Sue Hartigan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
v.
CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF APPEAL OF LOUISIANA , THIRDCIRCUIT
No. 96-1584. Argued January 20, 1998 - Decided April 21,
1998
A grand jury in Evangeline Parish, Louisiana, indicted petitioner
Campbell for
second-degree murder. In light of evidence that, for the prior 16 #275
years, no black
person had served as grand jury foreperson in the Parish even though
more than 20
percent of the registered voters were black, Campbell filed a motion to
quash the
indictment on the ground that his grand jury was constituted in
violation of his Fourteenth
Amendment equal protection and due process rights and the Sixth
Amendment's
fair-cross-section requirement. The trial judge denied the motion
because Campbell, a
white man accused of killing another white man, lacked standing to
complain about the
exclusion of black persons from serving as forepersons. He was
convicted, but the
Louisiana Court of Appeal ordered an evidentiary hearing, holding that
Campbell could
object to the alleged discrimination under the holding in Powers v. Ohio
, 499 U.S. 400,
that a white defendant had standing to challenge racial discrimination
against black
persons in the use of peremptory challenges. In reversing, the State
Supreme Court
declined to extend Powers to a claim such as Campbell's. It also found
that he was not
afforded standing to raise a due process objection by Hobby v. United
States , 468 U.S.
339, in which the Court held that no relief could be granted to a white
defendant even if his
due process rights had been violated by discrimination in the selection
of a federal grand
jury foreperson whose duties were purely "ministerial." Noting that the
Louisiana
foreperson's role was similarly ministerial, the court held that any
discrimination had little,
if any, effect on Campbell's due process right of fundamental fairness.
Held: 1. A white criminal defendant has the requisite standing to raise
equal protection
and due process objections to discrimination against black persons in
the selection of
grand jurors. Pp. 3-10.
(a) This case must be treated as one alleging discriminatory selection
of grand jurors, not
just of a grand jury foreperson. In the federal system and in most
States using grand
juries, the foreperson is selected from the ranks of the already seated
jurors. In Louisiana,
by contrast, the judge selects the foreperson from the grand jury venire
before the
remaining members are chosen by lot. In addition to his other duties,
the Louisiana
foreperson has the same full voting powers as other grand jury members.
As a result,
when the Louisiana judge selected the foreperson, he also selected one
member of the
grand jury outside of the drawing system used to compose the balance of
that body. Pp.
3-4.
(b) Campbell, like any other white defendant, has standing under Powers,
supra, to raise
an equal protection challenge to the discriminatory selection of his
grand jury . The
excluded jurors' own right not to be discriminatorily denied grand jury
service can be
asserted by Campbell because he satisfies the three preconditions for
third-party standing
outlined in Powers, supra, at 411. First, regardless of skin color, an
accused suffers a
significant "injury in fact" when the grand jury's composition is
tainted by racial
discrimination. The integrity of the body's decisions depends on the
integrity of the
process used to select the grand jurors. If that process is infected
with racial
discrimination, doubt is cast over the fairness of all subsequent
decisions. See Rose v.
Mitchell, 433 U.S. 545, 555-556. The Court rejects the State's argument
that no harm is
inflicted when a single grand juror is selected based on racial
prejudice because the
discrimination is invisible to the grand jurors on that panel, and only
becomes apparent
when a pattern emerges over the course of years. This argument
underestimates the
seriousness of the allegations here: If they are true, the impartiality
and discretion of the
judge himself would be called into question. Second, Campbell has a
"close relationship"
to the excluded jurors, who share with him a common interest in
eradicating discrimination
from the grand jury selection process, and a vital interest in asserting
their rights because
his conviction may be overturned as a result. See, e.g., Powers , 499 U.
S., at 413-414. The
State's argument that Campbell has but a tenuous connection to jurors
excluded in the
past confuses his underlying claim-that black persons were excluded from
his grand
jury-with the evidence needed to prove it-that similarly situated
venirepersons were
excluded in previous cases on account of intentional discrimination.
Third, given the
economic burdens of litigation and the small financial reward available,
a grand juror
excluded because of race has little incentive to sue to vindicate his
own rights. See id., at
415. Pp. 4-7.
(c) A white defendant alleging discriminatory selection of grand jurors
has standing to
litigate whether his conviction was procured by means or procedures
which contravene due
process. Hobby, supra , at 350 , proceeded on the implied assumption
that such standing
exists. The Louisiana Supreme Court's reading of Hobby as foreclosing
Campbell's
standing is inconsistent with that implicit assumption and with the
Court's explicit
reasoning in Hobby . Campbell's challenge is different in kind and
degree from the one
there at issue because it implicates the impermissible appointment of a
member of the
grand jury. What concerns Campbell is not the foreperson's performance
of his ministerial
duty to preside, but his performance as a grand juror, namely voting to
charge Campbell
with second-degree murder. The significance of this distinction was
acknowledged in
Hobby , supra, at 348. By its own terms, then, Hobby does not address a
claim like
Campbell's. Pp. 7-10.
2. The Court declines to address whether Campbell also has standing to
raise a
fair-cross-section claim. Neither of the Louisiana appellate courts
discussed this
contention, and Campbell has made no effort to meet his burden of
showing the issue was
properly presented to those courts. See Adams v. Robertson , 520 U. S.
___, ___ (per
curiam) . P. 10.
673 So. 2d 1061, reversed and remanded.
KENNEDY , J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court with respect
to Parts I, II, IV,
and V, and the opinion of the Court with respect to Part III, in which
REHNQUIST , C. J.,
and STEVENS , O'CONNOR , SOUTER , GINSBURG , and BREYER , JJ., joined.
THOMAS , J., filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part,
in which SCALIA
, J., joined.
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