Posted on 01/21/2014 12:20:54 PM PST by nickcarraway
A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that potential jurors may not be removed from a trial during jury selection solely because of sexual orientation, extending to gays and lesbians a civil right that the U.S. Supreme Court has previously promised only women and racial minorities.
A unanimous three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that striking someone from a jury pool because he or she is gay constitutes unlawful discrimination. Its 39-page decision came in an antitrust and contract dispute between two rival drug companies over the price of a popular AIDS drug.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcbayarea.com ...
So I can’t use that excuse to get out of jury duty any more.
“Gayness” is not a protected status, yet.
So they go through Wadeer and then a “Batson” Challenge is initiated?
Gotta read the article to see if the “Gay” juror was removed for reasons of “Affinity”.
Sounds like the gay was removed for a legitimate reason. Wonder why the attorney didn’t initially say it was for cause?
-PJ
Well, there you go.
The juror most certainly could have a biased affinity and I think was properly removed.
He said his partner had AIDS and the trial involved a drug company. I suspect they took him off because they were worries the AIDS connection may have prejudiced him against a drug company.
The U.S. Supreme Court has previously held that even peremptory challenges cannot be used to systematically exclude blacks or women from juries. So if one lawyer uses permptories against all of the blacks or women on the panel, he will have to explain to the judge a non-discriminatory reason.
This decision expands that same rule to gays.
Can I ask a stupid question?
How do you know if someone is gay?
Are potential jurors required to disclose this?
Are lawyers making prejudicial judgements that someone looks gay or is acting in a stereotypical gay manner?
FTA...
“Abbott denied the allegation and said it had several reasons to remove the potential juror, which included his having a friend dying of AIDS.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I’d bet good money the juror wasn’t removed because he was gay; but rather it was evident that he was biased one way or the other.
But this being the 9th Circus and all....
Sorry, but a person is to be judged by their peers, anyone who looks at a guys hairy anus and thinks that’s heaven on earth is not a peer... but something that rhymes with it.
Unless homosexual behavior is pertinent to the trial, it should make no difference. If it is they should be removed for cause. Would they allow a self-proclaimed Nazi to stay on a jury trying a Nazi?
Our homosexual Supreme Court Justices should have had to recuse themselves in any case involving homosexual “rights”.
HOMOSEXUAL, because there’s nothing GAY about it.
Civil rights have to be based either on rights which the states have amended the Constitution to expressly protect, imo, or on 10th Amendment protected state laws which don’t abridge constitutionally enumerated rights. And the states have never amended the Constitution to protect so-called gay rights, activist judges wrongly legislating such rights from the bench in states which make laws which constitutionally discriminate against gay issues.
As a side note to civil rights, the states have not amended the Constitution to protect minority rights or women’s rights in general, but only in the context of voting rights as evidenced by the 15th and 19th Amendmens respectively.
When gays get protected status and start harassing heterosexuals in court, all the heterosexuals have to do is momentarily become gay.
Who can say someone isn’t gay?
There’s a certain logic in this. If the 9th Circus (San Francisco) let you strike gay people from jury panels, you wouldn’t be able to seat a jury, would you?
Oh, and something about “seat the jury” in San Francisco just doesn’t sound good...
They were tipped off when he said he was hoping for a hung jury.
Gay Juror Taken Off Panel Improperly...
What’s Panel’s first name and was he hurt when the fag was taken off improperly?
1. Consider the source; The 9th Circus Court of Unreal.
2. This case was in regard to an AIDS drug; an automatic conflict of interest for a sodomite!
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