In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit ____________

No. 02-4100

RALPH PRUITT,

Petitioner-Appellant,

v.

EUGENE MCADORY, Warden,

Respondent-Appellee.

____________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

No. 97 C 2115—Joan B. Gottschall, Judge.

____________

ARGUED MAY 28, 2003—DECIDED JULY 25, 2003

____________

Before EASTERBROOK, MANION, and KANNE, Circuit

Judges.

KANNE, Circuit Judge. Ralph Pruitt asks this Court

to reverse the district court’s decision and grant his petition for a writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254,

contending that his state conviction for sexual assault

and attempted armed robbery was procured in violation of

the Constitution. Pruitt argues that the prosecution engaged in impermissible gender discrimination in violation

of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause

by using its peremptory challenges to strike only males

from the venire. He also argues that he was denied a fair

trial when the prosecution, in violation of its duty under

the Due Process Clause, withheld from him information
2 No. 02-4100

that the prosecution’s chief witness appeared to testify

against him only after a judge imposed an appearance

bond, raising the threat of forfeiture of the bond and arrest if she failed to appear. For the following reasons, we

affirm the district court’s denial of his petition.

HISTORY

On November 24, 1992, Pruitt was sentenced to natural

life imprisonment, under Illinois’s habitual offender statute, after a Cook County, Illinois jury found him guilty

of the aggravated criminal sexual assault and attempted

armed robbery of Naomi Sims. The evidence against

Pruitt offered at trial consisted primarily of the testimony

of Sims, who told the jury that Pruitt had put a knife to her

throat, attempted to rob her, and then raped her in an

abandoned building.

Pruitt’s concerns with the fairness of his trial began

early in the proceedings. Immediately following the selection of the jury, Pruitt objected to the prosecution’s use

of its peremptory challenges, arguing that prosecutors

were impermissibly exercising the challenges to strike

prospective jurors based on their gender. The trial court

ruled that Pruitt had failed to make out a prima facie

showing of discrimination by the prosecution, and the

case proceeded to trial.

Also prior to the trial, the prosecution had a rather

difficult time in finding Sims and securing her presence

at various proceedings. It appears that prosecutors located her only after learning that she had been arrested

on an unrelated prostitution charge. The Assistant State’s

Attorney prosecuting Pruitt then had Sims brought before a judge, where she signed an agreement providing

for the execution of a $5,000 appearance bond. Under

Illinois law, should Sims have then failed to appear at

trial, she would have forfeited the $5,000 and would fur-
No. 02-4100 3

1 The district court subsequently granted Pruitt’s motion for

reconsideration of its ruling on his speedy trial claim but, after

Pruitt filed an amended petition further addressing that issue,

(continued...)

ther have been subject to arrest and imprisonment. Neither the existence of the agreement nor the appearance

bond was disclosed to Pruitt; in fact, his attorney only

learned of its existence after Pruitt had been convicted.

Pruitt unsuccessfully appealed his conviction and sentence to the Illinois Appellate Court, challenging the

prosecution’s use of its peremptory challenges during

jury selection. Because Pruitt learned about the existence

of the appearance bond after his direct appeal had been

taken, he raised the nondisclosure issue in a separate postconviction challenge. The Illinois Appellate Court consolidated the direct appeal and the post-conviction petition, ultimately denying relief on both grounds. The Illinois Supreme Court denied him leave to appeal either issue.

On March 27, 1997, Pruitt filed this petition for habeas

relief in the United States District Court for the Northern

District of Illinois, challenging the legality of his conviction on four grounds: (1) that the evidence against him

was insufficient to support his conviction; (2) that he

was denied the right to a speedy trial under the Sixth

Amendment; (3) that the prosecution improperly used its

peremptory challenges to strike prospective jurors on the

basis of gender in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause; and (4) that the prosecution failed to disclose that the key witness against him

was compelled to appear at his trial by a $5,000 appearance bond. After briefing by both parties, the district court

denied Pruitt’s petition on all grounds save the third.

United States ex rel. Pruitt v. Page, No. 97 C 2115, 1999

U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13123, at *32 (N.D. Ill. Aug. 20, 1999).1
4 No. 02-4100

1 (...continued)

denied relief on that ground. United States ex rel. Pruitt v. Page,

No. 97 C 2115, 2000 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20731 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 14,

2000). Pruitt has not raised the speedy trial claim on appeal.

As for the nondisclosure of the appearance bond, the

court held that the Illinois Appellate Court’s decision

was not contrary to federal law. Id. at *31. It noted that

“[w]hile the evidence of Sims’ bond would have been

relevant, in context it was not material” under the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Bagley, 473

U.S. 667 (1985). Pruitt, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13123,

at *31.

The district court did rule that the Illinois Appellate

Court had unreasonably applied federal law, as identified

by the Supreme Court in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79

(1986), and J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B., 511 U.S. 127

(1994), by finding that Pruitt had failed to make out a

prima facie case of gender discrimination in the prosecution’s use of its peremptory challenges. Pruitt, 1999 U.S.

Dist. LEXIS 13123, at *22. The court held that Pruitt had,

in fact, made such a showing and was entitled to a hearing on the issue. Rather than conditionally granting

Pruitt’s petition by providing for his release unless the

State held a hearing on his Batson claim, the court decided

that it would conduct the hearing itself, evaluate the

evidence, and determine whether the peremptory challenges were exercised for discriminatory reasons. Id. at *34.

The evidentiary hearing was held on November 19, 2001.

The district court heard from the two Assistant State’s

Attorneys who prosecuted Pruitt, Joe Howard and Laura

Morask, who testified as to their reasons for using six

of their seven peremptory challenges to strike only men

from the venire. As the district court later noted in its

order, the hearing was held some nine years after Pruitt’s
No. 02-4100 5

trial, and the prosecutors’ testimony was based in part on

their review of the voir dire transcript and Morask’s

contemporaneous notes. United States ex rel. Pruitt v.

Page, No. 97 C 2115, slip op. at 4 n.3 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 26,

2002). Nevertheless, the district court found that the two

witnesses had sufficient recall of the trial to testify adequately and sincerely as to the reasons they had for striking each of the six male venire members. Id. at 13.

After hearing testimony from the two prosecutors, the

district court issued its order denying Pruitt habeas relief

on the Batson-J.E.B. issue. Id. at 14. While the court

found that Pruitt had established a prima facie case of

gender discrimination, it held that the prosecution witnesses had articulated “neutral reasons [that were] clear,

specific, related to the case at hand, and sufficient to rebut

Pruitt’s prima facie case.” Id. at 6. The court went on to

hold that, based on its review of the record and its evaluation of the demeanor of the witnesses, the prosecution’s

proffered reasons for the use of peremptory challenges

were credible and not simply a pretext for impermissible gender discrimination. Id. at 13. The court therefore

denied Pruitt’s petition, disposing of his last remaining

ground for relief. Pruitt timely appealed to this Court for

a review of the district court’s decision on two of the

original four grounds he had asserted.

ANALYSIS

In reviewing the district court’s decision to deny Pruitt’s

habeas petition, “[w]e review . . . factual findings for clear

error and legal conclusions as well as mixed questions

of law and fact de novo.” Harding v. Walls, 300 F.3d 824,

827 (7th Cir. 2002). The Anti-Terrorism and Effective

Death Penalty Act (“AEDPA”), however, significantly constrains federal court review of state court decisions. Under

that statute, habeas relief should only be granted if a
6 No. 02-4100

state court adjudication “resulted in a decision that was

contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of,

clearly established Federal law, as determined by the

Supreme Court of the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1)

(2003). Once the clearly established governing legal principles are identified, we must then determine whether the

Illinois Appellate Court’s decision in Pruitt’s case was

either “contrary to, or involved an unreasonable application of” those legal principles.

A. Nondisclosure of the Appearance Bond

We begin with Pruitt’s claim that he was denied a fair

trial, as guaranteed by the Due Process Clause of the

Fourteenth Amendment, because of the State’s failure to

disclose the existence of the appearance bond guaranteeing Sims’s presence at his trial. The Supreme Court has

made clear that the due process guarantee includes protection against the nondisclosure to the defense of favorable and material evidence in the possession of the prosecution. See Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 87 (1963)

(“[T]he suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due process

where the evidence is material either to guilt or punishment, irrespective of the good faith or bad faith of the

prosecution.”). The Court has further explained that

“[i]mpeachment evidence . . . as well as exculpatory evidence, falls within the Brady rule.” Bagley, 473 U.S. at 676

(citing Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150, 154 (1972)).

The Brady duty to disclose favorable evidence does not

mean that the prosecution is required to turn over its

entire case file to the defense. Bagley, 473 U.S. at 675.

Rather, the key to triggering the duty to disclose is the

materiality of the evidence to the question of guilt: “We do

not, however, automatically require a new trial whenever

a combing of the prosecutors’ files after the trial has dis-
No. 02-4100 7

closed evidence possibly useful to the defense but not

likely to have changed the verdict. A finding of materiality

of the evidence is required under Brady. A new trial is

required if the false testimony could . . . in any reasonable

likelihood have affected the judgment of the jury.” Giglio,

405 U.S. at 154 (quotations and citations omitted). In

Bagley, the Supreme Court further sought to clarify this

concept of materiality, noting that “a constitutional error

occurs . . . only if the evidence is material in the sense

that its suppression undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial.” 473 U.S. at 678. The Court went on to

explain that “evidence is material only if there is a reasonable probability that, had the evidence been disclosed

to the defense, the result of the proceeding would have

been different.” Id. at 682 (Blackmun, J.); id. at 685

(White, J., concurring in that sentence).

In this case, Pruitt argues that evidence of the appearance bond guaranteeing Sims’s presence at trial was

both favorable and material to his defense—and therefore should have been disclosed by the prosecution. He

contends that Sims’s testimony, as the State’s chief complaining witness, was central to the prosecution’s case

against him, and that evidence of the appearance-bond

agreement could have been used to impeach her testimony. He directs our attention to Crivens v. Roth, a case

in which we held that the prosecution’s withholding of

the criminal history of its key trial witness was a sufficient ground on which to grant the defendant’s habeas

petition. 172 F.3d 991, 998 (7th Cir. 1999). In that case,

we stated that “[w]hen the credibility of a witness plays

a pivotal role in a conviction, it may become an issue

upon which we will reverse a conviction.” Id. at 998.

Pruitt argues that because Sims’s testimony was critical

to the prosecution’s case against him, any evidence that

bore on her credibility was therefore material to the

question of his guilt or innocence. He further argues that
8 No. 02-4100

2 The Illinois Code of Criminal Procedure provides: “[T]he judge

may require any material witness for the State or defendant to

enter into a written undertaking to appear at the trial, and

may provide for the forfeiture of a sum certain in the event the

witness does not appear at the trial. . . . Any witness who executes a recognizance and fails to comply with its terms shall, in

addition to any forfeiture provided in the recognizance, be subject to the penalty provided in Section 32-10 of the ‘Criminal Code

of 1961’ . . . for violation of bail bond.” 725 ILL. COMP. STAT. 5/109-

3(d) (2003).

the existence of the appearance bond could have been

used to expose what he believes was Sims’s perjurious

testimony regarding her motivation for testifying against

him, when Sims stated at trial that she was testifying

because she “want[ed] to.” (Tr. D-51.)

In addressing Pruitt’s claim, the Illinois Appellate

Court noted that while it did not “condone the State’s

failure to disclose to defendant the existence of the bondsecured agreement, in this case, the failure to do so did

not result in prejudice to defendant nor deny him a fair

trial.” People v. Pruitt, Nos. 1-93-0162 & 1-94-3562, slip

op. at 15 (Ill. App. Ct. Nov. 22, 1995). Important to the

court’s analysis were the facts that the record failed to

indicate that Sims had been promised leniency in exchange for her testimony or that she had been required

to testify in any particular manner, and that material

witness bonds (and the penalties for violating them)

were authorized under state law.2 Id. at 14-15. The Illinois court therefore denied relief on the nondisclosure issue.

On habeas review, we consider whether the Illinois

Appellate Court’s decision was “contrary to, or involved an

unreasonable application of” federal law. The district

court concluded that while evidence of the appearance

bond may have been favorable to Pruitt, it was nevertheless not material to the question of his guilt or innocence.
No. 02-4100 9

Pruitt, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13123, at *30-32. The court

observed that “[d]efense counsel knew that Sims had

failed to appear in the past, giving him an opening to

bring out her reluctance to testify, and he did so. It

would have been clear to the jury that Sims had to be

pressured to testify. Had they also been told that she

knew she would be subject to arrest and bond forfeiture

if she failed to appear, it is unlikely that it would have

made a difference in their appraisal of the evidence.” Id.

at *32. The court, concluding that the nondisclosure of

the evidence did not undermine its confidence in the

outcome of Pruitt’s trial, held that the Illinois Appellate

Court’s decision was not contrary to federal law.

We agree that the Illinois court’s resolution of this

issue was neither contrary to nor an unreasonable application of the Brady disclosure rule. The evidence of the

appearance bond was certainly favorable to Pruitt, in the

sense that it would have given him another basis on

which to question the motivation for Sims’s testimony

against him. But when the defense was already aware

of Sims’s reluctance to testify and had full opportunity

to question her about it at trial (see Tr. 109-111, 114),

this additional piece of evidence was not material, as

the Supreme Court has explained that term in Bagley, so

much as it was cumulative on the issue of motivation. Cf.

United States v. Milan, 304 F.3d 273, 288 (3d Cir. 2002)

(finding no Brady violation in part because “the additional evidence would have been merely cumulative” (citations omitted)). We do not believe that giving Pruitt the

opportunity to inform the jury that the prosecution had

invoked the Illinois Code of Criminal Procedure to ensure Sims’s presence would have raised a “reasonable

probability that . . . the result of the proceeding would have

been different.” Bagley, 473 U.S. at 682. Rather, like the

evidence at issue in Giglio, the evidence of the appearance

bond was “possibly useful to the defense but not likely to

have changed the verdict.” Giglio, 405 U.S. at 154.
10 No. 02-4100

Finally, Pruitt claims that evidence of the appearance

bond was material because it would have provided a

basis on which he could have questioned the veracity

of Sims’s statement that she was testifying “[b]ecause

[she] want[ed] to.” This statement, he argues, demonstrates

her propensity to testify falsely—and Pruitt reminds us

that this Court has previously stated that evidence of a

habit of lying to police and judges could have a negative

impact on a witness’s credibility, potentially undermining confidence in the outcome of a trial. See Crivens, 172

F.3d at 999. But we, like the district court, are not convinced that Sims’s statement was necessarily false—the

appearance bond may have been merely a more forceful

reminder of her obligation to testify—and Pruitt already

had ample information on which to question the veracity

of her statement, as he was well aware of her repeated

reluctance to testify at prior proceedings. At trial, he did,

in fact, question Sims about her failure to appear voluntarily on prior occasions and her evasion of police attempts to locate her. As the district court put it, had

Pruitt’s attorney been able to point out that her appearance at trial had been secured by an appearance bond

and the threat of arrest, “the jury would hardly have been

surprised.” Pruitt, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13123, at *32.

While full disclosure by the prosecution of the means

it had employed to secure Sims’s presence at trial would

have been the better course here (and may have avoided

questions regarding the prosecution’s compliance with

its ethical duties), we do not believe that had the existence of the appearance-bond agreement been disclosed

to the defense, the outcome of Pruitt’s trial would have

been different. Therefore, the Illinois Appellate Court’s

decision was neither contrary to nor an unreasonable

application of the federal law established by the Supreme Court in Brady, Bagley, and Giglio.
No. 02-4100 11

3 Because, at the time of Pruitt’s trial, the Supreme Court had

yet to address the applicability of the federal Equal Protection

Clause to discrimination on the basis of gender in the use of

peremptory challenges, the objection was made on state-law

grounds. Before the Illinois Appellate Court rendered its decision in Pruitt’s appeal, however, the Supreme Court decided

J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B., 511 U.S. 127, 129 (1994). The

Illinois Appellate Court therefore applied J.E.B. to Pruitt’s case,

as it was pending on appeal.

B. Gender Discrimination in Jury Selection

Pruitt next argues that the district court erred in holding that the prosecution had not violated the Equal Protection Clause in using its peremptory challenges to strike

only men from the venire, finding instead that the prosecution had offered credible, gender-neutral reasons for

each challenge. Pruitt initially raised this objection at

the completion of jury selection.3

 At the outset of voir

dire, the venire consisted of 40 individuals, at least 28 of

whom were male (the prosecution says 30). The prosecution exercised six of its seven peremptory challenges to

strike potential jurors—all of whom were male. Pruitt’s

jury ultimately was comprised of nine men and three

women, with one male and one female selected as alternate jurors.

After Pruitt raised his objection, the state trial court

ruled that Pruitt had failed to make out a prima facie

case of impermissible discrimination, without further

elaborating on its reasoning for so ruling. (Tr. CC-178.)

Because the trial court had not required the prosecution

to explain or justify its actions during voir dire, the Illinois Appellate Court discussed a number of permissible,

yet entirely hypothetical, reasons that the prosecution

may have had to exclude potential jurors. Noting these

possible reasons, it went on to affirm the trial court’s ruling, holding that “the court’s decision that defendant did
12 No. 02-4100

not establish a prima facie case of gender discrimination

is not against the manifest weight of the evidence.” Pruitt,

slip op. at 11-12 (Ill. App. Ct.).

On habeas review, the district court found that the

Illinois court’s determination that Pruitt had failed to

establish a prima facie case of gender discrimination was

an unreasonable application of federal law established

by the Supreme Court in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79

(1986) and J.E.B. v. Alabama ex rel. T.B., 511 U.S. 127

(1994). In Batson, the Supreme Court held that the Equal

Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment governs

the use of peremptory challenges by a prosecutor in a

criminal trial, prohibiting the use of such challenges to

strike potential jurors on the basis of their race. 476 U.S. at

89. Eight years later, in J.E.B., the Court concluded that

the Equal Protection Clause also prohibits the use of

peremptory challenges to strike potential jurors solely

on the basis of their gender. 511 U.S. at 129.

Since the Batson and J.E.B. decisions, this Court has

on many occasions reiterated the three-step process required to establish a violation of the Equal Protection

Clause. See, e.g., Alverio v. Sam’s Warehouse Club, Inc.,

253 F.3d 933, 939-40 (7th Cir. 2001). First, the party alleging the impermissible use of the peremptory challenge

must establish a prima facie case of intentional discrimination. J.E.B., 511 U.S. at 144-45 (suggesting that analysis of gender-based discrimination claims should follow

the approach outlined in Batson). For purposes of this

appeal, we will assume, without deciding, that the district court was correct in holding that the Illinois court

erred and that Pruitt had indeed made the requisite

showing.

Once the challenging party has made a prima facie

showing, the second step in the Batson-J.E.B. analysis

requires the party exercising the peremptory challenge
No. 02-4100 13

4 Pruitt suggests that holding an evidentiary hearing to determine the prosecutor’s intent some nine years after the trial was

not an appropriate remedy in his case. Rather, he argues, a

new trial should have been ordered because determining the

(continued...)

to come forward, if it can, with a gender-neutral explanation for the strikes. See Batson, 476 U.S. at 97. This is not

a difficult step to overcome: “Any neutral reason, no matter how ‘implausible or fantastic,’ even if it is ‘silly or superstitious,’ is sufficient to rebut a prima facie case of discrimination.” United States v. Evans, 192 F.3d 698, 701 (7th

Cir. 1999) (quoting Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 768

(1995) (per curiam)). The explanation “merely must be

based on a juror characteristic other than gender, and the

proffered explanation may not be pretextual.” J.E.B., 511

U.S. at 145. If gender-neutral reasons are given, the

analysis shifts to the third step: the court must determine if the explanation is a mere pretext for discrimination. At this stage, the burden remains on the party alleging the impermissible use of the peremptory challenge

to prove intentional discrimination. See Batson, 476 U.S.

at 93 (“As in any equal protection case, the burden is, of

course, on the defendant who alleges discriminatory

selection of the venire to prove the existence of purposeful

discrimination.” (quotation omitted)); Purkett, 514 U.S.

at 768 (“[T]he ultimate burden of persuasion regarding

[the impermissible] motivation rests with, and never shifts

from, the opponent of the strike.”).

Because, in the district court’s opinion, Pruitt had

established a prima facie showing of intentional discrimination, he was entitled to move to the second stage of the

Batson analysis. The district court therefore held an

evidentiary hearing to elicit the prosecution’s actual

reasons for exercising its peremptory challenges, rather

than relying on hypothetical rationales.4 See Pruitt, 1999
14 No. 02-4100

4 (...continued)

intent of the prosecutors was impractical. See Barnes v. Anderson, 202 F.3d 150, 156 (2d Cir. 1999) (“If [the court] concludes

that the passage of time has unduly impaired [its] ability to

make a fair determination of the [non-movant]’s intent, [the

court] may so state, in which event the . . . court shall order a

new trial.” (quotation omitted)). The State argues that any

such challenge on this basis has been waived, as this is the first

time Pruitt has raised it. Even so, Pruitt’s argument would

not have prevailed.

In this case, the district court concluded, and the testimony

at the evidentiary hearing confirmed, that the passage of time

had not unduly impaired the ability of the court to fairly determine the prosecution’s intent. The prosecutors (after reviewing

the voir dire transcript and trial notes) were able to recall a great

deal of information about the jury-selection process—sincerely

and honestly, in the district court’s opinion. See Pruitt, slip. op.

at 13 (N.D. Ill.). Given this, we cannot say the district court erred

in choosing the remedial path it did.

U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13123, at *26. The two Assistant State’s

Attorneys who prosecuted Pruitt appeared at the hearing, offering rather specific explanations, clearly related

to the issues involved in the rape trial of a prostitute, for

each of the six peremptory challenges. State’s Attorney

Howard testified to their general strategy in choosing

a jury:

We were looking for a very liberal jury. We were looking for a jury that would not condemn Ms. Sims for

being a cocaine user and would not hold that against

her or hold it against her that she was out at 3:00

o’clock in the morning smoking crack, wandering

around the streets. We needed a jury who would be

very liberal, who would be perhaps understanding of

someone who was a drug user. And we were looking

for someone, I would say, an urban juror, who would

have had some contact with these types of people. And
No. 02-4100 15

if not contact, then at least some knowledge of people

like [Sims].

(Hr’g Tr. at 19-20). This generally meant that the prosecution, according to State’s Attorney Morask, wanted

“people who lived in Chicago, more than people who lived

in the suburbs because . . . people who lived in Chicago

would have a better idea of the realities of crime and

that anybody can be victimized.” (Hr’g Tr. at 103.) In sum,

the prosecutors testified that they had the entirely rational and legitimate goal of selecting jurors who would

hear the evidence without starting from a position of

bias against the prosecution’s key witness. According to

the prosecutors, the six jurors they struck had no contact

with the urban areas of Chicago, no experience with

crime—either as a victim or as the family or friend of a

victim—and no other basis on which the prosecutors

believed they could relate to the victim in this case.

Given these legitimate, gender-neutral reasons for

striking the six male jurors, the court turned to the

third step of the Batson analysis: determining whether

the proffered reasons were pretextual. “It is not until the

third step that the persuasiveness of the justification

becomes relevant—the step in which the trial court determines whether the opponent of the strike has carried

his burden of proving purposeful discrimination. At that

stage, implausible or fantastic justifications may (and

probably will) be found to be pretexts for purposeful discrimination.” Purkett, 514 U.S. at 768. Here, the district

court found the proffered explanations persuasive, noting

that “[t]he prosecutors who testified appeared sincere

and honest as they explained their reasons for striking

six male venire members.” Pruitt, slip. op. at 13 (N.D. Ill.).

The district court was able to observe the demeanor of

both witnesses and thus, as is typical, was better positioned than an appellate court to judge the veracity of

the proffered explanations. Given that, “the trial court’s
16 No. 02-4100

determination represents a finding of fact of the sort

accorded great deference on appeal. We cannot reverse a

trial court’s finding that proffered, race-neutral, reasons

for a strike were credible unless the court’s finding is

clearly erroneous—even if we find it dubious.” Dunham

v. Frank’s Nursery and Crafts, Inc., 967 F.2d 1121, 1124

(7th Cir. 1992) (quotation omitted); see also Alverio, 253

F.3d at 940 (“Once the trial judge has been persuaded of

the neutrality of the . . . reason for striking a juror, we

have no basis for reversal on appeal unless the reason

given is completely outlandish or there is other evidence

which demonstrated its falsity.” (quotations omitted)).

Pruitt contends, however, that the district court’s

analysis—and ultimate acceptance—of the prosecution’s

justifications was flawed because the court considered

them on a juror-by-juror basis, rather than considering

them as part of the totality of the circumstances. Cf.

Coulter v. Gilmore, 155 F.3d 912, 921 (7th Cir. 1998) (holding that the trial court erred in failing to consider the

“totality of the circumstances” when evaluating defendant’s

Batson claim). Coulter makes clear that, “the crucial and

determinative inquiry in a Batson claim is whether the

state has treated similarly situated venirepersons differently based on race [or, after J.E.B., gender].” Id.

Pruitt complains in his brief that “the district court

looked to the reasons offered to justify striking each

individual male juror without considering whether the

reason was applied equally to males and females.” That

claim, however, is directly refuted by the district court’s

opinion, which addressed that very analysis under the

heading “Comparing Males and Females.” Pruitt, slip. op.

at 11-14 (N.D. Ill.). In fact, the district court compared

two women who were ultimately accepted as jurors (one

was an alternate) with the six men stricken by the prosecution. While acknowledging that the women shared an

undesirable characteristic (as the prosecution saw it)
No. 02-4100 17

with the men—that is, they lived in the suburbs—the

court also observed that they possessed characteristics

that the stricken men did not. One stated that she had

a daughter who had previously been injured as the victim

of a fight (perhaps allowing her to better empathize with

other crime victims), while the other declared that she

had a low tolerance for rape. The district court found that

these responses demonstrated that the six stricken men

and these two selected women were not “similarly situated,” id. at 14, and any differential treatment could

be justified by non-gender-based differences.

Picking jurors is a complex and multifaceted process.

Individual factors or characteristics often do not provide

the “silver bullet” that will mean acceptance or rejection

of any potential juror. Rather, it is a combination of factors that will determine whether a party believes a juror

will be favorable to their side: “The decision to challenge

a juror will often rest on the interplay of various factors.”

Dunham, 967 F.2d at 1126. Pruitt has failed to establish that the prosecution’s proffered reasons for striking

the six male jurors were designed to hide impermissible

discrimination. That, considered in combination with

the other evidence relied on by the district court (including the fact that the venire was at least 70 percent

male, making it statistically less likely for a woman to

be stricken, and the fact that the prosecution did not use

its seventh peremptory challenge to strike another male),

leads us to conclude that Pruitt’s conviction was not

attained in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. The

district court was therefore correct in denying Pruitt’s

petition on this ground.

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, the decision of the district

court denying Pruitt’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus

is AFFIRMED.
18 No. 02-4100

A true Copy:

Teste: 

 ________________________________

Clerk of the United States Court of

Appeals for the Seventh Circuit 

USCA-02-C-0072—7-25-03