Green v. State

A juror's failure to respond truthfully during voir dire constituted legal cause for the trial court to remove him, after deliberations had commenced.

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After a jury trial, Sammie Lee Green was found guilty of kidnapping,1 armed robbery,2 two counts of aggravated sodomy,3 and possession of a knife during the commission of a crime.4 On appeal, Green alleges that the trial court abused its discretion by dismissing a juror after deliberations had commenced and by failing to investigate a juror who allegedly communicated to the mother of one of the victims during the trial. Finding no error, we affirm. 1. Green argues that the trial court abused its discretion when it dismissed a juror after the close of evidence and after jury deliberations had commenced. During voir dire, the State asked potential jurors if they ever had been arrested on a felony charge.5 The juror in question failed to divulge that he had been arrested for rape in 1997. The State did not learn about this omission until after deliberations had begun and raised the issue before the trial court at that time. The trial court questioned the juror outside the presence of the other jury members, and the juror first denied that he had been arrested for a felony, but later admitted that he had been arrested for rape. Based on the juror’s answers, the trial court removed him from the jury.

OCGA § 15-12-172 “gives the trial court discretion to discharge a juror and replace him or her with an alternate at any time, and we will not reverse as long as the court’s exercise of discretion has a sound legal basis.”6 In this case, the trial court did not abuse its discretion by dismissing the juror after deliberations had begun because the juror’s “failure to respond truthfully during voir dire” constituted legal cause to remove him.7 Although there has been no allegation in this case that the juror in question refused to deliberate with his fellow jurors, and although the juror contended that his failure to answer was an honest mistake, we discern no abuse of discretion in his removal because “the trial court was faced with a juror whose veracity was clearly in question.”8

Green v. State

A juror's failure to respond truthfully during voir dire constituted legal cause for the trial court to remove him, after deliberations had commenced.

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