Thomas Miller-El received a life sen­tence from a Texas judge after plead­ing guilty to a Dallas mur­der in exchange for the pros­e­cu­tion’s agree­ment not to seek the death penal­ty. Miller-El had orig­i­nal­ly been sen­tenced to death in 1986. He raised an appeal assert­ing that poten­tial black jurors had been improp­er­ly stopped from serv­ing at his tri­al. The appeal was denied by the low­er courts, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled (8 – 1) in 2003 that he should have been grant­ed addi­tion­al review of his claim in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (Miller-El v. Cockrell). The Fifth Circuit did review his bias claim but denied him any relief. The U.S. Supreme Court again reviewed his case and this time ruled (6 – 3) that blacks had been uncon­sti­tu­tion­al­ly elim­i­nat­ed from Miller-El’s tri­al jury, and, hence, he was enti­tled to a new tri­al (Miller-El v. Dretke (2005)).

Miller-El, who is 56, also agreed not to appeal his case fur­ther. He will serve a life sen­tence for the mur­der plus 20 years for aggra­vat­ed assault.

The U.S. Supreme Court ref­er­enced a Dallas Morning News study indi­cat­ing that a high per­cent­age of blacks were struck from jury ser­vice in Dallas County around the time of Miller-El’s tri­al. There was also ref­er­ence to an ear­li­er pros­e­cu­tor’s man­u­al that rec­om­mend­ed exclud­ing ​“Jews, Negroes, Dagos and Mexicans or a mem­ber of any minor­i­ty race on a jury, no mat­ter how rich or how well edu­cat­ed.” Although the man­u­al was no longer in use, the defense argued that such philoso­phies con­tin­ued to influ­ence jury selec­tion in the 1980s.

(J. Emily, ​“Death penal­ty case that high­light­ed jury bias ends in plea deal,” Dallas Morning News, March 20, 2008). See Supreme Court and Race.

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