DALLAS AREA PRACTICE OF EXCLUDING NATURALIZED CITIZENS FROM JURIES REVEALED

In a practice that did not come to light until after it was halted, Dallas, Texas court clerks were systematically excluding recently naturalized citizens from jury duty.  The custom was revealed when a Vietnamese immigrant who had been selected for a panel of potential jurors failed to appear in the courtroom for questioning.  One of the attorneys filed a motion for a mistrial in the case. While the motion was dropped, the discovery did lead to an investigation of the practice.  This investigation led to the discovery of the informal practice of excluding people who had been naturalized within the past six months and expressed concern about their English skills.

The practice apparently began about four years ago, after a judge advised clerks to excuse potential juror who had been naturalized within the past six months if they did not have sufficient English skills.  No one is certain of the identity of the judge who gave this advice.  The judges who discovered the custom say that since then they have informed court clerks that excusing potential jurors on such a basis is improper.

Some experts think the practice may lead to challenges regarding the outcome of earlier cases.  Others, however, believe such a challenge would be almost impossible to mount because of the difficulty of proving both that someone was improperly excluded and that their exclusion affected the outcome of the trial. 

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