Two men who have served more than half their sentences in prison for armed robbery may get a new trial.
Defense attorney Ashleigh Merchant appealed on behalf of her clients for a new trial, because a prosecutor dismissed a potential juror for having gold teeth.
Duvalle Minor and Robert Clayton were tried together and convicted in 2011 of an attack on two men along a pathway off Franklin Road in Cobb County.
They’ve served more than five years of their 10-year sentence.
Merchant said in the appeal that the “gold-teeth rationale was a race-based stereotype of the African-American community, and the State’s reliance on Juror No. 31’s alleged involvement in the theft of a motorcycle was a race-neutral pretext for the State’s explicitly race based strike.”
The State responded in the appeal by saying people who choose to wear gold teeth are iconoclastic and trying to set themselves apart, which paints an undesirable picture of a juror.
The Georgia Court of Appeals decided “this race-based rationale demonstrates clear error in the trial court’s finding that the State’s reason for striking the juror was race neutral.”
The District Attorney’s office told Channel 2 Action News it will file a motion for reconsideration.
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