All-White juries can convict Black defendants despite convincing exculpatory evidence

Evidence

In chapter 7, which is the final chapter on the criminal justice actors, Bergold and Kovera discuss bias in jurors. For as long as there have been jury trials, defendants have questioned whether racial bias impacts the verdicts rendered by nonrepresentative juries. One early example is the case of the “Scottsboro Boys” (Norris v. Alabama, 1935). In the face of convincing exculpatory evidence, an all-White jury convicted all nine Black defendants of sexually assaulting a White woman. The authors discuss the extent to which minorities—and, in particular, Blacks—fare worse than their White counterparts as a result of jury trials. While courts afford several protections against the prejudices of legal decision-makers, and while the ability of diversity to guard against biased legal decisions is incontrovertible, barriers to minorities serving on juries and racial bias in peremptory challenges remain significant hurdles. — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law, 34

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s interest in conviction-vs-measured-bias gaps: the ritual/explicit conviction of guilt (the verdict) diverging from evidence, echoing sincere-conviction-vs-measured-bias theme.
• QUESTION: The Scottsboro case is presented as early evidence that jury diversity guards against bias — worth chasing the Norris v. Alabama holding and its treatment of jury exclusion for a legal-facing footnote.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Joseph Avery, Jim Sidanius, Joel Cooper, Gregory Davis, Amanda N., Bias in the Law: A Definitive Look at…, 34