Court Opinion

ID: 9681182
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:45:26.958442+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:32.560216
License: Public Domain

DAVIDSON, Judge,
(Dissenting.)
Appellant moved to quash the indictment because of discrimination practiced in the organization of the grand jury that returned the indictment in this case, setting out the grounds for such contention.
The trial court heard the motion, and the evidence offered in support thereof — properly certified by the trial court — is before this court.
If the right of appeal means anything, then in all fairness and justice this court ought to determine the question here presented. It should not leave the question undetermined and make a nullity of the right of appeal.
*560When the question is examined it will be found that the evidence shows that appellant’s contention is well taken and that members of the Negro race were expressly included as prospective grand jurors upon the grand jury venire, in express violation and in contravention of the rule laid down by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Cassell v. Texas, 94 L. Ed. 839, being violative of due process under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution.
The Supreme Court of the United States held in that case that unlawful discrimination in the organization of the grand jury can and may be effectuated by express inclusion of members of the Negro race upon the list of the grand jury venire from which the grand jury is to be drawn the same as by excluding therefrom members of the Negro race.
The Supreme Court of the United States having held as above and the facts bringing this case within the rule, so far as I am concerned I have no right not to follow that court.
I respectfully dissent.