Barring of Blacks From Jury Cited as Conviction Reversed

By challenging prospective black jurors solely on the basis of their race, San Diego County prosecutors improperly forced a black man from Oceanside to be tried by an all-white jury that convicted him of murder, a state appellate court ruled Monday.

The 4th District Court of Appeal reversed the conviction of Curtis Eugene Washington, who was found guilty of second-degree murder in 1985 in the stabbing death a year earlier of James Thomas, also of Oceanside.

In a 2-1 decision, the appellate judges said San Diego County Superior Court Judge David Gill erred in allowing the district attorney’s office to use three of its four challenges to knock all the black prospective jurors out of the jury box for Washington’s trial.

Prior decisions by the state Supreme Court have held that a defendant’s right to be tried by a jury drawn from “a representative cross-section of the community” is violated when black jurors are excluded from the jury solely on the basis of their race.

El Cajon Municipal Judge Elizabeth Riggs, sitting temporarily on the appellate court, wrote in the majority opinion that county prosecutors failed to meet the standard established by earlier court rulings for demonstrating that their challenges of the black jurors were for reasons other than race.

Her ruling focused on the bumping of a young black male from the jury. Prosecutors argued that the man was challenged because he was indecisive and soft-spoken, but Riggs noted that the prospective juror had said he could reach an independent decision if selected to hear the case.

Prosecutors, she said, made only “desultory” inquiries of the prospective juror, insufficient to suggest that anything but his race was the real reason he was dropped from the jury.

Dissenting from the ruling, Presiding Justice Daniel Kremer said questioning by prosecutors revealed ample reason unrelated to race for challenging each of the black potential jurors. Kremer said Gill had carefully followed the rules outlawing race as a basis for rejecting jurors.

Ross Thomas, defense attorney for Washington, described the defense victory as “rare.” Deputy Atty. Gen. Lilia Garcia, who argued the prosecution case before the appellate court, said she had not seen the decision and was unprepared to comment on the ruling.

Prosecutors could seek a rehearing by the appellate court or ask the state Supreme Court to review the decision. If the decision stands, county prosecutors can refile the charges. In the meantime, Washington, who is serving a 16-year-to-life term, will remain in custody.

This was the second time Washington’s case had figured in a decision regarding race and juries.

In a 1984 ruling in the cases of Washington and another black defendant charged in North County, the appellate court declared unconstitutional the Vista Superior Court’s practice of drawing its jurors solely from the county’s 5th Supervisorial District.

Following the ruling, the Vista court began drawing jurors from the entire North County Judicial District, which extends beyond the 5th District’s boundaries to include several North County coastal communities.

Washington’s case, meanwhile, was transferred to the downtown San Diego courthouse, where his attorneys had argued it was more likely blacks could be seated on a jury.

Just last week, however, the state Supreme Court, taking up the issue of Vista juries for the first time, ruled that defendants could get fair trials in the Vista court even though its jurors are drawn solely from North County, which has a black population percentage only one-third that of the county as a whole.