Opinion ID: 2076252
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Jeffrey Nesson

Text: Prospective juror Nesson was a criminal defense lawyer. He testified that the fact that the victim was a police officer did not predispose him in favor of the death penalty, but it certainly doesn't help. Hunt's major complaint with Nesson was his expression of unwillingness to consider voluntary use of drugs to be mitigating. When first asked about whether drug use by Hunt would be a mitigating factor, Nesson stated: It depends on why he was using them. If it is strictly voluntary use, I don't know that it would mitigate the crime. Later in the voir dire, he stated: [V]oluntarily taking drugs and going out and shooting someone does not mitigate [the crime] ... I think it aggravates it, not mitigates it. He did, however, indicate that he could impose punishment in accordance with the law. Hunt's contention seems to be that jurors should be excused for cause if they might have some bias against any unenumerated circumstance that a defendant wishes to argue ought to be mitigating. Such a contention is far beyond the Witt standard and we decline to apply it. The death penalty statute grants jurors the discretion to find the existence of mitigating circumstances other than the seven enumerated. A jury would not be impartial if it was composed exclusively of jurors predisposed to find as mitigating the factors or circumstances the defendant intends to argue ought to be mitigating. The statute was intended to provide jurors with the flexibility to find mitigating factors that the legislature may not have enumerated. It was not intended to guarantee the defendant a jury that always agrees with his argument as to what circumstances ought to be mitigating. It was not error for the trial judge to refuse to excuse juror Nesson.