Professional Negligence Law Reporter

A Georgia appellate court held that a trial court’s decision to deny a plaintiff’s motion to strike two married prospective jurors had been proper.

Arianna Thomas was admitted to a hospital to deliver her baby. Her attending physician, Tanya Meziere, ordered fetal monitoring, which showed a sinusoidal pattern. Thomas later delivered her child via cesarean section; however, the baby died the next day. Thomas sued Meziere and others for wrongful death, alleging the defendants had failed to timely respond to signs of fetal distress. During voir dire, it was revealed that two members of the jury panel were married. The parties conducted additional voir dire, with both sides asking the potential jurors about their ability to remain impartial and independent. The plaintiff then moved to strike the couple for cause on the basis that they could not remain impartial because they were married. The trial court denied the motion, and the plaintiff used a peremptory strike to exclude the wife from the jury. The husband remained on the jury, which later found for the defense.

On appeal, the intermediate appellate court noted that Georgia law presumes that potential jurors are impartial but that a potential juror must be excused for cause if she or he holds an opinion so fixed and definite that it prevents deciding the case on the evidence and the court’s charge on the evidence. Here, the court said, the parties questioned both the husband and wife alone and together about their marital dynamic and they both stated that they could be fair and evaluate the case based on the evidence presented. Moreover, the court said, there is no evidence that the husband or wife had an interest in the outcome or were unqualified due to their relationship to the plaintiff or the defense. Neither potential juror showed an inability to decide the case on the merits or come to his or her own conclusion, the court found.

Consequently, the court held that the trial court’s ruling had been proper.

Citation: Thomas v. Meziere, 2020 WL 5244848 (Ga. Ct. App. Sept. 3, 2020).