Opinion ID: 1860205
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Winstead's Jury Was Fairly Selected.

Text: Winstead next contends that he was denied his right to fair jury selection procedures. He complains that he was denied an adequate opportunity to canvas the venire regarding racial prejudice and also that the trial court erred when it refused to strike for cause a panel member who indicated that he would not consider mitigating circumstances. We review the trial court's conduct of voir dire under the abuse of discretion standard. Thompson v. Commonwealth, 147 S.W.3d 22 (Ky. 2004) (scope of voir dire); Sherroan v. Commonwealth, 142 S.W.3d 7 (Ky.2004) (strikes for cause).
This was a capital case in which the defendant was African-American and the victim Caucasian. Winstead had also been involved in romantic relationships with Caucasian women. Under these circumstances, as Winstead correctly notes, both the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and RCr 9.38 gave him the right to question potential jurors regarding racial prejudice. Turner v. Murray, 476 U.S. 28, 106 S.Ct. 1683, 90 L.Ed.2d 27 (1986). At the beginning of individual voir dire, Winstead asked one of the panel members whether she agreed that in this State's history racial prejudice had been, and that it continued to be, a serious social problem. He also asked how she would react to an interracial romantic relationship in her own family. The Commonwealth objected to these questions as straying from the issues in the case. Defense counsel argued that because panel members were apt to be reluctant to admit racial bias or even to be unaware of their bias, he should be allowed questions somewhat more likely to elicit racial attitudes than direct questions about prejudice. The court agreed with the Commonwealth, however, and essentially limited voir dire on race to the following questions: Does the fact that the defendant is an African-American have any bearing on your judgment in this case? Would the fact that individuals in this case were involved in interracial relationships have any bearing on your judgment? Would the fact that the defendant is African-American and the victim Caucasian have any bearing on your judgment? Winstead contends that the court unduly restricted the voir dire and thus denied him his right to an impartial jury. We disagree. Although, as noted, Winstead had a constitutional right to canvas the panel concerning race (or at least to have the panel canvassed), the Supreme Court has made clear that as long as the subject of race is raised and the panel members put upon their oath, the manner of the canvassing lies within the trial court's very broad discretion: [T]he trial judge retains discretion as to the form and number of questions on the subject, including the decision whether to question the venire individually or collectively. Turner, 476 U.S. at 37, 106 S.Ct. 1683. For voir dire questions to be constitutionally compelled, the Court has explained, it is not enough that such questions might be helpful. Rather, the trial court's failure to ask these questions must render the defendant's trial fundamentally unfair. Mu'Min v. Virginia, 500 U.S. 415, 425-26, 111 S.Ct. 1899, 114 L.Ed.2d 493 (1991). Winstead's proposed questions aimed at probing the panel members' racial attitudes do not meet this standard. Even if Winstead's counsel deemed them helpful, we cannot say that Winstead's trial was rendered fundamentally unfair or that the trial court abused its discretion when it focused voir dire on the particular racial facts confronting the jurors in this case. The questions allowed by the court gave it and the parties an opportunity to assess not only the panel members' verbal responses to the racial aspects of the case, but their demeanor as well, and thus provided an adequate basis both for challenges for cause and for peremptory strikes. The result is no different under RCr 9.38. It is certainly true, as Winstead notes, that [t]here can be no question that an adequate voir dire examination is essential to the seating of a fair and impartial jury. Woodall v. Commonwealth, 63 S.W.3d 104, 116 (Ky.2001). Under our rule, however, as under the federal Constitution, [t]he extent of direct questioning by counsel during voir dire is a matter within the discretion of the trial court. Fields v. Commonwealth, 274 S.W.3d 375, 392 (Ky.2008) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). For the reasons discussed above, we are not persuaded that the trial court abused its discretion in this case.
Nor did the trial court abuse its discretion when it refused to strike juror 29 for cause. At the outset of voir dire, the trial court informed the potential jurors that if they found the defendant guilty they would be asked to decide upon one of five authorized penalties. The jurors were shown a list of these penalties, ranging from twenty years to death. The court informed them that in fixing a penalty they would also be asked to consider any aggravating or mitigating circumstances and explained the meaning of those terms. During individual voir dire, each potential juror was asked if he or she could consider the full range of penalties and whether he or she would consider mitigating evidence. In the course of his examination, Juror 29 stated that he would consider the death penalty but would not automatically vote to impose it, that he could imagine circumstances in which imprisonment for twenty years would be an appropriate punishment for murder and robbery, and that he would consider evidence offered in mitigation of the offense. When defense counsel asked if he would take the facts of the defendant's life into consideration, Juror 29 said that he probably would, but he could not be sure until he knew the facts of the case. Defense counsel then asked if the defendant's poverty and family history would bear on his decision, and Juror 29 replied that they would not. The court made sure that Juror 29 understood that the question was not whether those factors would bear on the defendant's guilt but whether they would bear on his punishment, and Juror 29 reiterated that poverty and family background would not affect his sentencing decision. At that point defense counsel moved to have Juror 29 struck for cause. Counsel argued that Juror 29's expressed attitude toward poverty and family background amounted to a disqualifying bias against mitigation. The court took the motion under advisement and ultimately denied it. At the conclusion of voir dire, Winstead used a preemptory strike to remove Juror 29 and preserved his objection to the trial court's ruling by otherwise exhausting his preemptory challenges. Shane v. Commonwealth, 243 S.W.3d 336 (Ky.2008). He contends on appeal that the trial court's refusal to strike Juror 29 for cause infringed his constitutional right to a jury able to consider mitigating circumstances. We disagree. The United States Supreme Court has held that under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution a capital defendant is entitled to an individualized sentencing by a jury allowed to consider and give effect to any mitigating evidence that the defendant can produce. Penry v. Johnson, 532 U.S. 782, 121 S.Ct. 1910, 150 L.Ed.2d 9 (2001); Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U.S. 104, 102 S.Ct. 869, 71 L.Ed.2d 1 (1982). In furtherance of that right, the Court has also held that such a defendant is entitled to have removed for cause any potential juror so biased in favor of the death penalty that he would automatically vote for that penalty regardless of any mitigating evidence. Such a juror, the court explained, will fail in good faith to consider the evidence of aggravating and mitigating circumstances as the instructions require him to do. Indeed, because such a juror has already formed an opinion on the merits, the presence or absence of either aggravating or mitigating circumstances is entirely irrelevant to such a juror. Therefore, based on the requirement of impartiality embodied in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, a capital defendant may challenge for cause any prospective juror who maintains such views. Morgan v. Illinois, 504 U.S. 719, 729, 112 S.Ct. 2222, 119 L.Ed.2d 492 (1992). A potential juror should be disqualified, therefore, who would automatically impose the death penalty and give no consideration to mitigating circumstances. Winstead would expand this rule to disqualify a potential juror who, like Juror 29, would give no weight to a particular mitigating factor. That is not what the Supreme Court has held, however, and in Sherroan, 142 S.W.3d at 14, we rejected a similar invitation to expand upon the Supreme Court's rulings. In that case we rejected a claim that voir dire into particular mitigating factors was constitutionally mandated and explained that a capital defendant's right to individualized sentencing does not entitle [him] to jurors who are bound to weigh mitigating evidence in his favor. Because Juror 29 indicated that he would not automatically impose the death penalty but could conceive of mitigating circumstances that would justify the minimum penalty and that he would consider mitigating evidence, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in ruling that he was not disqualified under Morgan and related Supreme Court precedent. The fact that Juror 29 was disinclined to see poverty and a difficult family life as factors mitigating murder and robbery did not betray an attitude so closed to all mitigation as to suggest a prejudgment on the merits and so does not undermine the trial court's decision. Again, the result is no different under our rules. RCr 9.36 provides that [w]hen there is reasonable ground to believe that a prospective juror cannot render a fair and impartial verdict on the evidence, that juror shall be excused as not qualified. In Sherroan, supra , we noted that a disqualifying bias need not be imputed to the fact that a juror may favor harsher penalties. Id. at 16. Similarly, Juror 29's unwillingness to say that he would find mitigating the defendant's poverty and family background did not indicate that he was incapable of rendering a fair verdict on the evidence. He was not obliged, after all, to weigh that particular evidence in Winstead's favor, and otherwise he indicated that he would consider the full range of penalties and would consider as well the facts of Winstead's life. The trial court did not abuse its discretion under the rule when it declined to strike Juror 29 for cause.