Case Title: State v. Jones

Citation: 2020-Ohio-3051

Docket Number: 2019-0187

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2020-05-27T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
v. Jones, Slip Opinion No. 2020-Ohio-3051.] 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2020-OHIO-3051 
THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. JONES, APPELLANT. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State v. Jones, Slip Opinion No. 2020-Ohio-3051.] 
Criminal law—A trial court’s good-faith error in allowing the state to exercise a 
peremptory challenge out of sequence is not structural error but rather is 
trial error and subject to harmless-error review—Court of appeals’ 
judgment affirmed. 
(No. 2019-0187—Submitted February 11, 2020—Decided May 27, 2020.) 
CERTIFIED by the Court of Appeals for Hamilton County, 
No. C-170358, 2018-Ohio-4754. 
_______________________ 
KENNEDY, J. 
{¶ 1} The First District Court of Appeals has certified a conflict between its 
decision in this case and a decision from the Tenth District Court of Appeals on the 
following question of law:  
 
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“Where the state is permitted to exercise more than its 
allotted number of peremptory challenges in a criminal prosecution, 
does that circumstance constitute structural error requiring 
automatic reversal of a conviction, or is the defendant-appellant 
required to demonstrate that prejudice has resulted from the error?”   
 
155 Ohio St.3d 1418, 2019-Ohio-1315, 120 N.E.3d 865, quoting 1st Dist. Hamilton 
No. C-170358 (Jan. 11, 2019).  The answer to both parts of that question is no. 
{¶ 2} A structural error is a violation of the basic constitutional guarantees 
that define the framework of a criminal trial; it is a fundamental constitutional 
defect in the proceeding that is presumptively prejudicial and not susceptible to 
harmless-error review.  See State v. Fisher, 99 Ohio St.3d 127, 2003-Ohio-2761, 
789 N.E.2d 222, ¶ 18.  However, the right to exercise peremptory challenges is not 
guaranteed by either the United States Constitution or the Ohio Constitution but 
rather is provided by a statute, R.C. 2945.21.  Moreover, it is the Rules of Criminal 
Procedure that regulate the number and manner of exercising peremptory 
challenges.  See Crim.R. 24(D) and (E).  Accordingly, while a trial court’s good-
faith misallocation of peremptory strikes is an error, the error does not cause a 
fundamental constitutional defect within the framework of the trial-court 
proceedings that should be classified as structural error.  Like other trial errors, it 
is subject to harmless-error review and a reviewing court may disregard the error 
upon a determination that it did not affect the outcome of the trial-court 
proceedings. 
{¶ 3} In this case, the First District correctly held that the trial court 
erroneously allowed the state to strike a juror from the panel after the state had 
waived its final peremptory challenge.  But that error is not structural and therefore 
does not require the automatic reversal of appellant Seante Jones’s conviction for 
complicity to theft.  However, when the First District analyzed the error, it 
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incorrectly required Jones to demonstrate that the error affected the outcome of the 
trial.  Under the harmless-error standard of review, the state always bears the burden 
of demonstrating that the error did not affect the outcome of the trial-court 
proceedings.  Nonetheless, because the record demonstrates that allowing the state 
to exercise an additional peremptory strike did not affect the outcome of Jones’s 
trial, the appellate court’s error is itself harmless. 
{¶ 4} Accordingly, we affirm the appellate court’s judgment. 
Facts and Procedural History 
{¶ 5} The state charged Jones with theft based on an allegation that he had 
shoplifted clothing items and a watch valued at $37.97 from a Burlington Coat 
Factory store in Springdale, Ohio. 
{¶ 6} During jury selection, the state chose not to exercise its third and final 
peremptory strike.  Jones then used his final peremptory challenge, causing 
prospective juror M.W. to be brought into the jury box and seated as the final juror.  
In his individual voir dire, prospective juror M.W. admitted that his feelings about 
police officers were “split 50/50,” meaning that he believed there were “good cops” 
and “bad cops.”  He also said that police-officer-involved shootings in the national 
news had “gotten [his] attention” and that “it just seemed like, in [his] opinion, 
things just wasn’t adding up.”  But on further questioning, prospective juror M.W. 
agreed that he could set those issues aside, listen to the evidence presented in the 
courtroom, keep an open mind until a verdict was reached, and remain fair and 
impartial to Jones and to the state.  The state did not challenge him for cause.  E.R. 
was then selected as the alternate juror, and both parties agreed that they were 
satisfied with the jury. 
{¶ 7} At a sidebar conference, however, before the jury was empaneled, the 
assistant prosecuting attorney claimed that the state had been denied an opportunity 
to use its final peremptory strike on juror M.W.  The trial court “reviewed the 
transcript” and said that it had failed to offer the state the chance to use its last 
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challenge, and over defense counsel’s objection, it excused juror M.W. and seated 
juror E.R. as the final juror.  Jones moved for a mistrial, asserting that Crim.R. 24 
did not permit the state to use its third and final peremptory challenge after having 
waived it and that juror M.W. appeared to be “a potentially friendly juror” for the 
defense.  The trial court denied the request for a mistrial. 
{¶ 8} At trial, Steve Seiter, a loss-prevention associate for the Burlington 
Coat Factory store, testified that on June 29, 2016, he watched from the camera 
room as Jones and Ricardo Scott entered the store.  Seiter testified that Jones 
appeared to be looking around the store to see if anyone was paying attention to 
him and that that behavior was concerning because it made Seiter feel like Jones 
was “doing something that [was] out of the ordinary or * * * suspicious in [a] 
possible theft act.”  Seiter observed Jones select clothing from the racks, including 
a red shirt and a pair of black shorts, and take those items into a fitting room.  
According to Seiter, Jones left the fitting room, placed several clothing items back 
on a rack, and then walked out of the store in a hurry, without paying for anything.  
However, Seiter could not find the red shirt and black shorts.  Seiter then checked 
the fitting room and ascertained that the red shirt and black shorts were missing.  
Jones got into a tan Hyundai Sonata with Scott.  Seiter took down the license-plate 
number and reported the theft to the Springdale Police Department. 
{¶ 9} Officer Joseph Robers testified that he was dispatched to respond to 
the call, saw Jones and Scott leave the store, and stopped the Sonata as it pulled out 
of the parking lot.  Jones and Scott received pat-down searches, during which 
merchandise belonging to the store was found.  At trial, however, Officer Robers 
could not remember whether the merchandise belonging to the store was found on 
Jones or Scott.  Subsequently, the car was searched and additional merchandise was 
found, including a red shirt and black shorts with Burlington Coat Factory stickers 
on them.  Seiter arrived and identified the clothing as items that had been stolen 
from the store. 
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{¶ 10} Jones testified in his own defense, explaining that he had arranged a 
“bootleg trip”—a ride with an unlicensed taxi driver—to Tri-County Mall with 
Scott, someone Jones had connected with on social media.  Burlington Coat Factory 
was on the way to the mall, and Jones agreed to stop there first, even though he 
“was not interested in anything at Burlington Coat Factory.”  He said they walked 
inside the store and he looked around for about five minutes before returning to the 
car, where he waited for Scott for another 20 minutes.  According to Jones, Scott 
got back in the car and “start[ed] pulling stuff out of his pants, tucking it away.”  
Jones testified that he told Scott, “I’m not going to jail for you.”  As Scott drove 
out of the parking lot, the police pulled the car over and ordered Jones and Scott 
out of the car.  At trial, Jones testified that none of the clothing, which he admitted 
had been stolen, was found on him. 
{¶ 11} The trial court instructed the jury on the offenses of theft and 
complicity.  The jury found Jones not guilty of theft but guilty of complicity.  The 
trial court imposed a jail sentence of 180 days (with 177 days suspended), a $200 
fine, court costs, and six months of community control. 
{¶ 12} Jones appealed, asserting that the error in allowing the state to 
exercise a peremptory challenge out of sequence was structural in nature and 
therefore per se reversible.  The court of appeals recognized that the trial court erred 
in allowing the state to use a peremptory strike that it had already waived, but it 
held that the error was not a constitutional error and therefore could not amount to 
a structural error.  2018-Ohio-4754, 124 N.E.3d 439, ¶ 21-23.  It then determined 
that the error was harmless, because Jones had failed to demonstrate that he had 
been prejudiced by it.  Id. at ¶ 37.  After rejecting other assignments of error not at 
issue here, the court of appeals affirmed Jones’s conviction and sentence.  Id. at 
¶ 52.  Subsequently, the First District certified that its decision was in conflict with 
State v. Holloway, in which the Tenth District held that “as a matter of law, the 
defendant was not required to make a showing of actual prejudice where the state 
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is granted an ‘extra’ peremptory challenge,” 129 Ohio App.3d 790, 798, 719 N.E.2d 
70 (10th Dist.1998). 
{¶ 13} We determined that a conflict existed.  155 Ohio St.3d 1418, 2019-
Ohio-1315, 120 N.E.3d 865. 
Positions of the Parties 
{¶ 14} Jones maintains that granting the state’s request for an “extra” 
peremptory strike violated his right to a trial by an impartial jury, as guaranteed by 
Article I, Sections 5 and 10 of the Ohio Constitution and as implemented by 
Crim.R. 24.  He contends that by improperly allowing the peremptory challenge, 
the trial court “unfairly skewed the trial process in favor of the state,” so that the 
error permeated the whole trial.  Jones cites Lewis v. United States, 146 U.S. 370, 
13 S.Ct. 136, 36 L.Ed. 1011 (1892), and decisions from the Fourth, Tenth, and 
Eleventh District Courts of Appeals for the proposition that a violation of the right 
to exercise a preemptory strike “is a significant error that traditionally has required 
automatic reversal.”  He also argues that regardless of whether the error is 
constitutional in nature, permitting the state to exercise an out-of-sequence 
peremptory challenge affected the whole framework of Jones’s trial and therefore, 
because it is impossible to know whether excusing the juror changed the outcome 
of Jones’s trial, the error should not be subject to a harmless-error analysis.  A 
contrary holding, Jones urges, would make the mandatory language of Crim.R. 24 
unenforceable. 
{¶ 15} The state concedes that the trial court erred in allowing the out-of-
sequence peremptory strike but maintains that the error was not structural.  It 
contends that the United States Supreme Court has disavowed cases like Lewis 
because they predated the harmless-error rule.  Citing to State v. Greer, 39 Ohio 
St.3d 236, 530 N.E.2d 382 (1988), the state notes that this court has already held 
that there is no state or federal constitutional right to peremptory challenges.  The 
state further asserts that when a state does provide for the right—as Ohio does—
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the number of challenges that are allowed is solely a matter of procedure.  The state 
challenges Jones’s attempt to bootstrap peremptory challenges to the state and 
federal constitutional right to an impartial jury, pointing out that not only may 
biased jurors be removed for cause but that an erroneous excusal of a juror does not 
compromise a jury’s impartiality.  The state asks this court to follow the decisions 
of other state courts of last resort and hold that an error related to peremptory 
challenges is not a structural error. 
{¶ 16} Accordingly, this case presents a single question: whether a trial 
court’s error in allowing the state to exercise a peremptory challenge after having 
waived it is structural error and therefore per se prejudicial. 
Law and Analysis 
Plain, Harmless, and Structural Error 
{¶ 17} Ohio’s criminal law distinguishes between errors that a defendant 
objects to at trial and those that he or she fails to raise at trial.  State v. Perry, 101 
Ohio St.3d 118, 2004-Ohio-297, 802 N.E.2d 643, ¶ 14; Crim.R. 52.  When the 
defendant forfeits the right to assert an error on appeal by failing to bring it to the 
trial court’s attention in the first instance, an appellate court applies plain-error 
review.  State v. Rogers, 143 Ohio St.3d 385, 2015-Ohio-2459, 38 N.E.3d 860, 
¶ 21-22.  Under this standard, the defendant bears the burden of “showing that but 
for a plain or obvious error, the outcome of the proceeding would have been 
otherwise, and reversal must be necessary to correct a manifest miscarriage of 
justice.”  State v. Quarterman, 140 Ohio St.3d 464, 2014-Ohio-4034, 19 N.E.3d 
900, ¶ 16.  An appellate court has discretion to notice plain error and therefore “is 
not required to correct it.”  Rogers at ¶ 23. 
{¶ 18} In contrast, when a defendant objects to an error, an appellate court 
applies harmless-error review.  Perry at ¶ 15.  Under that standard, the state “bears 
the burden of demonstrating that the error did not affect the substantial rights of the 
defendant.”  Id.  Whether the defendant’s substantial rights were affected depends 
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on whether the error was prejudicial, i.e., whether it affected the outcome of the 
trial.  Fisher, 99 Ohio St.3d 127, 2003-Ohio-2761, 789 N.E.2d 222, at ¶ 7.  An 
appellate court is required to reverse the conviction when the state is unable to meet 
its burden.  Perry at ¶ 15. 
{¶ 19} We have recognized that when a defendant is represented by counsel 
and tried by an impartial fact-finder, there is a strong presumption that all errors—
constitutional and nonconstitutional—are subject to harmless-error review.  Id. at  
¶ 17.  Nonetheless, this court and the United States Supreme Court have held that 
certain errors are never harmless.  Weaver v. Massachusetts, ___ U.S. ___, 137 
S.Ct. 1899, 1907-1908, 198 L.Ed.2d 420 (2017); Perry at ¶ 17. 
{¶ 20} Structural errors are “constitutional defects that ‘ “defy analysis by 
‘harmless error’ standards” because they “affect[] the framework within which the 
trial proceeds, rather than simply [being] an error in the trial process itself.” ’ ” 
(Brackets sic.)  Perry, 101 Ohio St.3d 118, 2004-Ohio-297, 802 N.E.2d 643, at  
¶ 17, quoting Fisher at ¶ 9, quoting Arizona v. Fulminante, 499 U.S. 279, 309-310, 
111 S.Ct. 1246, 113 L.Ed.2d 302 (1991).  “ ‘Errors of this type are so intrinsically 
harmful as to require automatic reversal (i.e., “affect substantial rights”) without 
regard to their effect on the outcome.’ ”  State v. Hill, 92 Ohio St.3d 191, 196, 749 
N.E.2d 274 (2001), quoting Neder v. United States, 527 U.S. 1, 7, 119 S.Ct. 1827, 
144 L.Ed.2d 35 (1999).  They are “so fundamental that they obviate the necessity 
for a reviewing court to do a harmless-error analysis.”  Id. at 199. 
{¶ 21} “The purpose of the structural error doctrine is to ensure insistence 
on certain basic, constitutional guarantees that should define the framework of any 
criminal trial.”  Weaver at ___, 137 S.Ct. at 1907.  Structural error has therefore 
been recognized only in limited circumstances involving fundamental 
constitutional rights, including the denial of counsel to an indigent defendant, the 
denial of counsel of choice, the denial of self-representation at trial, the denial of a 
public trial, and the failure to instruct the jury that a defendant’s guilt must be 
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proved beyond a reasonable doubt.  Id. at ___, 137 S.Ct. at 1908; United States v. 
Davila, 569 U.S. 597, 611, 133 S.Ct. 2139, 186 L.Ed.2d 139 (2013) 
{¶ 22} Therefore, the threshold issue in determining whether an error is 
structural is whether the error deprives the accused of a constitutional right.  Perry 
at ¶ 21; see also State v. Payne, 114 Ohio St.3d 502, 2007-Ohio-4642, 873 N.E.2d 
306, ¶ 18 (“all structural errors are by nature constitutional errors”); State v. 
Esparza, 74 Ohio St.3d 660, 662, 660 N.E.2d 1194 (1996) (“the trial-
error/structural-error distinction is irrelevant unless it is first established that a 
constitutional error has occurred” [emphasis sic]). 
The Right to Peremptory Challenges 
{¶ 23} The Supreme Court of the United States has held that under federal 
law, the erroneous but good-faith denial of a defendant’s peremptory challenge is 
not a structural error requiring automatic reversal of the defendant’s conviction.  
Rivera v. Illinois, 556 U.S. 148, 157-158, 162, 129 S.Ct. 1446, 173 L.Ed.2d 320 
(2009).  The court explained that “there is no freestanding constitutional right to 
peremptory challenges,” id. at 157, and that “[b]ecause peremptory challenges are 
within the States’ province to grant or withhold, the mistaken denial of a state-
provided peremptory challenge does not, without more, violate the Federal 
Constitution,” id. at 158.  And it concluded:  
 
Absent a federal constitutional violation, States retain the 
prerogative to decide whether such errors deprive a tribunal of its 
lawful authority and thus require automatic reversal.  States are free 
to decide, as a matter of state law, that a trial court’s mistaken denial 
of a peremptory challenge is reversible error per se.  Or they may 
conclude * * * that the improper seating of a competent and 
unbiased juror does not convert the jury into an ultra vires tribunal; 
therefore the error could rank as harmless under state law. 
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Id. at 161-162. 
{¶ 24} Similarly, this court has held that the Ohio Constitution does not 
require peremptory challenges to be provided in a criminal trial.  Greer, 39 Ohio 
St.3d at 245, 530 N.E.2d 382.  Rather, we have explained that while the substantive 
right to peremptory strikes is provided by R.C. 2945.21, the number of strikes 
allowed and the time and manner of their exercise is a procedural matter governed 
by Crim.R. 24.  Greer at 245-246.  In Greer, we rejected the argument that a trial 
court’s denial of the lawful number of peremptory challenges to a defendant “is 
reversible error without any demonstration of prejudice.”  Id. at 244-245.  We noted 
that not only had the accused failed to demonstrate that he was entitled to 24 
peremptory strikes in a death-penalty case (double the amount provided by statute 
and four times that allowed by Crim.R. 24(C)), but because he used only five of the 
six challenges granted to him, he was also unable to demonstrate “actual prejudice.”  
Id. at 245. 
{¶ 25} Although Greer holds that there is no state constitutional right to 
peremptory strikes, Jones nonetheless contends that the error in allowing the state 
to exercise an out-of-sequence peremptory challenge violates his right to an 
impartial jury as guaranteed by Article I, Sections 5 and 10 of the Ohio 
Constitution.  We acknowledged in Greer that “[w]hen utilized in conjunction with 
the challenge for cause, the peremptory challenge aids in the provision of an 
impartial jury.”  Id.  But the flaws in Jones’s argument are that he does not assert 
that any of the jurors who served on the panel were biased against him and he passed 
on the opportunity to challenge each one of them for cause.  The good-faith error 
in misallocating peremptory challenges did not deny Jones the right to a panel of 
impartial, indifferent jurors, and he had no constitutional right to a panel with jurors 
who appeared friendly or who were skewed in his favor.  See State v. Coley, 93 
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Ohio St.3d 253, 258-259, 754 N.E.2d 1129 (2001).  The right to an impartial jury 
is not implicated in these circumstances. 
{¶ 26} The trial court did, however, violate a procedural rule dictating the 
manner in which peremptory challenges are to be made.  Crim.R. 24(E) provides 
that “[p]eremptory challenges shall be exercised alternately, with the first challenge 
exercised by the state.  The failure of a party to exercise a peremptory challenge 
constitutes a waiver of that challenge, but does not constitute a waiver of any 
subsequent challenge.”  For this reason, when the assistant prosecuting attorney 
failed to exercise the state’s third and final peremptory challenge, he waived it, and 
the trial court erred in permitting him the opportunity to subsequently exercise it 
against any juror.  But that error does not implicate one of those “constitutional 
rights so basic to a fair trial that their infraction can never be treated as harmless 
error.”  Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 23, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705 
(1967).  Instead, a violation of Crim.R. 24(E) is “ ‘simply * * * an error in the trial 
process itself,’ ” Fisher, 99 Ohio St.3d 127, 2003-Ohio-2761, 789 N.E.2d 222, at 
¶ 9, quoting Fulminante, 499 U.S. at 310, 111 S.Ct. 1246, 113 L.Ed.2d 302.  
Because a trial court’s good-faith mistake in controlling the parties’ use of their 
peremptory strikes does not violate the basic constitutional guarantees setting the 
framework of a criminal trial as a whole, the error is not structural in nature and 
therefore is not presumptively prejudicial.  Consequently, it is subject to harmless-
error review. 
Harmless Error 
{¶ 27} The court of appeals concluded that allowing the state to exercise an 
out-of-sequence peremptory challenge was harmless error because Jones had failed 
to demonstrate that he suffered any actual prejudice because of it.  However, as we 
have explained, the state—not Jones—bears the burden on harmless-error review, 
and it had to show that the error did not affect the outcome of Jones’s trial.  Fisher 
at ¶ 7; Perry, 101 Ohio St.3d 118, 2004-Ohio-297, 802 N.E.2d 643, at ¶ 15.  
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Accordingly, the court of appeals improperly shifted the burden to Jones to show 
that the trial court’s error affected the outcome of his trial. 
{¶ 28} Nonetheless, the record demonstrates that the error was harmless.  
First, nothing in the colloquy with juror M.W. indicates that he would have voted 
to acquit Jones or that he would have disregarded his oath to serve impartially.  
Although juror M.W. did say that his feelings about police officers were “split 
50/50” and that there were “good cops” and “bad cops,” he also said that media 
coverage of police-involved shootings had “gotten [his] attention” and that “it just 
seemed like, in [his] opinion, things just wasn’t adding up.”  But on further 
questioning, juror M.W. swore that he would set aside those thoughts, listen to the 
evidence introduced in the case, keep an open mind until a verdict was reached, and 
remain fair and impartial to Jones and to the state. 
{¶ 29} Second, the evidence in this case was overwhelming.  Seiter, the 
loss-prevention associate, testified that he saw Jones enter Burlington Coat Factory, 
act suspiciously, and take a red shirt and black shorts into a fitting room before 
leaving in a hurry and without paying for anything.  The red shirt and black shorts 
Jones had selected were not found in the fitting room, and it is undisputed that 
police officers found those items of clothing—which Jones admitted had just been 
stolen from the store—minutes later after stopping the Sonata.  At the same time, 
Jones’s excuse for being in the store—that he had arranged a ride to the Tri-County 
Mall with an unlicensed taxi driver who decided to stop and shoplift for 25 minutes 
at Burlington Coat Factory before taking Jones to his destination—defies 
credibility. 
{¶ 30} For these reasons, it is manifest that the error in excusing juror M.W. 
did not affect the outcome of the trial. 
Conclusion 
{¶ 31} We are asked to determine whether a trial court’s error in allowing 
the state to exercise a peremptory challenge of a prospective juror in violation of 
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the Rules of Criminal Procedure rises to structural error.  That question is answered 
by our precedent and caselaw from the United States Supreme Court—only 
constitutional defects may be structural errors, and misallocating peremptory 
strikes is a trial error, not a constitutional one.  For this reason, we resolve the 
certified-conflict question by holding that a good-faith error in allowing the state to 
exercise a peremptory challenge out of sequence is not structural error but rather is 
trial error and subject to harmless-error review. 
{¶ 32} And because we are convinced from the record that the trial court’s 
error did not affect the outcome of Jones’s trial and is therefore harmless, we affirm 
the judgment of the First District Court of Appeals. 
So answered. 
O’CONNOR, C.J., and FRENCH, FISCHER, DEWINE, and DONNELLY, JJ., 
concur. 
STEWART, J., concurs in part and dissents in part, with an opinion. 
_________________ 
STEWART, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part. 
{¶ 33} I agree that a trial court’s error in its application of Crim.R. 24(D) 
and (E) is not structural in nature and is subject to a harmless-error analysis on 
review.  I also agree that the First District Court of Appeals improperly shifted the 
burden to appellant, Seante Jones, to show that the trial court’s error affected the 
outcome of his trial.  I disagree, however, with this court’s decision to conduct a 
harmless-error analysis in the first instance. 
{¶ 34} This court should not conduct a harmless-error analysis of a trial 
court’s actions in the first instance.  See McFadden v. United States, ___U.S.___, 
135 S.Ct. 2298, 2307, 192 L.Ed.2d 260 (2015); Shelly Materials, Inc. v. Streetsboro 
Planning & Zoning Comm., ___ Ohio St.3d. ___, 2019-Ohio-4499, ___ N.E.3d 
___, ¶ 25; State v. Jones, 148 Ohio St.3d 167, 2016-Ohio-5105, 69 N.E.3d 688, 
¶ 29.  This is particularly so when, as here, neither party briefed the issue of whether 
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the court of appeals erred in its application of the harmless-error standard.  State v. 
Martin, 156 Ohio St.3d 503, 2019-Ohio-2010, 129 N.E.3d 437, ¶ 18; State v. Tate, 
140 Ohio St.3d 442, 2014-Ohio-3667, 19 N.E.3d 888, ¶ 21. 
{¶ 35} Accordingly, I would remand this case to the court of appeals so that 
court may conduct a harmless-error analysis in the first instance. 
_________________ 
Joseph T. Deters, Hamilton County Prosecuting Attorney, and Alex Scott 
Havlin, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
Raymond T. Faller, Hamilton County Public Defender, and David 
Hoffmann, Assistant Public Defender, for appellant. 
_________________