Facts: After being charged with possession of methamphetamine in the Superior Court for King County, petitioner Louis Lanciloti requested a jury trial and subsequently challenged the constitutionality of Washington Revised Code §2.36.055, which allows counties with more than one superior court facility to divide themselves into multiple jury assignment districts, asserting that it violated his right under Article I §22 of the Washington State Constitution to an impartial jury of the county in which the offense was charged to have been committed and his right under the 6^th Amendment to the United States Constitution to an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed. The trial court certified the case to the Supreme Court of Washington for review.

Question(s): Does §2.36.055 unconstitutionally limit the pool of potential jurors?

Conclusion: Justice Chambers’ opinion for a unanimous Court remanded the case to the trial court for trial, concluding that §2.36.055 is neither unconstitutional as written nor as applied in Lanciloti’s case insofar as jurors are not constitutionally required to be selected from the entire county and no showing had been made that demographic differences among King County’s jury assignment districts amount to the systematic exclusion of a distinctive group.

Docket No. 81219-5 (from King Case No. 07-1-06093-2 SEA)

Petitioner: Louis F. Lanciloti IV

Respondent: State of Washington

Briefs:

Argument: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 10:00am

[Source: TVW, http://tvw.org]

Decided: Thursday, February 12th, 2009

Prevailing Party: State of Washington (Respondent)

Vote: 9-0

Citation: Pending

Alexander

Johnson

Madsen

Sanders

Chambers
(Majority)

Owens

Fairhurst

Johnson

Stephens