Racial Justice Act Repeal Bill Heads to Governor

June 13, 2013 12:00 am

RALEIGH - Yesterday, the North Carolina Senate gave final approval to S.B. 306, a bill that will repeal what remains of the Racial Justice Act (RJA), a landmark civil rights law that allows death-row inmates to appeal their sentences and seek life without parole if they could demonstrate that racial bias played a role in their sentence. The bill now heads to Governor Pat McCrory for his signature. Contact Gov. McCrory here to ask him to veto S.B. 306, and watch the video below to learn more about the disturbing role of racial bias in North Carolina's death penalty system.

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In the first case ever tried under the RJA, North Carolina Superior Court Judge Gregory Weeks commuted the sentence of death-row prisoner Marcus Robinson to life in prison without the possibility of parole after finding that the defendant “introduced a wealth of evidence showing the persistent, pervasive, and distorting role of race in jury selection throughout North Carolina. The evidence, largely unrebutted by the state, requires relief in his case and should serve as a clear signal of the need for reform in capital jury selection proceedings in the future."

The heart of the statistical evidence presented in the Robinson case from a comprehensive study by researchers from Michigan State University that showed that state prosecutors in North Carolina were significantly more likely to strike potential jurors who were African-American. In a related study, the researchers found that defendants are much more likely to be sentenced to death if the victim is white than if the victim is black.

On December 13, 2012, three more state death-row inmates were resentenced to life in prison without parole after a judge found that racial discrimination played a key role in securing their sentences. The ACLU's Capital Punishment Project helped represent all three inmates.