Cortez Watts v. State of Mississippi, 281 So.3d 873

Cortez Watts was tried for conspiracy to commit armed robbery, attempted armed robbery, armed robbery, aggravated assault, and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon; jury convicted on all counts except armed robbery.
Incident: after meeting Tanyatta Kinnel at a casino, victims Phillips and McCray went to Kinnel’s apartment; an altercation ensued during which Watts allegedly demanded money and shot Phillips.
During jury selection Watts used peremptory strikes against three white venire members; the State raised a Batson challenge to those strikes.
The trial court sustained the State’s objection to striking Juror 3 (a bank employee/worker at a bank) and seated him, concluding the defense’s stated reason was not race-neutral.
Watts moved for JNOV or a new trial; the motion was denied. On appeal the Court of Appeals found the trial court failed to complete the Batson analysis (specifically the third-step pretext inquiry), reversed and remanded for a new trial.
The court also considered but rejected Watts’s challenge to the indictment/sentencing enhancement, concluding the indictment gave fair notice of the 10-year firearm enhancement.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether the trial court improperly denied Watts’s peremptory strike under Batson	Watts: the denial violated his right to a jury of his peers because the court did not complete the Batson three-step test and failed to assess pretext	State: defense’s explanation (banker) was not sufficiently race-neutral or persuasive; judge acted within discretion	Reversed — court found a prima facie case and that Watts offered a race-neutral reason; trial court erred by not conducting the required pretext analysis; reversible error requires new trial
Whether Watts’s indictment was fatally defective as to firearm sentencing enhancements	Watts: indictment referenced subsection providing 5-year enhancement in parts, so notice of 10-year enhancement under subsection 2 was defective	State: indictment contained factual allegations supporting the firearm enhancement and fair notice of the possible 10-year enhancement	Affirmed on this issue — indictment read as a whole gave fair notice and included facts supporting the 10-year enhancement

Hardison v. State, 94 So. 3d 1092 (Miss. 2012) (Mississippi Supreme Court requires full three-step Batson analysis and treats erroneous denial of a peremptory strike without proper analysis as reversible error)
Rivera v. Illinois, 556 U.S. 148 (2009) (U.S. Supreme Court: mistaken denial of a peremptory challenge may be subject to harmless-error review)
Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765 (1995) (even implausible or imperfect explanations can be race-neutral for Batson purposes)
Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400 (1991) (prima facie Batson inquiry focuses on whether pattern or practice of strikes based on race is shown)
Hatten v. State, 628 So. 2d 294 (Miss. 1993) (trial judge must give clear on-the-record findings when resolving Batson challenges)