483 U.S. 402 (1987)
On January 7, 1981, police in Louisville, Kentucky discovered the partially clad body of 20-year-old Barbel C. Poore in the backseat of her automobile after her mother reported the gas station where she worked unattended and unlocked.
The young woman had been sexually assaulted and shot twice in the head.1 The ensuing investigation led to the arrests of Kevin Stanford, Troy Johnson, and petitioner David Buchanan, a juvenile.2
From the confessions of the participants, the events were reconstructed as follows: Buchanan first approached Johnson with a plan to rob the station and obtained a gun and bullets from him.3 Buchanan then telephoned Stanford, who lived next to the station, and the three met in the apartment parking lot. Buchanan and Stanford entered the station while Johnson waited in the car.4 Stanford carried the gun, raped Poore in the restroom, and after Buchanan failed to open the safe the two took turns raping and sodomizing her.
Buchanan later returned to the car with gasoline, then rejoined Stanford who drove Poore a short distance away and shot her in the face and back of the head while Buchanan watched. Johnson remained in juvenile court. Buchanan and Stanford were transferred to the Circuit Court of Jefferson County and indicted on capital murder and other charges.5 The Commonwealth tried them jointly.6 Buchanan filed pretrial motions to prevent death-qualification of the jury and for separate guilt and sentencing juries, both of which the court denied.
He also moved to dismiss the capital portion of his indictment on the ground that Stanford had been the triggerman and he had no intent to kill; the court granted that motion without objection from the prosecution. At trial Buchanan called social worker Martha Elam as his sole witness to support an extreme emotional disturbance defense.7 At defense counsel's request she read to the jury from several prior psychological reports and letters concerning evaluations of Buchanan's mental condition while he was in state custody.8 On cross-examination the prosecutor had Elam read from a report prepared by Dr. Robert J. G. Lange after a joint motion by defense counsel and the prosecutor under the Kentucky involuntary-hospitalization statute.9 The report addressed whether Buchanan met criteria for psychiatric treatment pending trial.10 The jury convicted Buchanan on all charges and imposed the maximum sentence on each count to run consecutively.11 The trial court ordered the sentences to run concurrently with the life term on the murder count.12 Stanford received a death sentence from the same jury.13 The Supreme Court of Kentucky affirmed Buchanan's conviction and sentences.14
Whether the death-qualification of the jury in a joint trial where only one defendant faced possible capital punishment deprived the noncapital defendant of his right to an impartial jury drawn from a fair cross section of the community?15
The Sixth Amendment fair cross section requirement applies only to venires and not to petit juries.16 Witherspoon-excludables do not form a distinctive group for fair cross section purposes.17 Their exclusion serves the state's legitimate interest in obtaining a jury able to follow the law at both guilt and sentencing phases of a joint capital trial.18
No. The Commonwealth tried Buchanan and Stanford jointly after indicting both on capital murder and related charges arising from the same events.19 Buchanan filed pretrial motions to bar death-qualification and for separate juries but did not move to sever his case from Stanford's.20 The trial court denied the motions and permitted death-qualification of the jury for Stanford's capital charges.21 Under the rule from Lockhart v. McCree, Witherspoon-excludables are not a cognizable group whose removal violates the fair cross section guarantee, and the state's interest in a single jury for joint trials of capital and noncapital defendants charged with offenses from one chain of events justifies the procedure.
The same jury convicted Buchanan on all counts and imposed consecutive maximum sentences later ordered concurrent by the court.
Death-qualification of the jury did not deprive Buchanan of his right to an impartial jury drawn from a fair cross section of the community.22
Related opinions on this issue
Joined by Justice Brennan Joins And Justice Stevens Joins As To Part I
Justice Marshall dissented on the ground that the Commonwealth's interest in efficiency and consistency was attenuated when a noncapital defendant was tried jointly with a capital defendant.23 He argued that the rarity of such joint trials undermined any claim of intolerable administrative burden and that the residual-doubt justification was speculative and unavailable because Buchanan could not waive the supposed benefit.24 Marshall concluded that no state interest justified excluding Witherspoon-excludables from a jury deciding exclusively noncapital charges, thereby tilting the scales toward conviction in violation of the Sixth Amendment.25
Whether the admission through cross-examination of findings from a psychiatric examination requested jointly by defense counsel and the prosecutor violated the noncapital defendant's Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights when the defendant had presented a mental-status defense at trial?26
When a defendant requests a psychiatric examination or introduces psychiatric evidence at trial, the prosecution may rebut with evidence from that examination without violating the Fifth or Sixth Amendment, provided defense counsel requested the evaluation and had the opportunity to consult with the defendant about its nature and scope.27
No. Buchanan's counsel joined the prosecutor in moving the juvenile court for Dr. Lange's examination under the Kentucky involuntary-hospitalization statute to determine whether Buchanan met criteria for psychiatric treatment pending trial.28 At trial Buchanan called social worker Martha Elam as his sole witness and had her read prior psychological reports to support his extreme emotional disturbance defense.29 On cross-examination the prosecutor had Elam read an edited version of Lange's report containing only general observations of Buchanan's current mental state with no statements about the crimes.30 Because counsel had requested the examination and Buchanan placed his mental status at issue, the limited rebuttal use of the report did not violate the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination or the Sixth Amendment right to counsel.31
Admission of the psychiatric report through cross-examination did not violate Buchanan's Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights.32
Related opinions on this issue
Joined by Justice Brennan Joins And Justice Stevens Joins As To Part I
Justice Marshall dissented on the ground that the examination was conducted solely for therapeutic purposes under the involuntary-hospitalization statute and focused on Buchanan's present amenability to treatment rather than his mental condition at the time of the offense.33 He argued that Buchanan's consent was materially uninformed because neither he nor counsel had notice that the report could be used to rebut temporally and functionally unrelated evidence of emotional disturbance.34 Marshall concluded that the admission therefore violated the Fifth and Sixth Amendments by undermining the trust necessary for effective psychiatric examinations.35