Facts: Petitioner Covell Thomas was convicted of murder, burglary, and unlawful possession of a firearm in the Superior Court for Pierce County and sentenced to death after the jury found four aggravating factors and insufficient mitigating factors. Thomas subsequently appealed his sentence and the Supreme Court of Washington ultimately vacated the sentence and remanded the case to the trial court, ruling that the jury had been improperly instructed with regard to aggravating factors as the jury instructions had been insufficiently precise in specifying that the jury needed to find that it had been Thomas, rather than one or more of his accomplices, that had committed the aggravating factors. On remand, the state of Washington declined to seek the death penalty and the jury once again found that Thomas had committed four aggravating factors, this time sentencing him to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Thomas once again appealed his sentence, asserting that the jury had once again been improperly instructed with regard to aggravating factors, that the jury had been improperly required to accept as a given that he personally committed the murder, that the trial court had improperly commented upon the evidence against Thomas by informing the jury of Thomas’s guilt, that the trial court lacked the authority under Washington Revised Code §10.95 to empanel a jury solely for the purpose of considering aggravating factors, that retrying the issue of aggravating factors subjected him to double jeopardy, and that the trial court had erred in permitting the state to dismiss the sole African American in the jury pool during voir dire. The Washington Court of Appeals affirmed Thomas’s sentence. Thomas appealed this decision to the Supreme Court of Washington.

Question(s): Was the jury properly instructed with regard to aggravating factors?

Was the jury improperly required to accept as a given that Thomas had committed the murder?

Did the trial court improperly comment upon the evidence against Thomas?

Does §10.95 authorize the empanelment of a jury solely for the purpose of considering aggravating factors?

Did retrying the penalty phase subject Thomas to double jeopardy?

Was the state’s dismissal of the sole African American from the jury pool race neutral?

Conclusion: Justice Madsen’s decision for the Court affirmed the Washington Court of Appeals, concluding that there had been no error in instructing the jury as the jury was directly asked whether Thomas had personally committed the aggravating factors, that the jury had not been improperly required to accept Thomas’s guilt with regard to the underlying crime as a given as the sole question before the jury was whether Thomas had committed the aggravating factors, that the trial court stating the fact that Thomas had been convicted of the underlying crime of murder was not an impermissible comment upon the evidence, that the trial court was authorized to empanel a jury solely for the purpose of considering aggravating factors as to do otherwise would have denied Thomas his constitutional right to a jury, that retrying the penalty phase did not subject Thomas to double jeopardy as the vacation of the death sentence initially imposed upon Thomas was not a final disposition of the case, and that the state had a race neutral rationale for dismissing the sole potential African American juror insofar as that potential juror had expressed hostility toward the state during voir dire.

Docket No. 80643-8 (from Court of Appeals Division II Case No. 34339-8)

Petitioner: Covell Paul Thomas

Respondent: State of Washington

Other Parties: State (respondent) v. Thomas (petitioner)

Briefs:

Argument: Tuesday, September 23, 2008 10:00am

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

Decided: Thursday, June 11th, 2009

Prevailing Party: State of Washington (Respondent)

Vote: 8-1

Opinion: 166 Wn.2d 380 (2009)

Court: Alexander4 Court (2008-2009)

Alexander

Johnson

Madsen

Sanders

Chambers

Owens

Fairhurst

Johnson

Stephens

Opinion

Dissent