The purpose behind this paper is to inform the reader about the importance and the influential outcome of the Batson V. Kentucky case. A simple overview of the case is the offender James Batson was an African American male from Kentucky. Batson was accused of burglary and receiving stolen merchandise in 1981. During the court proceedings, the judge conducted voir dire to determine the ability of the jurors and discharge the jurors that did not meet the proper qualifications. When it was the prosecutors turn to make peremptory challenges, he utilized four out of the six challenges to remove the four African Americans who were left on the jury panel. This procedure shaped an all white jury. Defense counsel opposed this development prior to the …show more content…
The original offense involves James Kirkland Batson, an African American man in Louisville, Kentucky in 1981. One day in September of 1981, James Batson and an associate decided to visit a house in Louisville, Kentucky. The two offenders decided to steal two handbags that were located on a door knob located on a door next to a married white couple. These purses contained several items such as some expensive rings. Batson is suspected of then pawning these items including the rings for fifteen dollars apiece. James Batson was later recognized as the offender by not only the victim but also the neighbor and the pawn shop representative. This identification led to Batson’s arrest and conviction on second-degree burglary, receiving stolen goods, and for being a continual felonious offender. The crimes committed by James Batson and his accomplice were not extraordinary in any manner. In fact, the offense itself was straightforwardly charged. James Batson was identified as the offender who not only burglarized the home but also was identified as the person whom pawned some of the items that were reported as being stolen. Had this been where the story ended Batson would be just another criminal. What happens later during the criminal proceeding is what makes this case so
On Feb. 2, 2002 a couple from Phoenix left on a trip to Tucson and were never heard from again – but now, a little more than 16 years later, Brian James Ferry stands accused of the alleged murders of Charles Martin Russell and Catherine Nelson. According to the Nicol Green, a prosecuting lawyer, Russell and Nelson drove up to Tucson to purchase a motorcycle being sold by Ferry. He had placed a false advertisement in the Arizona Republic and was selling the nonexistent motorcycle for $12,000.
Case Citation: Maryland v. Pringle 540 U.S. 366 (2003) Parties: State of Maryland, Petitioner / Appellant Joseph Jermaine Pringle, Defendant / Appellee Facts: On the morning of August 7th, 1999 at 3:16 a.m., a Baltimore Police Officer conducted a stop on a passenger car for speeding. As the officer approached the car he noticed it was occupied by three males one of which was the respondent, Joseph Jermaine Pringle located in the front passenger seat. As the driver retrieved the vehicle’s proof of registration for the glove compartment located in front of Pringle, the officer noticed what appeared to be a large amount of currency rolled up in the glove compartment in plain view. After obtaining the driver’s license and registration, the police officer went back to his patrol car and conducted a check for warrants and prior traffic violations.
Kentucky v. King 1 Audelio Camacho Professor Alva AJ 180 3-27-17 Kentucky v. King The Supreme Court Case of Kentucky v. King occurred on October 2005, when Police officers in Lexington, Kentucky did a “buy bust operation in which a confidential informant attempted to buy crack cocaine from a suspected drug dealer.” The undercover was police officer Gibbons. When officer Gibbons gave the signal that the transaction was completed, the police approached the scene with their marked police cars. Once they were close to the suspect, Officer Gibbons radioed in a description of the suspect and said that King had gone through a specific hallway at a apartment complex. As the officers got to the hallway, a door was shut closed and the officers smelled
Stanford v. Kentucky Stanford vs Kentucky is a supreme court case that caused major controversy. This court case was argued on March twenty-seventh of 1989 but was not decided until June twenty-sixth of 1989. This court case is based on a murder trial that was committed by Kevin Stanford in Kentucky. The court cases No. is 87-5765. This trial was difficult because the killer was only seventeen years old.
1) On August 28, 1986, a woman named Queen Madge White was found dead in her home in Rome, Georgia. She was a 79-year-old widow and was found to be beaten, sexually assaulted, and strangled to death. Her home had also been burglarized. Timothy Foster, an 18-year-old black male, confessed to the crime and officers recovered some of the stolen items from Foster’s home. The State subsequently indicted him for malice, murder, and burglary and the jury that was selected convicted him of capital murder and assigned the death penalty.
While Steele was investigating multiple robberies that occurred in the same vicinity a witness provided information of a vehicle that was possibly associated
In her book, The New Jim Crow, Alexander argues the discrimination of jury selections which is an unfair of treatment for people of color under the law (The Fourth Amendment). Moreover, she provides more information about the juries and juror race-based selection in the justice system. The statistical shows that there is approximately 30 percent of black man are automatically banned or rejected from the jury service and many cases all black jurors are eliminated with the irrational explanations, such as the physical appearance, clothing style, and even marital status (Alexander, 2012). She also reports the interesting case of the two black men who was convicted of second degree robbery in a Missouri court. In addition, she emphasizes that during
Following a jury trial in the Circuit Court for Baltimore County, appellant, James Davis (“Davis”), was convicted of one count of robbery with a dangerous weapon, three counts of use of a handgun in a felony or crime of violence, three counts of first-degree assault, and one count of first-degree burglary. For his offenses, Davis was sentenced to a total of thirty years’ incarceration. Davis appealed his conviction and the computation of his sentences. We affirmed the judgments in an unreported opinion. Davis v. State, No. 2509, Sep. Term 2003 (Md. Ct.
During the time of the Willie Francis trial, black lives were reflected as lower class citizens. Black lives were classified as a non-factor of importance and only mattered for the purpose of labor and production. In the small town of St. Martinville there was an evident divide among races and improper use of power; which created a lack of justice in the eyes of the law. There was an air in the town, that if a black person was accused of committing a crime; they must be guilty. Hearsay in the small town of St. Martinville was the law and set the tone for how people were accused and prosecuted.
“We all should know that diversity makes for a rich tapestry, and we must understand that all the threads of the tapestry are equal in value no matter what their color.”, says Maya Angelou putting in the spotlight the judgment of people based on how they look. The cases of Dred Scott vs. Sanford, Plessy vs. Ferguson, and Loving vs. Virginia all attempt to prove this point during the civil rights movement. These cases also make apparent the segregation of blacks in the court system. In 1864, the question of having freedom was brought into the courtroom by Dred and Harriet Scott in St. Louis City. Dred and Harriet Scott had been held captive in free territory and then brought back to a slave state.
The ability to create an enforceable law is an important part of the case, but the major significance lies in the cultural understanding of race and racism. The case makes a previously accepted theory of white supremacy and reduces it to segregation. Segregation is farther reduce to social customs that were largely ignored in society during the time that require a change and thinking about race, leading to changes in law. The trail is the first signs of a majority seeing Jim Crow laws as an evil. The verdict of the trail shows the concept of legally structured racism is unjust.
It is what provides the rightful punishment to those who test the privilege of freedom, those who violate the laws which provide a safe, and secure society. It is the great justice system, and with such power, fair utilization is expected, as it governs us all equally. The ideology of this system was a crown jewel of America; it was a symbol of an equal society. Although greatly improved today, it was not always like this, an equal perception of people. In the 1930’s, black people were discriminated in society, simply because of the color of their skin.
Peremptory Challenges are Ruining the Justice System Cassidy Watson, an African American male, has been wrongfully accused in the state of Alabama of murdering 10-year-old Mya Morris. Today, he sits within a courtroom awaiting his hearing to begin. Moments pass, and the plaintiff’s lawyer has struck a juror from the jury; this juror is the only African American seated at the mostly Caucasian jury. In response, the judge asks the lawyer to explain why he struck the juror. The lawyer stated that the African American woman was “too vocal about her opinions.”
Annotated Bibliography Alexander, M. (2010). The new Jim Crow: Mass incarceration in the age of colorblindness. New York: The New Press. Alexander opens up on the history of the criminal justice system, disciplinary crime policy and race in the U.S. detailing the ways in which crime policy and mass incarceration have worked together to continue the reduction and defeat of black Americans.
Twelve Angry Men is in many ways a love letter to the American legal justice system. We find here eleven men, swayed to conclusions by prejudices, past experience, and short-sightedness, challenged by one man who holds himself and his peers to a higher standard of justice, demanding that this marginalized member of society be given his due process. We see the jurors struggle between the two, seemingly conflicting, purposes of a jury, to punish the guilty and to protect the innocent. It proves, however, that the logic of the American trial-by-jury system does work.