The role of the death penalty as a toll of the racist system of criminal punishment has been long documented. In the case of Alameda County, California, the inside story of how prosecutor misconduct influenced jury selections to increase the likelihood of death penalty convictions demonstrates how the racism of capital punishment remains with us in the 21st century. For decades, prosecutors worked to limit jury participation from Black and Jewish individuals in order to produce juries that were more likely to support capital punishment. Michael Collins, Senior Director of Government Affairs at Color Of Change, joins Rattling the Bars for a revealing discussion on prosecutor misconduct, and what it tells us about the state of the criminal injustice system.

Transcript: Prosecutor Misconduct and Structural Racism in Death Penalty Convictions

Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling The Bars. I’m your host, Mansa Musa.

The death penalty in the United States of America has been influenced by prosecutor misconduct in Oakland. At one point in time, the Supreme Court had put it on hold because of the manner in which it was being given out. At that time, the way it was being given out is upon a person being found guilty of a capital offense, the judge made the ultimate determination whether they got the death penalty or not.

Throughout the course of litigation and the evolution of the legislative process, the death penalty started taking on the shape of a jury determining whether or not a person gets the death penalty or not after they were sentenced.

What we have now, in this day and age — And when I first heard it, it startled me to even believe that this was taking place — But in California, they have, in certain parts, the death penalty being given out, but more importantly, the death penalty given out by the prosecutor and the courts through their systematic exclusion of people’s juries of their peers. Prosecutor misconduct is rampant.

The prosecutors, along with the courts, have systematically set up a template where they look at anybody that they think is going to be fair and impartial and have them removed from the jury, which constitutes prosecutor misconduct. Subsequently, a lot of men and women are on death row in California.

Here to talk about the abuse of this system and the discovery of the process and exposing it is Michael Collins from Color of Change.

Read the full article about prosecutor misconduct in Oakland at The Real News Network.