Thomas v. Georgia
Annotate this CaseJoseph Thomas was convicted by jury of murder and other crimes in connection with the shooting death of Gregory Savelio. In his sole claim of error, Thomas contended the trial court erred in denying his Batson challenge to the State’s use of its peremptory strikes to remove African-Americans from the jury pool. Specifically, Thomas contended the trial court failed to properly scrutinize whether the prosecutor’s facially race-neutral reasons for striking Jurors 18, 31, and 42 were pretextual. He argued the trial court’s failure to apply Batson’s three-step analysis resulted in the court improperly shifting the burden to the defense to prove the prosecutor’s discriminatory intent. The Georgia Supreme Court found no merit to this claim of error; therefore, it affirmed.
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