Washington v. Rivers (Majority and Concurrence)
Annotate this CasePetitioner Paul Rivers, a Black man, was convicted on two criminal charges in King County, Washington by a jury drawn from a panel that lacked any Black potential jurors. Rivers argued this venire, as well as certain aspects of the King County jury selection system that produced this venire, violated his state and federal fair cross section rights. “No one in this case disputes that jury diversity is lacking in Washington and that more can and must be done to promote juror diversity statewide.” Because Rivers did not show that the Washington Constitution required the heightened test he proposed for assessing fair cross section claims, the Court analyzed his claim using the existing Sixth Amendment framework, and that Rivers’ venire and King County’s jury selection system satisfied constitutional minimums. The case was remanded for resentencing, because the Court found Rivers was entitled to the benefit of RCW 9.94A.647, which no longer allowed a persistent offender life sentence based on prior second-degree robbery convictions.
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