Opinion ID: 1683171
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the motion to quash the jury panel

Text: The appellant, on this motion, placed on the stand three supervisors and the chancery clerk of the county in an effort to show discrimination, because of race, in selecting, drawing and empaneling jurors. But these witnesses, with one accord, testified that there had been no discrimination whatever in the selection, drawing and empaneling of jurors as regards the white and Negro races; that they selected qualified persons of good intelligence, sound judgment, and fair character in strict conformity with Sec. 1766, Code of 1942, Rec.; and that there were no marks to indicate in any way the color of the potential jurors. Besides, six Negroes, registered and qualified persons, used as witnesses by the appellant, testified that they had been called for jury service several times in past years, and that others of like color were on the jury panels at those times. One witness testified that he remembered that eight or ten Negroes were called on the panel at one term last year. The trial judge stated into the record that he had been the presiding judge of that court since January 1943; that, to his knowledge, Negroes had not been systematically kept off of juries; and that the court had empaneled them on both grand and petit juries since he had been judge. He mentioned cases when Negroes actually sat on the panel in trials. He either drew the name of the jurors, or they were drawn by the statutory officers, when he did not perform this service, and that there was no instance of failing to select, or of excluding, Negroes because of their race. There had always been quite a number of such names in the boxes. (Hn 8) In other words, the evidence wholly failed to show any discrimination against Negroes in the selection and empaneling of jurors. And so, as it was said in Wilson v. State, 243 Miss. 859, 140 So.2d 275, at page 867: Appellant, therefore, did not meet his burden. His witnesses proved that the converse of his motion was true. See also Akins v. Texas, 325 U.S. 398, 65 S.Ct. 1276, 89 L.Ed. 1692, and cases there cited, Cf. also Hernandez v. Texas, 347 U.S. 475, 74 S.Ct. 667, 98 L.Ed. 866; Kennard v. State, 242 Miss. 691, 128 So.2d 572. This Court in Cameron v. State, 233 Miss. 404, 102 So.2d 355, observed that it was a matter of common knowledge that the supervisors, in most of the counties in the state, since the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Patton v. Mississippi, 332 U.S. 463, 68 S.Ct. 184, 186, 92 L.Ed. 76, have been placing the names of qualified Negroes in the jury boxes. Cf. also Goldsby v. State, 240 Miss. 647, 123 So.2d 429 (1960), cert. den., 365 U.S. 861, 81 S.Ct. 829, 5 L.Ed.2d 824, where a change of venue was granted because of lack of names of Negroes in the jury boxes in the county where the crime was committed. Manifestly the court correctly overruled the motion to quash the panel of jurors on account of the alleged discrimination against selection of Negroes for jury service.