City of Tukwila v. Garrett

• Decision Date: 26 November 2008
• Docket Number: No. 81067-2.,81067-2.
• Citation: 165 Wn.2d 152,196 P.3d 681
• Court: Washington Supreme Court
• Parties: CITY OF TUKWILA, Petitioner, v. Kellas William GARRETT, Respondent.

196 P.3d 681

165 Wn.2d 152

CITY OF TUKWILA, Petitioner, v. Kellas William GARRETT, Respondent.

No. 81067-2.

Supreme Court of Washington, En Banc.

Argued May 6, 2008.

Decided November 26, 2008.

Michael R. Kenyon, Kenyon Disend PLLC, Issaquah, WA, for Petitioner.

Robert Charles Boruchowitz, Ronald A. Peterson Law Clinic, Seattle, WA, for Respondent.

MADSEN, J.

¶ 1 The defendant maintains that pursuant to RCW 2.36.050 jury pools for trials in Tukwila Municipal Court must be composed of persons residing within the city limits of Tukwila. Because the jury pool from which his jury was drawn was not, he contends that the jury pool was selected in violation of the statute. The trial court rejected the defendant's argument, but the superior court agreed and reversed his conviction.

¶ 2 The purpose of article I, section 22 of the Washington State Constitution is to guarantee a fair and random selection of jurors from the county in which a crime is alleged to have been committed. RCW 2.36.050 authorizes a court of limited jurisdiction to select jurors from a more limited pool, "the population of the area served by the court," so long as the jurors are randomly selected. Mr. Garrett advocates for a smaller pool of jurors than the City of Tukwila provides, thus decreasing the opportunity for a diverse and random jury. We reject Mr. Garrett's invitation to shrink the jury pool further than RCW 2.36.050 and our cases require. We reverse the superior court.

FACTS

¶ 3 Mr. Kellas Garrett was charged with violation of a temporary protection order-domestic violence and tried in Tukwila Municipal Court. After the jury returned a guilty verdict, he moved for reversal of his conviction and dismissal of the case on the ground that the jury pool from which his jury was drawn had been improperly selected. King County Superior Court selected the jury pool from areas having zip codes 98168, 98178, and 98188. According to the United States Postal Service website, these three zip codes apply to Tukwila¹ and in fact, Tukwila Municipal Court had selected its jury pools from these three zip codes since 1997. The zip codes only roughly conform to Tukwila's boundaries; however, they also apply to property outside the city. According to Mr. Garrett, none of the jurors on his jury lived in Tukwila.

¶ 4 As mentioned, King County Superior Court selected the jury pool. Prior to Garrett's trial, the Tukwila Municipal Court and the superior court had entered into a memorandum of understanding for a pilot project for trial court coordination of jury services, as permitted by RCW 2.36.052.² Pursuant to this agreement, King County Superior Court was responsible for processing jury summonses, maintaining juror information, and processing the responses (or lack thereof) from jurors. The agreement covered an 18-month period, from October 1, 2003 through April 30, 2005, when the written agreement expired by its express terms. Mr. Garrett's trial occurred in September 2005.

¶ 5 When the propriety of the jury pool became an issue, Garrett's attorney inquired about the agreement and process for selecting the jury pool, and initially received an e-mail from the manager of jury services for King County Superior Court who told counsel that the written agreement expired April 30, 2005, and had not yet been renewed because attempts were underway to make greater use of the Internet and make the process easier, with potential costs savings to the municipal court. Later, a declaration prepared by the lead clerk for the Tukwila Municipal Court explained that on expiration of the written agreement, Judge Kimberly Walden of that court had entered an oral agreement with King County Superior Court for provision of continued services. On October 13, 2005, King County Superior Court sent an invoice to the municipal court for jury summons processing from May 2005 through September 2005; the invoice included the period of time in which the jury pool was summoned from which Garrett's jury was selected.

¶ 6 Mr. Garrett argued, however, that Tukwila Municipal Court had no authority to select jurors outside the city limits and that there was no valid agreement in place at the time his jury was selected that allowed King County Superior Court to select the jury pool. The trial court disagreed on both counts and denied his motion for dismissal. The court found³ that by selecting King County jurors with zip codes provided for the City of Tukwila as well as surrounding areas, the municipal court complied with Washington law for selecting jurors. The court also found that there was a valid agreement with King County Superior Court. The court found that although the written agreement expired April 30, 2005, the superior court continued to provide services under the same terms pursuant to an oral agreement the courts entered into after the written agreement expired. The court concluded that the superior court's selection of the jury pool from the three zip codes designated for Tukwila conformed to statutory requirements.

¶ 7 Mr. Garrett appealed. King County Superior Court reversed his conviction, reasoning that there was no agreement in effect between the two courts and there was a material departure from the legal requirements for jury selection procedure required by law because the Tukwila Municipal Court had no authority to summons jurors from outside of the City of Tukwila and its electoral district. The City sought discretionary review, which the Court of Appeals granted, and the matter was transferred to this court.

ANALYSIS

¶ 8 The superior court held that under RCW 2.36.050 jury panels for trials in Tukwila Municipal Court must be selected from persons residing within the City of Tukwila. RCW 2.36.050 provides that

[i]n courts of limited jurisdiction, juries shall be selected and impaneled in the same manner as in the superior courts, except that a court of limited jurisdiction shall use the master jury list developed by the superior court to select a jury panel. Jurors for the jury panel may be selected at random from the population of the area served by the court.

The City contends that the jury selection process was proper under State v. Twyman, 143 Wash.2d 115, 17 P.3d 1184 (2001). Because interpretation of statutes is at issue, review is de novo. See State v. Nemitz, 105 Wash.App. 205, 210, 19 P.3d 480 (2001).

¶ 9 In Twyman, the defendants were convicted of crimes in the Shoreline Division of King County District Court by juries drawn from a pool selected from an area covered by three King County zip codes that was generally coextensive with the Shoreline Division's electoral district. The defendants argued that this procedure violated RCW 2.36.050 and the state constitution, which requires that "[i]n criminal prosecutions the accused shall have the right ... to have a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the county in which the offense is charged to have been committed." Const. art. I, § 22. The defendants argued that under RCW 2.36.050 the area served by the court was the entire county and that the constitution requires that the jury panel has to originate from the entire county. Alternatively, one defendant argued, as Garrett does in the present case, that the jurors should have been selected only from individuals residing within the exact electoral district of the Shoreline Division. Twyman, 143 Wash.2d at 118, 17 P.3d 1184.

¶ 10 We held that while the King County District Court is technically one court within the county, "its separate divisions make it clear that in any one case the `population of the area served by the court' is that of the division in question." Id. at 121, 17 P.3d 1184 (footnote omitted) (quoting RCW 2.36.050). "[A] district court's electoral district serves as the population area from which its juries should be drawn." Twyman, 143 Wash.2d at 124-25, 17 P.3d 1184. However, both statutes and case law establish that the statutory requirements for making up the jury lists are merely directory and need be only substantially complied with. Id. at 121-22, 17 P.3d 1184; see State v. Tingdale, 117 Wash.2d 595, 600, 817 P.2d 850 (1991); State v. Finlayson, 69 Wash.2d 155, 157, 417 P.2d 624 (1966); W.E. Roche Fruit Co. v. N. Pac. Ry., 18 Wash.2d 484, 488, 139 P.2d 714 (1943); State v. Rholeder, 82 Wash. 618, 620, 144 P. 914 (1914); RCW 2.36.065 (providing that "[n]othing in this chapter shall be construed as requiring uniform . . . method throughout the state, so long as fair and random selection of the master jury list and jury panels is achieved").

¶ 11 The purpose of statutory procedures for making up the jury lists is to provide a fair and impartial jury. Twyman, 143 Wash.2d at 122, 17 P.3d 1184; Finlayson, 69 Wash.2d at 157, 417 P.2d 624. As the court said in Rholeder, 82 Wash. at 620-21, 144 P. 914:

The purpose of all [the statutes prescribing the manner of making up the jury lists] is to provide a fair and impartial jury, and if that end has been attained and the litigant has had the benefit of such a jury, it ought not to be held that the whole proceeding must be annulled because of some slight irregularity that has had no effect upon the purpose to be effected.

In Finlayson, the statute then in effect required that precincts from which jurors were to be selected for the jury list would be selected by lot, the number of jurors from each precinct selected would be as far as practicable equal, and prospective jurors within a given precinct were to be selected by a given and identical numbered sequence based on the number of jurors to be selected from the precinct. Finlayson, 69 Wash.2d at 156, 417 P.2d 624 (quoting former RCW 2.36.060 (1961)). The defendant complained that the precincts were not drawn by lot but instead all precincts were used, selection of jurors was not by a given and identical numbered sequence, the proportionate list of registered voters was taken from registration books by city clerks in some Chelan...