FEDERAL COURTS-CRIMINAL PROCEDURE-EFFECT OF EXCUSING PROCEDURE ON COMPOSITION OF JURY PANEL

Petitioner was found guilty of violating the Harrison Narcotics Act in the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia by a jury composed wholly of federal employees. During the course of voir dire examination, petitioner moved to strike the entire panel, asserting that it did not represent a proper cross-section of the community. This motion was denied. Petitioner exhausted his ten peremptory challenges, and, upon finding that only government employees remained on the jury, then challenged the jury as impaneled for cause.

The challenge was overruled. Conviction was affirmed by the circuit court of appeals. On certiorari to the United States Supreme Court, held, affirmed. In absence of affirmative evidence showing systematic exclusion of a particular class or occupational group, the fact that a panel may not represent a cross-section of the community is insufficient to sustain a motion to strike the entire panel.

Nor does final composition of the jury entirely of government employees afford a basis for challenge for cause. Frazier v. United States, (U.S., 1948) 69 S.Ct. 201.