CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) - The Nevada Supreme Court ordered a new trial for a man convicted of killing two prostitutes in 2006, saying prosecutors purposely discriminated by excluding a black woman from the jury.
The court’s 4-3 decision handed down Thursday overturns the conviction of Jason Duval McCarty, 44, who is also black. The case will go back to Clark County District Judge Michael Villani.
McCarty received two death sentences in the deaths of Charlotte Combado, 34, and Victoria McGee, 26. Police said a co-defendant, Dominic “D-Roc” Malone, had threatened to kill the women if they didn’t make money for him.
Combado and McGee were kidnapped before they were beaten to death with rocks and a golf club, authorities said. Their bodies were found in the desert in Henderson by a man who was walking his dog.
Two African Americans were eliminated from a pool of 36 potential jurors, including a 28-year-old woman known as juror No. 36. Prosecutors said they excluded the woman from the jury because she had a permit to work at a strip club and had previously been a cocktail waitress, even though she was a married, full-time college student at the time of jury selection.
Justice Michael Cherry wrote the majority opinion, saying prosecutors didn’t conduct background checks on most of the other prospective jurors to see if they’d previously worked in strip clubs. He said the employment issue appeared to be a “mere pretext for purposeful discrimination.”
Justice Kristina Pickering wrote the dissenting opinion. She pointed out that the defendant was charged with murdering sex workers, and she argued that excluding someone who worked in adult clubs was a race-neutral reason for keeping her off the jury.
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