Unanimity Denied: The Fight for Retroactive Justice in Edwards v. Vannoy

In the United States, every vote counts: especially in the hands of a jury. Unanimity in juries is essential in order to correctly deal the hand of freedom or incarceration to a defendant. This principle came under scrutiny in the case of Evangelisto Ramos, who was sentenced to life in prison despite two jurors declining to vote guilty due to reasonable doubt [in the prosecution's case]. Ramos appealed his case and this principle of unanimity was solidified when the 2020 U.S. Supreme Court decision of Ramos v. Louisiana found that, in accordance with the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution, a guilty verdict in criminal cases must be unanimous. There was tension between this decision and the case of Thedrick Edwards, a black man who was found guilty and sentenced to a life in prison based on a 10-2 jury vote prior to the decision of Ramos v. Louisiana. In 2021, the Supreme Court’s decision of Edwards v. Vannoy found that jury unanimity cannot apply retroactively to court decisions. However, the Supreme Court’s refusal to retroactively require unanimous jury verdicts in Edwards v. Vannoy is unconstitutional—Edwards was denied the Sixth Amendment right to a unanimous jury due to the erosion of civil rights at the state level and the Court’s failure to follow precedent in correcting past injustices. In addition to a lack of constitutional basis, Edwards v. Vannoy perpetuates racial bias by not allowing this retroactive appeal; non-unanimous juries are historically exclusionary towards African Americans, and unanimous juries provide a more even field by not allowing the voices of African American people go unheard if they are the minority of a jury vote. The right to have a decision by a unanimous jury was denied to Edwards, a denial that stands in direct conflict with the protections guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment.

The Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution is interpreted by the Supreme Court to guarantee the right to a unanimous jury decision for all defendants. [1] This interpretation is grounded in thehaving “compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor.” [2] Rule 31 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure states that “if the jury cannot agree on a verdict on one or more counts, the court may declare a mistrial. The government may retry any defendant on any count on which the jury could not agree.” [3] Although Ramos v. Louisiana, which is currently precedent for jury proceedings, has made this law applicable to state cases, unanimity has long been a requirement for federal courts. [3] Before Ramos v. Louisiana, Apodaca v. Oregon (1972) was the precedent for less-than-unanimous state jury decisions; it held that non-unanimous convictions could be made for felony charges such as assault and battery. [4] The difference between Ramos v. Louisiana and Apodaca v. Oregon when it comes to state or federal jurisdiction shows a shift in legal standards towards universalized unanimous juries in the past 50 years. With this federal precedent being set, Louisiana—the state where Edwards was convicted—was one of only two states at the time to uphold non-unanimous decisions by the jury. Edwards is one of the few defendants with a conviction resting on the outdated legal standard from the 1972 decision of Apodaca v. Oregon. Edwards v. Vannoy failed to recognize this past “neglect of the right to ‘obtain witnesses in his favor’...” in full by not allowing a retrospective retrial with the right of a unanimous jury. The moral standards of criminal law provided by the Sixth Amendment not being upheld with the introduction of a new societal paradigm appeal to Edwards’ plea of unconstitutionality.

Many court decisions in the past have been retrospectively retried or overturned with the introduction of new information—one such example is the infamous Miller v. Alabama (2012). This monumental SCOTUS case decided that enforcement of life without the possibility of parole for offenders under the age of 18 is cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. [6] This decision explicitly overturned its previous counterpart SCOTUS decision on life without parole for minors in Montgomery v. Louisiana (1963). This trial occurred due to a boy named Henry Montgomery murdering a man just two weeks after he turned 17. His age-related appeal to the court was overturned and, as a minor, he was convicted to life in prison without the possibility of parole. In 2015 however, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that Miller v. Alabama holds up retroactively in regards to Montgomery v. Louisiana because of a fundamental shift in constitutional rights for minors who have committed crimes. [7] With Miller v. Alabama being retroactively applied to Montgomery v. Louisiana, it is clear that SCOTUS can alter decisions based on the changing nature of society such as that of possibility of parole for minor offenders. Such changes in precedent have been deemed constitutional with the introduction of new “watershed” information; “watershed” information was defined as new substantive rules or new procedural rules that fundamentally changed the way of understanding a case. [8] The rationale behind not retroactively altering Edwards v. Vannoy is that there was not the introduction of substantive or procedural rule changes as there was in Montgomery v. Louisiana. Edwards v. Vannoy did not follow precedent in correcting racial injustice based on newly implemented laws, therefore this SCOTUS case did not follow the example of Miller v. Alabama retroactively changing conviction laws through court cases. The decision of Edwards v. Vannoy fails to acknowledge the broader societal shift in criminal justice in the manner that Miller v. Alabama was able to revise past decisions to reform civil systems. While Miller v. Alabama explicitly overturned Montgomery v. Louisiana, the Court in Ramos v. Louisiana made a fundamental procedural shift but failed to extend that fairness retroactively. Though Edwards v. Vannoy claimed Ramos v. Louisiana was not a “watershed” ruling, this downplays the historic exclusion of black jurors and the structural harm of non unanimous verdicts.

The decision of Edwards v. Vannoy rests on the premise that Edwards’ conviction did not meet the criteria for a “watershed” rule as it did not “alter[] [the] understanding of the bedrock procedural elements essential to the fairness of a proceeding.” [9] “Watershed” doctrine gives prisoners the basis of reopening their case if the new protection would have made a difference in their trial. [10] Considering that the “bedrock procedural elements” of a conviction now include a unanimous jury, this designation clearly applies to Edwards v. Vannoy. Ramos v. Louisiana is a milestone SCOTUS decision that fundamentally altered how criminal courts proceed—the inability of the court to apply this textbook “watershed” criteria to Thedrick Edwards raises serious concerns about systemic racial bias within the courts. Due to this hypocrisy, the lack of application of the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution, as well as the unfair state-specific setting of Edwards’ trial, the decision of Edwards v. Vannoy is unjust and unconstitutional when following the model set by Ramos v. Louisiana. Ramos v. Louisiana was a significant step forward for criminal justice systems as well as racial justice in courts, but there are still many people—including Thedrick Edwards—whose freedom was denied due to the lack of unanimous voting provided to them. Progress in criminal court systems can only continue if wrongs are righted and those in Edwards' predicament are given a fair jury that is promised under current U.S. law through Ramos v. Louisiana. 

Edited by Love Patel

[1] "Unanimity of the Jury," Constitution Annotated, Congress.gov, Library of Congress, 2020, https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/amdt6-4-4-3/ALDE_00013134/.

[2] "U.S. Constitution - Sixth Amendment," Constitution Annotated, Congress.gov, Library of Congress, 2024, https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-6/.

[3] LII Staff, "Rule 31. Jury Verdict," Legal Information Institute, November 30, 2011, https://www.law.cornell.edu/rules/frcrmp/rule_31.

[4] "Unanimity of the Jury," Legal Information Institute, accessed April 14, 2025, https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-6/unanimity-of-the-jury.

[5] Apodaca v. Oregon, 406 U.S. 404 (1972), Justia Law, https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/406/404/.

[6] Legal Information Institute, "Martinez v. Ryan," accessed April 14, 2025, https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/cert/10-9646.

[7] Juvenile Law Center, "Montgomery v. Louisiana," accessed April 14, 2025, https://jlc.org/cases/montgomery-v-louisiana.

[8] Barry Leiwant, "Supreme Court Overrules the ‘Watershed Rule of Criminal Procedure’ Portion of Teague v. Lane," Federal Defenders of New York Blog, May 27, 2021, https://blog.federaldefendersny.org/supreme-court-overrules-the-watershed-rule-of-criminal-procedure-portion-of-teague-v-lane/.

[9] Supreme Court of the United States, 2020, https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/19-5807_086c.pdf.

[10] Phoebe R. Esser, “The Death of the Watershed Doctrine,” Washington Law Review 91, no. 2 (2016): 941, https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/wlr/vol91/iss2/14/#:~:text=The%20%E2%80%9Cwatershed%E2%80%9D%20doctrine%20gives%20prisoners,before%20their%20appeals%20were%20exhausted.