Source: https://openjurist.org/404/us/968
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 10:03:32+00:00

Document:
The issue for the jury was the relative credibility of two White police officers and the four Black defense witnesses. Cf. Note, 79 Yale L.J. 531 (1970). That this question was close is indicated by the fact that after some 5 1/4 hours of deliberation the jury reported itself deadlocked eight-to-four and an Allen charge was then given. See Allen v. United States, 164 U.S. 492, 17 S.Ct. 154, 41 L.Ed. 528 (1896). It took an additional hour of deliberation before the jury resolved the credibility issue against petitioner and returned a verdict of guilty.
Petitioner concludes that '[i]n the 1968 South District Jury Draw [from which his jury was selected], the cumulative effect of the * * * selection procedures * * * was such that the percentage selected from a white middle-class comparison area was 13 times as great as the percentage selected from a low-income black comparison area, and the exclusion of low-income Mexican-Americans was virtually total.'3 The opinion of the Court of Appeal and the argument of the respondent do not, in my mind, sufficiently rebut the prima facie showing petitioner has made that he has been denied the equal protection of the law by his conviction by a jury selected through racially biased procedures.4 'If there has been discrimination, whether accomplished ingeniously or ingenuously, the conviction cannot stand.' Smith v. Texas, 311 U.S. 128, 132, 61 S.Ct. 164, 166, 85 L.Ed. 84 (1940). It would seem enough, therefore, to reverse this conviction out of hand because of the racial bias built into the jury selection and because of the improper legal standard applied by the court below.
It would seem that this device is illsuited to serve any legitimate state interest and does serve to exclude from jury panels significantly disproportionate numbers of minority groups. The Constitution does not of course require racially-balanced juries because, in our pluralistic society, a group of 12 men and women could not possibly represent all of the ethnic, racial and economic groups which comprise our diverse culture. Swain v. Alabama, 380 U.S. 202, 208, 85 S.Ct. 824, 829, 13 L.Ed.2d 759 (1965); Cassell v. Texas, 339 U.S. 282, 286-287, 70 S.Ct. 629, 631-632, 94 L.Ed. 839 (1950); Akins v. Texas, 325 U.S. 398, 65 S.Ct. 1276, 89 L.Ed. 1692 (1945). What the Constitution demands, however, is that no such groups be consciously excluded from the selection process. See Hill v. Texas, 316 U.S. 400, 404, 62 S.Ct. 1159, 1161, 86 L.Ed. 1559; Smith v. Texas, 311 U.S. 128, 130, 61 S.Ct. 164, 165, 85 L.Ed. 84; 5 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Report, Justice 89-103 (1961).
Even if it were assumed that these exclusions were the unavoidable consequences of Los Angeles' method of jury selection, it does not follow that jury panels must be racially unrepresentative of the community. The names of prospective jurors are selected by a computer from voter registration lists. With modern sampling techniques, it would be a simple matter to program the computer so that its initial selection of names would—after the operation of these exclusions—yield a racially representative jury panel. Mills, A Statistical Study of Occupations of Jurors in a United States District Court, 22 Md.L.Rev. 205, 214 (1962).
See Appendix to this opinion.
The Court of Appeal argues, for example, that '[t]he poor, the Black and Mexican-Americans have the power to register to vote, and voter registration is free and relatively uncomplicated.' Crim. No. 17615, at 14. Be this as it may, this argument is unresponsive to petitioner's contention that jurors are selected from lists which are racially unbalanced.
Evidence was adduced at trial which indicated that, even apart from the unsupported changes in the grading of the examination, the test was likely invalid solely because of its vintage and the unrepresentative sample used to validate it in 1935.

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