Jury - Removal of Juror During Deliberations

Williams v. Cavazos, 646 F.3d 626 (9th Cir. 2011)

In deciding whether to discharge a juror mid-deliberation, the critical Sixth Amendment questions are whether, after an appropriately limited inquiry, it can be said that there is no reasonable possibility that the jury’s discharge stems from his views of the merits, and whether the grounds on which the trial court relied are valid and constitutional. In this case, the state trial judge removed a deliberating juror without adherence to these principles, because the juror who was removed was not shown to have been unable or unwilling to deliberate – he just stated that he was uncomfortable with the sufficiency of the evidence. In addition to other precedents, the Ninth Circuit cited Twelve Angry Men. See also United States v. Symington, 195 F.3d 1080 (9th Cir. 1999). CERT GRANTED 1/13/12 and the Supreme Court reversed on AEDPA deference grounds. 133 S. Ct. 1088 (2013).