While most of the country was consumed by the news coverage of O.J. Simpson’s criminal case in the mid-1990’s, there was another murder trial that dominated the attention of many across the world, especially in my hometown of Corpus Christi, Texas. I can remember the day like it was yesterday. I was leaving school on a bright and sunny Friday afternoon when I received the news. Selena had been shot. The Queen of Tejano music was dead.
Though she had not reached the pinnacles of the mainstream American music scene, Selena Quintanilla-Perez was an international singing sensation and our hometown claim to fame. On March 31, 1995, she was murdered by Yolanda Saldivar, her fan club president. In continuing this week’s theme, a look at potential jury prejudices and the intervention in Saldivar’s case can further our understanding of the criminal justice system.
When choosing the members of an impartial jury, both defense attorneys and prosecutors often seek to eliminate the individual prejudices that may affect their client’s cases. These problematic biases, described as interest, generic, specific, and normative, are all thought to figure in to how a jury may decide a verdict (Schneider, Gruman, & Coutts, 2012, p. 263). The interest prejudice details how individual connections to elements of the trial may sway a juror. This may include knowing a member of one of the relevant parties in the case, or even someone who had been charged with a similar crime (Schneider et al., 2012).. Additionally, a generic prejudice may cloud one’s judgement if they hold sexist, racist, homophobic, etc., attitudes (Schneider et al., 2012).
The specific prejudice depicts how one’s opinions can play a role in being a fair juror. Often times, these notions are influenced by the media coverage surrounding the trial (Schneider et al., 2012).. Lastly, the normative prejudice illustrates how a juror may be led to a specific decision based on how a community views the evidence and players in question. With the hope of conforming to society’s opinions, a juror may be biased in their ability to objectively evaluate the relevant facts (Schneider et al., 2012). In terms of selecting jurors for the trial of Saldivar, the specific and normative prejudices likely played a role in the decision for judicial intervention.
With a constant barrage of media coverage on local television, radio, and in the newspapers, it was nearly impossible to find a person living in Corpus Christi who had not been exposed to the details of Selena’s death. After Saldivar shot Selena in the back, she locked herself in a red pickup truck for 10 straight hours, an event that unfolded live on televisions across the city (The Sweet, 1995). Everyone in town was talking about it, and they demanded justice. There would have been little doubt in any juror’s mind about how the community felt about Saldivar, and which way the jury should decide the case. Ultimately, a combination of these potential biases caused the trial to be moved to Houston so that an impartial jury could hear the case. On October 23, 1995, Yolanda Saldivar was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison (The Sweet, 1995).
One of the crucial components of the criminal judicial system revolves around the selection of an impartial jury, and intervention in case of an inability to eliminate biases. The interest, generic, specific, and normative prejudices can all play a role in a juror’s ability to fairly hear a case and must be managed if they are found to exist. Some jurors may be expelled for their connections to the case or its participants, or for their inability to dismiss their general beliefs that may interfere with their judgment. In other cases, intense media coverage may cause a juror to develop opinions that can shape the view in which they would hear potential evidence. Also, when a community has determined that a specific outcome should be found, a juror might follow this decision regardless of the facts in the case.
In the circumstances surrounding the murder of Selena by Yolanda Saldivar, a judge found that specific and normative prejudices were too intense to hold the trial in the location of the crime. An intervention was instituted, and the case was moved 200 miles from Corpus Christi to Houston, Texas. When the jury returned a verdict of guilty, it was safe to assume that the appropriate actions had been taken to ensure a fair trial occurred, and justice was served.
References:
Schneider, F.W., Gruman, J.A., & Coutts, L.A. (2012). Applied Social Psychology: Understanding and Addressing Social and Practical Problems (2nd ed). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
The Sweet Song of Justice. (1995, December). Retrieved from https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/the-sweet-song-of-justice/