Commonwealth v. Simmons

OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUSTICE ABRAMSON

ABRAMSON, Judge.

In July 2008, the Madison Circuit Court convicted Deonte Simmons of first-degree trafficking in a controlled substance (cocaine) and sentenced him as a second-degree persistent felon to fifteen years in prison. The jury that ultimately found Simmons guilty of that offense had only eleven members, one of the jurors having broken her ankle during an over-night recess. Simmons appealed his conviction to the Court of Appeals and claimed, among other things, that the eleven-member jury deprived him of his constitutional right to a jury trial.…