Supreme Court rejects challenge to death sentence

over racially prejudiced jurors

Andre Thomas, who is Black, murdered his white wife and two children while in a
psychotic state and was sentenced to death by an all-white jury, including three members
who had said they opposed interracial relationships, according to court filings.

The gurney in the death chamber in Huntsville, Texas.Pat Sullivan / AP file

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Oct. 11, 2022, 4:45 PM +03

By Lawrence Hurley

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned away a Black death row inmate's
appeal over claims he did not receive a fair trial because several jurors had expressed
opposition to interracial relationships.

The conservative majority court’s decision not to hear the case, over the dissent of the
court's three liberal justices, leaves in place Andre Thomas’s conviction and death sentence.
"No jury deciding whether to recommend a death sentence should be tainted by potential
racial biases that could infect its deliberation or decision, particularly where the case
involved an interracial crime," wrote liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor. She was joined by
fellow liberals Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. The court has a 6-3 conservative
majority.

In 2004 Thomas murdered his estranged wife, Laura Boren, who was white; their 4-year-
old son Andre Boren; and his 13-month-old step-daughter Leyha Hughes in Sherman,
Texas. He stabbed all three to death and attempted to remove their hearts, saying later he
hoped to “set them free from evil,” according to court filings. He also attempted suicide.
Death-row inmate Andre Thomas, from Texoma, Texas. Texas Department of Criminal
Justice / via AP file

Thomas, now 39, later turned himself in and confessed. While awaiting trial for the murder
of Leyha Hughes, in which he claimed he was not guilty by reason of insanity, Thomas
gouged out one of his eyeballs after reading a passage in the Bible, the filings said. Years
later he removed his other eye and ate it.

Prosecutors agreed that Thomas was in a psychotic state when he committed the murders
but countered that it was caused by Thomas’ actions in ingesting a cough medicine that can
cause irrational behavior.

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At the 2005 trial for the murder of Leyha Hughes, the all-white jury found that Thomas was
guilty and sentenced him to death.

In contesting his conviction, Thomas’ lawyers argued that the jury was tainted because
three members during the selection process had expressed opposition to people of
different races marrying or having children, which was pertinent to the facts of the case
because of Thomas’ marriage to Boren.