Opinion ID: 2023647
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Excused Juror Under Householder Statute

Text: Finally, Baird contends that the trial court erred in excusing a juror pursuant to the requirement, since repealed, that a juror be a householder. IND.CODE § 33-4-5-7 (1993) (repealed by 1989 Ind.Acts, P.L. 282, § 2). This, he claims, resulted in violation of both his federal Sixth Amendment and Indiana constitutional right to be tried by a jury composed of a representative cross section of the community. [5] Specifically, Baird argues that the trial court's application of the householder statute to the venire was unconstitutional. The statute provided that a qualified juror must be a freeholder or householder, or the spouse of a householder, meaning that jurors should be actual members of the community [with] the experience of making important and binding practical decisions ... independently of family or relatives or others. Stevens v. State, 265 Ind. 396, 401, 354 N.E.2d 727, 731 (1976). [6] During voir dire, the trial court more narrowly defined a householder as a person who, with or without a spouse, was independent, self supporting, and maintained his or her own home. He then excused a juror who said she was unemployed and financially dependent on and living with her mother. Although Baird neither objected to the trial court's action at trial, nor raised this claim on direct appeal, Baird argues that the error was fundamental and therefore not waived. James, 613 N.E.2d at 25. Generally, an error is fundamental if it is so prejudicial to the rights of a defendant that it makes a fair trial impossible. Barany v. State, 658 N.E.2d 60, 64 (Ind.1995). Even if we were to assume that the trial court misconstrued the householder requirement, and that this error implicated Baird's Sixth Amendment rights, the resulting error is not necessarily fundamental. As we said in Wilson v. State, 514 N.E.2d 282, 284 (Ind.1987), [m]erely because an error relates to a violation of a constitutional right does not, in and of itself, render it fundamental error.... [T]he error must constitute a blatant violation of basic principles, the harm or potential for harm must be substantial, and the resulting error must deny the defendant fundamental due process. Baird's contention does not meet this standard. He makes no showing as to how the exclusion of one juror from the venire resulted in any harm that would affect the trial one way or the other. To the extent exclusion from the jury violated the juror's rights (as opposed to the defendant's) any error cannot be viewed as fundamental. Cf. Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400, 111 S.Ct. 1364, 113 L.Ed.2d 411 (1991); Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Co., 500 U.S. 614, 111 S.Ct. 2077, 114 L.Ed.2d 660 (1991). The issue is waived. Weatherford, 619 N.E.2d at 917.