Opinion ID: 2514211
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Jury Selection Challenges

Text: Clark argues that the trial court erred in denying certain of his juror challenges for cause, and in granting certain of the state's challenges for cause, and that such rulings denied Clark's constitutional right to a fair and impartial jury. At the threshold this issue is not properly raised because Clark accepted the jury as ultimately empaneled and did not exercise all of his peremptory challenges. Under well-settled case law, Clark can therefore show no prejudice based on the jury's composition. State v. Tharp, 42 Wash.2d 494, 500, 256 P.2d 482 (1953) (defendant must show the use of all his peremptory challenges or he can show no prejudice arising from the selection and retention of a particular juror and is barred from any claim or error in this regard); State v. Collins, 50 Wash.2d 740, 744, 314 P.2d 660 (1957) (no prejudicial error where defendant accepted the jury while having available peremptory challenges; nor did he challenge the panel); State v. Robinson, 75 Wash.2d 230, 231-32, 450 P.2d 180 (1969) (no prejudice may be shown where defendant failed to use all of his peremptory challenges); Gentry, 125 Wash.2d at 616, 888 P.2d 1105 (where defendant participated in selecting and ultimately accepted jury panel, his constitutional right to an impartial jury selected by him was not violated). We most recently reiterated this rule in State v. Elmore, 139 Wash.2d 250, 277, 985 P.2d 289 (1999), cert. denied, 531 U.S. 837, 121 S.Ct. 98, 148 L.Ed.2d 57 (2000). Clark seeks to distinguish this weight of authority by arguing that in his case the court used the struck method of voir dire [3] by which Clark knew ahead of time which juror would be seated had he exercised his final peremptory challenge. The prospective juror Clark was concerned about was Richard Lippincott (number 82) whose responses during voir dire seemed to indicate, although not unequivocally, that he would vote for a death sentence automatically upon a finding of guilty. As Clark thought Mr. Lippincott was the next juror to be seated should he exercise his final peremptory, Clark held back and used a peremptory challenge set aside for alternate jurors to keep Mr. Lippincott from serving as an alternate on the jury. Therefore Clark claims his defense, while technically exercising only 11 of [his] 12 peremptory challenges, effectively used [his] final peremptory challenge to exclude Mr. Lippincott from sitting on the jury. Br. of Appellant at 139-40. However Clark does not brief, argue, or cite to any authority which would except the struck method of jury selection from the basic and well-established principle requiring the use of all peremptory challenges in order to show prejudice from the composition of a particular jury. Moreover, the state challenged in its brief and at oral argument the fact that Mr. Lippincott was indeed the next juror to be seated; rather the state claimed juror Dorothy Peterson (number 76) was next in line. Br. of Resp't at 55. In response, counsel for Clark conceded at oral argument that in fact Ms. Peterson was next in line. See RP (Mar. 26, 1997) at 2828 (voir dire of prospective jurors) (THE COURT: That would mean that our alternates would be Ms. Peterson, Mr. Jones and Mr. Lippincott. They are the next three in line.). In this case, Clark did not challenge any of the ultimately seated jurors for cause, nor did he use an available peremptory challenge against any of them. As any claim that the jury was not impartial must focus on the jurors who ultimately sat, Ross v. Oklahoma, 487 U.S. 81, 86, 108 S.Ct. 2273, 101 L.Ed.2d 80 (1988), and as Clark had apparently not expressed dissatisfaction with any jurors actually seated, we do not review the merits of this claim.