In Dallas, Dismissal of Black Jurors Leads to Appeal by Death Row Inmate
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Carol Boggess says she was ”eager and willing to serve” on the jury in the 1986 capital murder trial of Thomas Miller-El in Dallas. When questioned by prosecutors, Ms. Boggess, an occupational therapist, said she strongly supported capital punishment and ”had no doubt at all” that she could sentence a person to death. Wayman Kennedy, a Sunday school teacher and church deacon, also wanted to be on the jury and told prosecutors he felt confident of his ability to impose a death penalty. So did Billy Jean Fields, a postal worker. Mr. Miller-El is black. He was charged with shooting two white hotel clerks, one of them fatally, during a robbery in November 1985. Ms. Fields, Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Boggess are also black. All were excluded from the jury panel by Dallas County prosecutors, as were seven of eight other blacks interviewed as prospective jurors. The jury the prosecutors accepted was composed of nine whites, one Filipino, one Hispanic and one black man who told prosecutors that he thought that execution was too easy, and that the appropriate punishment for murderers was to ”pour some honey on them and stake them out over an ant bed.” More : query.nytimes.com |