Opinion ID: 187129
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Jury Selection and Service Act

Text: In Taylor v. Louisiana, 419 U.S. 522, 95 S.Ct. 692, 42 L.Ed.2d 690 (1975), the Supreme Court held that the Sixth Amendment affords the defendant in a criminal trial the opportunity to have the jury drawn from venires representative of the community. 419 U.S. at 537, 95 S.Ct. 692. Although [d]efendants are not entitled to a jury of any particular composition... the jury wheels, pools of names, panels, or venires from which juries are drawn must not systematically exclude distinctive groups in the community and thereby fail to be reasonably representative thereof. Id. at 538, 95 S.Ct. 692. The JSSA codifies this right, stating that federal litigants entitled to a jury trial have the right to grand and petit juries selected at random from a fair cross section of the community in the district or division wherein the court convenes. 28 U.S.C. § 1861. Appellant contends that his venire was not comprised of a fair cross section of Washington, D.C. due to the underrepresentation of blacks, and thus his rights under the JSSA were violated. The Supreme Court has established the following test for determining violations of the fair cross section requirement: [T]he defendant must show (1) that the group alleged to be excluded is a distinctive group in the community; (2) that the representation of this group in venires from which juries are selected is not fair and reasonable in relation to the number of such persons in the community; and (3) that this underrepresentation is due to systematic exclusion of the group in the jury-selection process. Duren v. Missouri, 439 U.S. 357, 364, 99 S.Ct. 664, 58 L.Ed.2d 579 (1979). The Government used a variety of statistical methods to calculate the degree to which blacks were underrepresented in appellant's jury venire, and argues that the disproportionate number of blacks did not rise to a legally cognizable level. Appellant does not directly refute the Government's argument; rather, he argues that the calculations raise a red flag as to this jurisdiction's jury selection system, particularly in light of the racial skewing that was observed in United States v. Spriggs, 102 F.3d 1245 (D.C.Cir.1996), and United States v. DeFries, 129 F.3d 1293 (D.C.Cir. 1997). Reply Br. for Appellant at 18. However, in neither Spriggs nor DeFries did the court find that the JSSA had been violated. See DeFries, 129 F.3d at 1301; Spriggs, 102 F.3d at 1253-54. More importantly, this court noted in DeFries that [u]nderrepresentation of a cognizable group in a single venire, without evidence of a greater pattern, is insufficient to establish the `systematic exclusion of the group' required by Duren.  129 F.3d at 1301 (citing Duren, 439 U.S. at 364, 99 S.Ct. 664). In this case, appellant appears to suggest that DeFries and Spriggs themselves supply evidence that there is systematic exclusion, but this argument fails for two reasons: (1) both DeFries and Spriggs concerned an alleged underrepresentation of whites, whereas this case involves an alleged underrepresentation of blacks; and (2) two cases decided more than 10 years ago, in combination with appellant's own single venire, are insufficient to establish systemic exclusion as required by Duren. In short, appellant has not offered sufficient reasons to remand this case for further investigation of his venire.