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Case 1:20-cr-00330-PAE Document614_ Filed 02/24/22 Page10of12
the defense view that such delays and lapses may discredit such a witness. Indeed, his affiliation
with sexual abuse victims caused him to have a negative emotional reaction when defense counsel
did their job holding up the testimony of alleged victims to scrutiny. Thus, his own experiences
disqualified him as an unbiased juror. Additionally, it created the potential he would bias the other
panelists. But even one biased juror out of 12 fatally undermines the structural integrity of the
process — the Constitutional requirement of a unanimous jury verdict by 12 fair and impartial
jurors. See, e.g., Warger v. Shauers, 574 U.S. 40, 49 (2014) (discussing “structural” errors).
Had Juror 50 made the same sort of statement during voir dire that he made to the media
about approaching this case “from a victim’s point of view,” surely the Court would have struck
him for cause the way it struck so many other jurors who admitted being abuse victims. See United
States v. Encarnation, 2022 WL 500399, at *6 (1st Cir. Feb. 18, 2022) (jury should be “free from
preconceived viewpoints”). That is actual bias. Even when jurors who were sexually abused as
children claim they can be impartial, courts have found otherwise and reversed convictions. See
Ward v. Commonwealth, 587 S.W.3d 312, 329 (Ky. 2019); see also Mach v. Stewart, 137 F.3d
630, 633 (9th Cir. 1997) (reversing conviction because struck juror told the venire that she worked
with child sex abuse victims and never knew a child to lie about abuse).
Implied And Inferred Bias: “In contrast to the inquiry for actual bias, which focuses on
whether the record at voir dire supports a finding that the juror was in fact partial, the issue for
implied bias is whether an average person in the position of the juror in controversy would be
prejudiced.” Torres, 128 F.3d at 45. “And in determining whether a prospective juror is impliedly
biased, ‘his statements upon voir dire [about his ability to be impartial] are totally irrelevant.’” Jd.
(citation omitted). As Chief Justice Marshall explained, there are circumstances in which a
prospective juror “is presumed to have a bias” and even though “[h]le may declare that
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| Filename | DOJ-OGR-00009117.jpg |
| File Size | 757.3 KB |
| OCR Confidence | 94.4% |
| Has Readable Text | Yes |
| Text Length | 2,261 characters |
| Indexed | 2026-02-03 17:41:40.977884 |