A judge’s refusal to excuse two jurors from a Maricopa County death penalty trial did not end prosecutors’ effort to assess them: prosecutors later used police detectives and a confidential FBI database to investigate the jurors without notifying the court, defense, or jurors. One of them, Jillian Barfield, says the tactic may have violated her civil rights.
The dispute arose during the capital trial of Franklin Clifton, who was found guilty of first-degree murder on January 10, 2026, and sentenced to death on January 29, 2026, for the October 2014 fatal shooting of Olivia Hernandez and the non-fatal shooting of another woman in Phoenix, according to KTAR News. ABC15 Arizona reported that prosecutors Kristin Larish and Heather Livingstone asked Judge Monica Edelstein last September to remove two jurors, citing their demeanor and body language. After Edelstein denied the request, the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office had detectives investigate them, including by searching the FBI’s National Crime Information Center database, the outlet reported.
Barfield, who served five months on the Clifton jury, told ABC15 she considered the NCIC search unwarranted and believed it may have violated her civil rights and the FBI’s rules for using the database.
What the Database Searches Turned Up
The NCIC is an FBI database restricted to law enforcement. Unauthorized use is a Class 6 felony under Arizona law, according to ABC15. In one search described by the station, a panelist identified only as Juror 42 was found to have been a crime victim and to have had a sealed, dismissed case involving the shoplifting of baby formula. Juror 42 was ultimately dismissed from the case.
What NCIC rules say—and what remains unsettled
The FBI’s 2019 CJIS Security Policy says personally identifiable information extracted from criminal justice information is for official business only and calls on agencies to establish policies governing its handling. Arizona DPS says agencies that handle ACJIS or NCIC information must follow established policies and regulations, but that general requirement does not specifically address jury selection. Questions about the searches remain unresolved…