Johnson v. StateJohnson v. State
During jury selection in this case the defendant exercised peremptory challenges to strike Hispanic jurors. After striking the third such juror thе prosecutor objected pursuant to the Supreme Court‘s decision in Melbourne v. State, 679 So.2d 759 (Fla.1996), and asked the trial court to inquire of defense counsel for valid ethnic-neutral reasons for the strikes. As concerns the subject of this appeal, Juror Perez, defense counsel responded as follows:
Ms. Perez is a bank teller, it falls into the same category; people in a particular occupation. She also had a father accused of a crime and she was kind of wishy-washy with what he was accused of and how this affected her.
The following exchange followed:
COURT: She said it was 15 years ago.
STATE: She also said she could be totally fair about the whole situation and that it would not affect her and it was a father аnd an uncle accused of a drug deal and she was way too young to understand anything that was going on.
DEFENSE: That was my reason.
COURT: I am going to disallow your objection and force seat her.
DEFENSE: Note my objection.
COURT: Okay. I don‘t think it‘s sufficiently race-neutral.
DEFENSE: Judge, actually, if I may, for the record, the case law I just recently
looked at, the Melbourne case, says that the reason we give doesn‘t have to be a race reason, it just has to be a race-neutral reason. COURT: It also says I have to think its true. It has to be genuine. She is a bank teller. They‘re the lowest paid people on the face of business. To turn anybody down by habit—
The trial court did not finish its thought process and proceeded to the next juror.
In Melbourne v. State, 679 So.2d 759 (Fla.1996), the Supreme Court of Florida established the following prоcedure for determining the racial neutrality and genuineness of a peremptory challenge:
Step 1 A party objecting to the other side‘s use of a peremptory challenge on racial grounds must: a) make a timely objection on that basis, b) show thаt the venire person is a member of a distinct racial group, and c) request that the court ask the striking party its reason for the strike.
Step 2 At this point, the burden of production shifts to the proponent of the strike to come forward with a raceneutral exрlanation.
Step 3 If the explanation is facially raceneutral and the court believes that, given all the circumstances surrounding the strike, the explanation is not a pretext, the strike will be sustained.
Id. at 764. In the present case, the state complied with the first step of the analysis. The reasons proffered by defense counsel for excusing juror Perez were, 1) her job as a bank teller, 2) thе fact that her father and uncle had been previously accused of crimes, and 3) that she was wishy-washy about the nature of the accusation and how it affected her. The trial court was obligated at this point to assess the racial neutrality of the proffered reasons. In Melbourne, the Supreme Court relied heavily on the United States Supreme Court‘s decision in Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 115 S.Ct. 1769, 131 L.Ed.2d 834 (1995). As concerns step 2 of this process Elem states:
The second step of this process does not demand an explanation that is persuasive, or even plausible. `At this [second] step of the inquiry, the issue is the facial validity of the prosecutor‘s explanation. Unless discriminatory intent is inherent to the prosecutor‘s explanation, thе reason offered will be deemed race-neutral.’
514 U.S. at 767-68, 115 S.Ct. at 1770-71 (quoting Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 360, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 1866-67, 114 L.Ed.2d 395 (1991)(O‘CONNOR, J., concurring in judgment)). All of the reasons proffered by defense counsel wеre valid raceneutral reasons. The trial judge‘s comment that the reasons were not “sufficiently” raceneutral was incorrеct, as there is no specific threshold of neutrality that must be satisfied by the party explaining the peremptory strike at step 2 of the Melbourne analysis. At this second step there are only raceneutral reasons and those that are racebased.1 Although the triаl judge made this legally incorrect statement, it is clear that he
It also says I have to think its true. It has to be genuine.
When read in context, the judge‘s statement clearly indicates that he did not believe the proffered reason was genuine and that he was not gоing to change his ruling disallowing the peremptory strike. Immediately after saying this, the judge began but did not finish his thought process on the issue. There is nothing in Melbourne which requires trial judges to articulate their thought process on the issue of pretext. Davis v. State, 691 So.2d 1180 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997). In the absence of clear error this Court is compelled to affirm. Melbourne, 679 So.2d at 764 (“[T]he trial court‘s decision turns primarily on an assessment of credibility and will be affirmed on appeal unlеss clearly erroneous.“).
Affirmed.