Way back when I arrived in Texas, in 1984, the newspaper where I started working had just begun an editorial campaign to change the way the state impaneled grand juries.
The Jefferson County criminal justice system had come under fire over suspicions that a grand jury might have been seated to get back at political foes of a district judge. Our newspaper, the Beaumont Enterprise, disliked the jury commissioner system and we called for a change to select grand juries the way the state seats trial juries — using the voter registration rolls.
We finally persuaded the county’s two criminal district judges to adopt a random selection method.
Well, this week, Gov. Greg Abbott signed a bill into law that makes it a requirement to seat grand juries in a random method.
http://www.texastribune.org/2015/06/19/abbott-signs-grand-jury-reform-legislation/
It’s a good day for the state’s criminal justice system.
As the Texas Tribune reports: “Under House Bill 2150, the state will no longer use the outdated system that lets judge-appointed commissioners pick jurors, a nationally uncommon practice that critics say is rife with potential for conflicts of interest.”
The oldĀ system allowed judges to pick jury commissioners, usually friends, to find grand jurors. It’s been called a “pick a pal” system. Friends pick friends, who then might be friends with the judgeĀ whose court has jurisdiction.
The “potential for conflicts of interest” surely did exist.
I once served on a grand jury, in Randall County, that was pickedĀ by the old method. We had an uneventful term, meeting every other week for several months. I learned a lot about my community.
My participationĀ as a grand juror, though, all but eliminated me from consideration for a trial jury, District Attorney James Farren told us, as we then would be seen as “pro-prosecution” by defense counsel.
That’s fine.
But I’m still quite glad to see the Texas Legislature enact this long-needed reform, which follows the modelĀ used in theĀ vast majority of other states.
If a randomly selected trial jury is qualified to sentence someone to death, then a randomly selected grand jury ought to be qualified to determine whether the crime should be prosecuted in the first place.
