Underrepresentation In A Jury Case Study

Issue Presented: With the continuing underrepresentation of groups in the juror selection process, what is the cause, and what can be done to obtain a fair cross section of jurors to serve on a jury?

Short Answer: The Sixth Amendment provides a cross section guarantee of jurors representing a community, and to provide the defendant with a fair and impartial jury for trial.

Statement of Facts: The issue of underrepresentation in a jury can certainly have a negative impact on criminal justice topic as a whole. The underrepresentation can certainly lead to an impartial jury. The underrepresentation can certainly lead to thoughts of racism and prejudice in the criminal justice society. “A racially homogenous jury pool can have a harmful impact

The representation of the community must be represented by the jury pool. Thus, if a community is fifty percent African American, and the jury pool is predominately white then that would be in violation of the defendants Sixth Amendment rights. This is issue is a more recent common one than many think. As recently as the early 1960’s courts still used what was known as blue ribbon juries. This allowed mainly educated white males of high moral character to be selected as jurors, thus not a true representation of most communities. In 1967, a survey conducted by federal courts showed as much as sixty percent still relied on this type of selection. However, in 1968 the Jury Selection and Service Act, was accepted. “This system for federal courts, declaring it henceforth to be the policy of the United States that all litigants in Federal courts entitled to trial by jury shall have the right to grand and petit juries selected at random from a fair cross section of the community. In 1975, the Supreme Court extended the ideal of the cross-sectional jury to state courts as well, rul¬ing that the very meaning of the constitutional guarantee of trial by an impartial jury required that the jury pool be a mirror image or microcosm of the eligible community population.” (Abramsson, 2008) With these landmarks passing the right to a fair and impartial jury should be guaranteed to all individuals facing a trial