Particle.news
Download on the App Store
6 ARTICLES
·
13h ago

Supreme Court to Hear Terry Pitchford Appeal on Waiver of Batson Challenge

The case revisits jury practices of former Mississippi prosecutor Doug Evans in a capital trial.

The U.S. Supreme Court poses for a photo in Washington, D.C. on October 7, 2022.
FILE - The Supreme Court Building is seen in Washington on March 28, 2017. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
Chief Justice John Roberts and current associate justices Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett and Ketanji Brown Jackson on Feb. 07, 2023 at the U.S. Capitol.
Image

Overview

  • The justices granted review limited to whether the Mississippi Supreme Court unreasonably concluded Pitchford waived his challenge to the prosecution’s dismissal of four Black jurors.
  • Arguments are expected in spring 2026 with a decision likely by the end of June 2026, according to the Court’s term schedule.
  • The Court granted Pitchford in forma pauperis status, a fee waiver the justices rarely approve.
  • Pitchford was sentenced to death for the 2004 killing of Reuben Britt after a jury was seated with one Black juror following prosecutors’ strikes of four Black panelists.
  • A federal judge overturned the conviction over curtailed Batson litigation at trial, but a federal appeals court reversed, and the case now returns to the Supreme Court, which previously rebuked Evans’s juror strikes in the 2019 Curtis Flowers decision.