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Any claim to jury partiality is focus on the jurors who ultimately sat on the jury panel and heard evidence. Sometimes a gerbils that he can keep an open mind as to all punishments. Defense counsel get a chance to question prospective jurors. For example, defense counsel may ask whether a juror can impose the death penalty. If you’ve been charged with murder, you need the best Tulsa criminal defense attorney.
The purpose of jury selection examination is to determine whether there are grounds to challenge a prospective juror for cause and to permit the intelligent use of peremptory challenges. The manner and extent of jury selection is within the discretion of the trial court. The trial court’s rulings with regard to jury selection will not be disturbed on appeal without a clear abuse of discretion. To facilitate jury selection, the trial court may restrict questions that are repetitive, irrelevant, or regard to legal issues upon which the trial court will instruct the jury. No abuse of discretion will be found as long as the jury selection process is conducted in a manner that allows the defendant a jury free of outside influence, bias, or personal interests.
The Supreme Court is held that a defendant accused of an interracial crime is entitled to have a prospective jurors informed of the race of the victim in question on the issue of racial bias. The Supreme Court explained that because of the range of discretion entrusted to jury in a death penalty sentencing hearing, there is a unique opportunity for racial prejudice to operate but remain undetected. The court further found that the risk of racial prejudice in a death penalty case is especially serious in light of the complete finality of the death sentence. By refusing to question prospective jurors on racial prejudice, the trial judge failed to adequately protect the defendant’s constitutional right to the partial jury.
The equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution prohibits the prosecution from challenging potential jurors solely on account of their race. In order to raise an equal protection challenge to the states use of peremptory challenges, the defendant must first make a prima facie showing the prosecutor as exercise peremptory challenges on the basis of race. Then the burden shifts to the prosecutor to articulate a race neutral explanation related to the case for striking the juror in question. The trial court must then determine whether to the the defendant has carried this burden of proving purposeful discrimination. The trial court’s findings are entitled to great deference. Those findings will be reviewed in the record in the light most favorable to the trial court’s ruling.
Past criminal history of either a prospective juror or relatives of the juror has been found to be a race neutral reason for removal. In evaluating the race tetralogy of an attorney’s explanation, the court must determine whether, assuming proffered reasons for the challenges are true to they violate the equal protection clause as a matter of law. A court addressing this issue must keep in mind the fundamental principle that official action will not be held unconstitutional solely because a results in a racially disproportionate impact. Proof of racially discriminatory intent or purpose is required to show a violation of the equal protection clause. Discriminatory purpose implies more than intent. Implies that the decision-maker selected a particular course of action at least in part because of its adverse effects upon an identifiable racial group.
The defendant argued on appeal of the trial court erred committing the decedents statements and deifying him as the attacker. He asserted that the hearsay statements were testimonial nature, and that their mission violate his rights under the confrontation clause. State responded that the decedent’s statements were an exception to hearsay. It said that the statements were a dying declaration. That’s why you need the best Tulsa criminal defense attorney.
The confrontation clause right does not prohibit admission of statements of an unavailable witness if the statements pair adequate indicia of reliability. Reliability can be established if the evidence falls within a firmly rooted hearsay exception. Reliability can be established also if it does not fall within exception but bears guarantees of trustworthiness.
The US Supreme Court has drawn a distinction between testimonial and non-testimonial hearsay statements. It noted that an accuser who makes a formal statement to a government officer bears testimony in a sense that a person who makes a casual remark to acquaintance does not. In order for testimonial evidence to be admissible the sixth amendment choirs what the common law required, which is unavailability and a prior opportunity for cross-examination.
The test for determining whether the admission of an out-of-court statement offered for the truth of the matter asserted focuses on whether the statement was testimonial or nontestimonial. Only testimonial statements cause the declarant to be a witness within the meaning of the confrontation clause. It’s the testimonial character of the statement that separates it from other hearsay. Dying declarations to not run afoul of the Constitution’s confrontation clause.
The US Supreme Court expanded upon the meaning of the word testimonial in a situation involving an ongoing emergency. Tulsa criminal defense attorney Stephen Cale said that the Supreme Court explained that statements or nontestimonial when made in the course of the police interrogation where the purpose of the questioning is to help police with an ongoing emergency. However statements are testimonial when the circumstances objectively indicate that there is no such ongoing emergency, and the purpose of interrogation is to establish prove past events potentially relevant to later prosecution.
To determine whether the primary purpose of police questioning is to enable police to meet an ongoing emergency there is an objective evaluation of the circumstances in which the encounter occurs. Whether an emergency exists is dependent upon the circumstances. A court will look at the totality of the circumstances. Interrogation to determine the need for emergency assistance can evolve into testimonial statements, said Tulsa criminal defense attorney Stephen Cale.