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The case of the 'liberal' medallion
Prosecutor called gold necklace valid reason for rejecting juror, but judge didn't agree and let him serve
04:20 PM CST on Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Steve Ward wasn't asked a single question during two hours of jury
selection in a Dallas felony court last year.
But prosecutor Lara Peirce noticed the gold chain around his neck. And
when it came time to identify the 10 jurors she was allowed to reject,
Mr. Ward's name was on the list.
Ms. Peirce told the court that Mr. Ward was wearing a gold chain that
showed "a very prominent theater mask." Fans of the theater tend to be
liberal, she said, and not good jurors for the prosecution.
But when questioning of the pool of 60 Dallas County residents
concluded, defense attorney Russell Wilson II requested a hearing on why
the state wanted to send Mr. Ward and three other eligible blacks home.
State District Judge Mary E. Miller ultimately ruled that prosecutors
had given "race-neutral" reasons for striking three of the prospective
black jurors, but the reason for Mr. Ward's removal didn't pass muster.
She ruled that the
strike was based on race and called the prosecution's justification
"overreaching and overbroad."
"And it is masking the true reason why the state was striking Mr. Ward,"
the judge told Ms. Peirce.
Mr. Ward, a 41-year-old Garland truck driver, became the first juror –
and the only black one – seated for the weeklong trial of an ex-con
charged with pointing a gun at a police officer. He voted with the other
11 jurors to convict the defendant on a lesser charge of aggravated
assault with a deadly weapon, a second-degree felony.
In fact, until contacted by The Dallas Morning News this year,
Mr. Ward didn't know that the judge had ruled he was originally removed
from the jury because of his race – and even then, he quietly shrugged
off the controversy.
"That don't bother me," Mr. Ward said. "But the ones who pay the biggest
price for that kind of thinking are the ones on trial."
For the record, Mr. Ward says he's not a big fan of the theater, and he
doesn't own a gold theater mask medallion.
The morning he showed up for jury duty, he was wearing a 20-year-old
gold rope chain with a fingernail-size antique car dangling from it.
"I was sitting right in front, and I didn't think it [the chain] was
that obvious. I guess they couldn't think of another reason to get rid
of me, because I didn't say anything and they didn't ask me anything,"
Mr. Ward said.
"I guess there's still racism out there, like in politics and in the
courtrooms," he added, "but I don't let it bother me."
