Jury selection is underway in the fatal Hwy. 169 drive-by shooting in Plymouth last summer and the trial is expected to begin next week.
Alleged shooter Jamal Lindsey Smith, 34, of Chicago appeared in Hennepin County District Court on Monday facing first- and second-degree murder charges. He is accused of killing 56-year-old Jay Boughton the night of July 6.
Boughton, a youth baseball coach from Crystal, was driving with his teenage son in Plymouth when a brief altercation with Smith occurred on the road and Smith allegedly shot Boughton in an act of road rage. Smith, who was driving a rental vehicle with two passengers, pleaded not guilty and said someone else in the car pulled the trigger.
At the hearing, prosecutors and defense brought forth several motions concerning evidence and witnesses after a pool of 52 prospective jurors was instructed on the case and asked to complete a written questionnaire. They will be called throughout the week to attend individual interviews.
The majority of prospective jurors are white, which is an issue raised by defense attorney Emmett Donnelly, who filed a motion in early June to dismiss the first-degree grand jury indictment against Smith, who is Black, because there was not a jury of his peers. Of the 26 people assembled for the grand jury, two were Black.
Donnelly argues that Hennepin County assembles juries in a method that "results in the exclusion of non-white residents" and cited it as a systemic failure noted by former state Supreme Court Justice Alan Page three decades ago.
"The District Court has been keenly aware of this chronic underrepresentation since June 2020 and has failed to take any remedial action," Donnelly wrote in his motion to Judge Nicole Engisch.
Donnelly is asking that steps be taken to expand the jury pool by adding state tax filings as a juror source list. The county's jury selection process uses voter registration and driver's license information, but he told Engisch that tax filings are more likely to have current addresses and increase representativeness.
