Opinion ID: 2360649
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Voir Dire on Death Penalty

Text: For his final point, Greene contests the prosecutor's question on voir dire of whether the prospective juror could impose the death penalty. The correct question, according to Greene, was whether the prospective juror could consider the death penalty after weighing all the facts. We fail to discern a significant distinction between questioning about imposition of the death penalty and consideration of the death penalty. To the extent Greene is objecting to a death-qualified jury, we have recently rejected that argument as has the United States Supreme Court. See Williams v. State, 338 Ark. 97, 991 S.W.2d 565 (1999); see also Lockhart v. McCree, 476 U.S. 162, 106 S.Ct. 1758, 90 L.Ed.2d 137 (1986). In his reply brief, Greene is more precise in his argument and contends that a juror, Mrs. Dodge, was improperly excused for cause because she said she could not sign a verdict form assessing the death penalty. Greene cites us to the case of Witherspoon v. State, 391 U.S. 510, 88 S.Ct. 1770, 20 L.Ed.2d 776 (1968). Ironically, though, he quotes from a footnote in that case that a prospective venire person cannot be irrevocably committed against the death penalty regardless of the facts. 391 U.S. at 523, n. 21, 88 S.Ct. 1770. That is precisely what the trial court found to be the case with respect to Mrs. Dodge. There was no abuse of discretion by the trial court.