plea bargain.
The Dissent
Justice Thomas (joined by Scalia) dissented. His dissent was characteristically brief. Basically, his argument is that the trial court accepted the reason, with knowledge that racial pretexts would be unacceptable, and we must defer to the trial court's find. Thomas also takes Alito slightly to task for referencing the pair of white jurors with similar situations, as the petitioner did not raise this comparison prior to his merits brief to the Supreme Court.
The Upshot
This isn't, by any means, a "landmark case." However, it's significant for two reasons.
- It really indicates that a strong majority of the court takes Batson seriously, and won't just defer to trial court findings when something just doesn't seem right about how a prosecutor exercises challenges.
- It reflects that there is a line and difference between Justices Scalia and Thomas and Justices Alito and Roberts on these issues. Yes, Alito's opinion is narrowly drawn, but it would have been easy (and altogether unsurprising) if he and/or Roberts had joined the "deference to the trial court" rationale of Thomas. There's a divide there that will be interesting to see how it plays out over the next years and decades.