RACE: Historic Civil Rights Suit Filed in Alabama Over Exclusion of Blacks from Jury Service

On October 19, five African Americans filed a fed­er­al civ­il rights law­suit charg­ing that Alabama has ille­gal­ly exclud­ed blacks from serv­ing on death penal­ty juries in Houston and Henry Counties. The plain­tiffs in this class action suit were all pre­vi­ous­ly barred from serv­ing on juries in cap­i­tal or oth­er seri­ous felony cas­es. In each case, state courts found blacks were ille­gal­ly exclud­ed from jury ser­vice because of their race. Bryan Stevenson, lead attor­ney for the plain­tiffs and exec­u­tive direc­tor of the Equal Justice Initiative in Alabama, point­ed par­tic­u­lar­ly to the actions of District Attorney Douglas Valeska: ​“Mr. Valeska has repeat­ed­ly been found to have ille­gal­ly exclud­ed black peo­ple from jury ser­vice with peremp­to­ry strikes in cap­i­tal cas­es but he con­tin­ues the prac­tice because most peo­ple don’t know about it.” He con­tin­ued, ​“The under­rep­re­sen­ta­tion and exclu­sion of peo­ple of col­or from juries has seri­ous­ly dam­aged the cred­i­bil­i­ty and reli­a­bil­i­ty of the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem. Individual case rever­sals haven’t stopped this ille­gal prac­tice, so there must be greater account­abil­i­ty.” The law­suit alleges that, from 2006 to 2010, state pros­e­cu­tors in Dothan used peremp­to­ry strikes to exclude 82% of qual­i­fied black jurors in death penal­ty cas­es. As a result, the jury in every death penal­ty case in Houston County over this peri­od has been either all white or had only a sin­gle black juror, despite the fact that the cir­cuit is near­ly 25% African American. Houston County has the high­est per capi­ta death sen­tenc­ing rate in Alabama.

The attor­neys believe this class action suit is the first-ever direct­ed at a pros­e­cu­tor’s racial­ly dis­crim­i­na­to­ry use of peremp­to­ry strikes filed by the actu­al vic­tims of the discrimination.

(“African Americans Illegally Barred From Serving on Juries Sue Alabama Prosecutor Over Racial Discrimination,” Press Release, Equal Justice Initiative, October 19, 2011). See EJI’s report Illegal Racial Discrimination in Jury Selection: A Continuing Legacy. See also ​“Are Southern Juries Still Racially Rigged?” (BET News). Read more about Arbitrariness and Race.