Digital Learning Commons: Just Mercy: Discrimination in jury selection

Discrimination in jury selection

Racial discrimination in jury selection is specifically prohibited by law in many jurisdictions throughout the world. In the United States, it has been defined through a series of judicial decisions. However, juries composed solely of one racial group are legal in the United States and other countries.

Articles and Resources

A Growing Number of State Courts Are Confronting Unconscious Racism In Jury Selection
When lawyers in Cedric Hobbs Jr.’s 2014 death penalty trial in Cumberland County, North Carolina, began picking a jury, the pool was 50 percent black. By the time the trial began, there were only two black people on the jury. When the defense accused prosecutors of racial discrimination in the selection process, they acted indignant. “Somehow we’re just racists in this county,” one told the judge.
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Schwartzapfel, Beth. “A Growing Number of State Courts Are Confronting Unconscious Racism in Jury Selection.” The Marshall Project, 11 May 2020, www.themarshallproject.org/2020/05/11/a-growing-number-of-state-courts-are-confronting-unconscious-racism-in-jury-selection.
How racism shapes jury selection
Study after study has shown that all-white juries are harsher on black defendants, make more errors, and discuss fewer of the case facts. And all-white juries, like in the case of Emmett Till, have historically been problematic. But they also aren’t a thing of the past.
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Chakraborty, Ranjani. “How Racism Shapes Jury Selection.” Vox, Vox, 12 Oct. 2018, www.vox.com/videos/2018/10/12/17968090/how-racism-shapes-jury-selection.
Supreme Court Takes On Racial Discrimination In Jury Selection
The U.S. Supreme Court wrestles with a problem that has long plagued the criminal justice system: race discrimination in the selection of jurors.
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Totenberg, Nina. “Supreme Court Takes on Racial Discrimination in Jury Selection.” NPR, National Public Radio, 2019, www.npr.org/2015/11/02/452898470/supreme-court-takes-on-racial-discrimination-in-jury-selection.

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