Washington– the supreme court Tuesday seems likely to be ruled for A black death row inmate from Mississippi Who claims there was racial bias in the composition of the jury that convicted him.
The justices accepted an appeal by Terry Pitchford in a case similar to that of another black man on death row in Mississippi, whose conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court seven years ago.
The jury that sentenced Pitchford to death for his role in the murder of a North Mississippi grocery store owner had one black juror. Doug Evansa now-retired prosecutor with a history of dismissing black jurors for discriminatory reasons, excused four more black people.
The Supreme Court ruled 40 years ago Batson vs. Kentucky That jurors cannot be excused from service because of their race and that a system be established by which trial judges can evaluate claims of discrimination and race-neutral interpretations by prosecutors.
Pitchford’s case centers on whether his lawyers did enough to object to Judge Joseph Loeber’s rulings and whether the state Supreme Court acted reasonably in ruling that they did not.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh said he believed one of Pitchford’s lawyers spoke. “She’s trying to raise objections there,” Kavanaugh said, reading from a transcript of the trial.
There was widespread agreement that neither the judge nor the attorneys performed particularly well when selecting the jury.
“This is the most timid and reserved defense attorney I have ever encountered,” Justice Samuel Alito said.
But Alito also criticized Looper, who accepted Evans’ explanations and moved without analyzing whether race was to blame. “The judge did not handle the matter the way he should have handled it,” Alito said.
In 2019, the Supreme Court overturned the death sentence and conviction Curtis FlowersBecause of what Kavanaugh described As a “relentless and determined effort to rid the jury pool of black individuals.”
Mississippi Attorney General Scott Stewart sought to distinguish the Pitchford case from the Flowers case.
“In Flowers v. Mississippi, this court faced an extraordinary case and ruled against the state,” Stewart said. “This case is also exceptional but in a completely different way and requires a completely different outcome.”
The Supreme Court could rule on Pitchford’s case, but will leave it to lower courts to decide whether his conviction should be overturned.
Pitchford, now 40, was 18 when he and a friend decided to rob Crossroads Grocery, outside Grenada in North Mississippi. The friend shot store owner Robin Britt three times, fatally wounding him, but he was ineligible for the death penalty because he was younger than 18. Pitchford was tried for murder and sentenced to death.
The case has been working its way through the court system for 20 years. In 2023, U.S. District Judge Michael B. Mills Pitchford’s conviction overturned, He argued that the trial judge did not give Pitchford’s attorneys sufficient opportunity to argue that the prosecution was improperly dismissing black jurors.
Mills wrote that his ruling was motivated in part by Evans’ actions in previous cases. Unanimous committee of Fifth Circuit US Court of Appeals Overturn the ruling.
Kavanaugh, in an exchange with Stewart, praised Mills’ handling of the case. “Mills is a very experienced district judge. He’s a former Mississippi Supreme Court justice. He knows what he’s doing. He read the record very differently than I read it,” he said.