Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Great Use of Pictures in an Appellate Brief

The issue in Foster v. Chatman, currently in the briefing stages in front of SCOTUS,  is whether prosecutors in a capital case violated Batson by intentionally striking black jurors on the basis of race. Not only did prosecutors strike all four black jurors from the panel while claiming facially race-neutral reasons that would apply equally to unstricken white jurors, but the defendant later uncovered documentary evidence that prosecutors had conspired to strike all the black jurors.

To highlight that latter point, the Petitioner's brief copy-and-pastes photos of the prosecutors' damning work product into its Statement of the Case section. Pet. Br. 15-16. The effect is terrific: the photos display jury selection worksheets in which the black jurors' names are highlighted and marked with a "B"; juror questionnaires on which prosecutors circled the word "BLACK" that jurors had filled into the race category; and another document on which prosecutors labeled black jurors "B#1," "B#2," etc.

As the Petitioner's brief amply demonstrates, when the pictorial evidence supports your position that strongly, you should include it within the body of your brief.

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