Thomas v. Lumpkin (Denial of Cert.)
143 S. Ct. 4, 214 L. Ed. 2d 154 (2022)
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Rule of Law:
The Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel is violated when defense counsel, in a capital case involving an interracial crime, fails to question or exercise peremptory strikes on prospective jurors who have expressed explicit bias against interracial marriage and procreation.
Facts:
- Andre Thomas, a Black man, was married to Laura Boren Thomas, a white woman, with whom he had a biracial son.
- Thomas was charged with murdering his estranged wife, their son, and his wife's daughter from a previous relationship.
- The killings were particularly gruesome, as Thomas attempted to remove the victims' hearts, believing it would free them from evil.
- Thomas turned himself into the police and confessed to the crimes later the same day.
- Thomas has a documented history of severe mental illness, including having removed both of his own eyeballs while incarcerated.
Procedural Posture:
- Andre Thomas was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in a Texas state trial court by an all-white jury.
- Thomas filed a state habeas corpus petition, arguing ineffective assistance of counsel for failing to strike biased jurors; the state court denied the claim without a hearing.
- The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest criminal court, adopted the lower court's findings and denied relief.
- Thomas filed a federal habeas petition in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, which was denied.
- Thomas appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, where a divided panel affirmed the denial of his petition.
- Thomas then filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court.
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Issue:
Does defense counsel provide constitutionally ineffective assistance in a capital case involving an interracial crime by failing to question or use available peremptory strikes on prospective jurors who explicitly state their opposition to interracial marriage and procreation?
Opinions:
Dissenting - Sotomayor
Yes, defense counsel provides constitutionally ineffective assistance under these circumstances. To establish ineffective assistance under Strickland v. Washington, a defendant must show both deficient performance and prejudice. Counsel's performance was deficient because they failed to question two of three jurors who expressed strong opposition to interracial marriage in their written questionnaires, a topic central to this capital case. This failure is inexcusable given the Supreme Court's holding in Turner v. Murray that a capital defendant in an interracial crime case is entitled to have jurors questioned on racial bias. The prejudice prong is also met because seating even one biased juror violates the Sixth Amendment right to an impartial jury, and the prosecutor exacerbated the prejudice by appealing to racial fears during the penalty phase.
Analysis:
This dissent from a denial of certiorari highlights a sharp division on how strictly to enforce the Sixth Amendment's guarantee of effective counsel in the face of overt juror bias. Authored by Justice Sotomayor, it signals that at least three justices believe the lower courts, particularly the Fifth Circuit, are applying an overly deferential standard to counsel's alleged 'strategic' decisions during voir dire. While not binding precedent, the dissent serves as a powerful critique of a system that allows jurors with explicit, relevant biases to decide a capital defendant's fate, arguing that such a failure is a clear structural error that renders the death sentence unconstitutional.
