Butler v. State, 30764

• Court: Indiana Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: LEWIS; HUNTER; JACKSON
• Citation: Butler v. State, 229 N.E.2d 471, 249 Ind. 484 (Ind. 1967)
• Decision Date: 05 September 1967
• Docket Number: No. 30764,30764
• Parties: Jerry Dean BUTLER, Appellant, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee.

Page 471

229 N.E.2d 471

249 Ind. 484

Jerry Dean BUTLER, Appellant, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee.

No. 30764.

Supreme Court of Indiana.

Sept. 5, 1967.

Leon J. Humbert, Greensburg, George R. Tolen, Jr., Shelbyville, for appellant.

John J. Dillon, Atty. Gen., Kenneth M. Waterman, Deputy Atty. Gen., Indianapolis, for appellee.

LEWIS, Judge.

The appellant was tried by jury upon an indictment returned by the Grand Jury of Decatur County, Indiana, on the charge of murder in the first degree. The jury's verdict found the defendant guilty of murder in the second degree, and the judgment of the court was that the defendant be committed to the State Penitentiary during his life. The case had been venued to Shelby County, Indiana, and was tried in the Shelby Circuit Court.

The defendant filed a Plea in Abatement alleging in substance that the Grand Jury, which handed down the true bill against the defendant, was not properly selected in that members of the female sex were systematically excluded from the venire. Evidence was taken on the Plea in Abatement and proved substantially that a United States Census Report indicated a greater number of females eligible for jury service in Decatur County than males. Additional evidence further indicated that only 6 female persons were drawn out of 150 names drawn for the Grand Jury; only 32 names of the female sex were drawn for duty as petit jurors in the last 539 names drawn. From testimony elicited on the Plea in Abatement, it was evident the Jury Commissioners used the tax rolls for the drawing of prospective jurors, and that in each instance where married couples appeared on the tax rolls the man's name appeared first. The Jury Commissioners uniformly selected the man's name and omitted to use the married woman's name. The Jury Commissioners did use the names of unmarried persons of the female sex.

'Qualifications of jurors.--To be qualified as a juror, either grand or petit, a person must be a resident voter of the county, and a freeholder or householder, or the spouse of a householder. Any person shall be excused from acting as a juror who is over sixty-five (65) years of age and desires to be excused for such reason.' Burns' Ind.Stat., Anno., (1946 Repl.), § 4--3317.

Palmer v. State (1926), 197 Ind. 625, 150 N.E. 917.

It is evident, therefore, that women are not excluded under the Indiana statute with reference to the selection of jurors. In the picking of the Grand Jury in question in Decatur County, Indiana, we conclude that the Jury Commissioners' application of the statutory method for selecting jurors was a departure from the intention of the legislature, in that married women whose names followed the names of their husbands on the tax rolls were not included by the Jury Commissioners. We believe further, however, that there is complete absence of evidence to show that the Jury Commissioners were arbitrary or deliberate in their exclusion of the women from the jury list. The evidence presented by the appellant on his Plea in Abatement failed to show that the omissions of the Jury Commissioners in their statutory duty were in any way tainted with 'bad faith', and appellant did not show that the action of the Jury Commissioners was probably harmful to appellant's substantial rights. It will not be presumed that appellant's rights were prejudiced by the action of the Jury Commissioners in not including names of married women. In the absence of a showing of 'bad faith' or probable harm to the substantial rights of the objecting party, the failure of the Jury Commissioners to perform their statutory duty does not invalidate the indictment. Harrison v. State (1952), 231 Ind. 147, 106 N.E.2d 912, 32 A.L.R.2d 875. See also the pertinent part of Burns' Ind.Stat., Anno., § 4--3321, which is as follows:

'* * * no indictment shall be quashed, and no trial, judgment, order or proceeding shall be reversed or held invalid on the ground that the terms of this act have not been followed, unless it shall appear that such noncompliance was either in bad faith or was objected to promptly upon discovery and was probably harmful to the substantial rights of the objecting party.'

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