A Growing Number of State Courts Are Confronting Unconscious Racism In Jury Selection

When lawyers in Cedric Hobbs Jr.’s 2014 death penalty trial in Cumberland County, North Carolina, began picking a jury, the pool was 50 percent black. By the time the trial began, there were only two black people on the jury. When the defense accused prosecutors of racial discrimination in the selection process, they acted indignant. “Somehow we’re just racists in this county,” one told the judge.Prosecutors presented a range of justifications. One black man, according to court documents, “had once been a member of a gang in his youth.” Another...