Talk:Davis v. Ayala

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Davis v. Ayala/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: AHeneen (talk · contribs) 23:01, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

Claiming this review. It will take a couple days before it's complete. AHeneen (talk) 23:01, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	No issues here. The prose reads well. I fixed a couple minor errors myself (missing "of"; removed a duplicate "when"). See remark below about the Dostoyevsky caption.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.	No lists, fiction, or words to watch. Article is divided into appropriate sections. The lead adequately summarizes the article.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.	The content is well sourced and the citations are properly formatted (Bluebook style)
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).	No issues here.
	2c. it contains no original research.	No issues here
	2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism.	No issues here.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	The "background" section needs an explanation of Batson challenge, similar to the explanations in the "The right to petition for a writ of habeas corpus under federal law" & "Federal harmless error doctrine" subsections. The article presently just states: "Ayala, who was of Hispanic descent, filed a series of Batson challenges to contest the prosecution's use of peremptory challenges. The trial judge permitted the prosecution to explain the basis of their peremptory challenges in a closed hearing, outside the presence of Ayala's counsel, "so as not to disclose trial strategy"." Since the court's decision pertains to Batson challenges, which are mentioned in the following "Opinion of the Court" section, they should be explained. However, the GA criteria for this says that it permits "articles that do not cover every major fact or detail". I changed the "Batson challenge" wikilink to link to the appropriate subsection of Batson v. Kentucky, where there is a decent explanation of the challenge. Therefore, I'll let this issue pass, but a small overview should be added to this article (if a subsection is added, use Template:Main article below the subsection heading to link to Batson challenge)
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).	No issues here
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.	No issues here
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.	No issues here
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.	The information for this image of Justice Kennedy does not clearly evidence that the photo is in the public domain. The source link is broken. I couldn't find any additional information about the origin of this photo through a Google reverse image search. However, the image matches the cropped, black-and-white image beside his biography on the Supreme Court's website and I will give it the benefit of the doubt and assume that the broken link contained information about the image sufficient to establish that is is in the public domain. This image of Justice Kennedy does have appropriate support for its copyright status (only other good & appropriate image in commons:Category:Anthony Kennedy).
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	The GA criteria does not consider the lack of pictures, only that those in the article are relevant. I think that it's odd to only include Justice Kennedy's photo. Photos of Justice Alito & Justice Sotomayor should be added in the respective subsections about their opinions. This would cram three images in a short amount of space. To address this, the image of Justice Kennedy could be moved to the subsection "Commentary about Justice Kennedy's concurring opinion". The side-by-side images of Justice Kennedy and Dostoyevsky with its caption is creative and interesting. In my opinion, a caption shouldn't contain information that is not in the prose of the article, but I can find no guideline to support that and so it can't prevent promotion of this article to GA status.
	7. Overall assessment.	An explanation of Batson challenges should be added to this article. However, it is not essential enough to the broad coverage GA requirement to prevent promotion.

AHeneen (talk) 16:13, 28 April 2016 (UTC)

@AHeneen: Thank you very much for the thorough and helpful review. I will be sure to make all of the recommended changes to this article. In particular, I agree that it is a good idea to add background information about Batson challenges. Best, -- Notecardforfree (talk) 22:15, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

@AHeneen: I added a section about Batson challenges in the legal background section. Please let me know if there is anything else that you think should be done with this article. Thanks again for your GA review! Best, -- Notecardforfree (talk) 00:14, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Looks good to me. I added the hatnote to Batson challenges below the section heading. After cleaning the article up, I plan on nominating Bank Markazi v. Peterson for GA (it's currently a DYK candidate). If you have time and don't mind the different citation style, I'd appreciate a review of that (once it's nominated, of course). AHeneen (talk) 01:15, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

@AHeneen: I would be more than happy to review the article! Feel free to ping me when you nominate it, and I'll take a look. Thanks again for your strong work! Best, -- Notecardforfree (talk) 01:25, 5 May 2016 (UTC)