## In the 

# United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

____________

No. 02-4100

RALPH P RUITT
, Petitioner-Appellant

,
v.

E UGENE M C A DORY , 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 M AY 28, 2003—D ECIDED J ULY 25, 2003

____________

Before E ASTERBROOK
, M ANION
, and K ANNE
, Circuit Judges

. K

ANNE
, 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 ofthe 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 information2 No. 02-4100

that the prosecution’s chief witness appeared to testify against him only after a judge imposed an appearancebond, 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 Illinoi s’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 beganearly 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 exercisingthe 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 a ppears that prosecutors located her only after learning that she had been arrested on an unrelated prostitution charge. The Assistant State’sAttorney 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 subsequentlygranted 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 beentaken, 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 NorthernDistrict 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 pros ecution improper ly used its peremptory challenges to stri ke prospective jurors on thebasis 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 himwas compelled to appear at his trial by a $5,000 appearance bond. After briefing by bo th 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). 14 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 beenrelevant, 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 faciecase 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 Batsonclaim, the court decided that it would conduct the hearing itself, evaluate theevidence, 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 cha llenges to strike only men from the venire. As the distri ct court later noted in its order, the hearing was held some nine years after Pruitt’sNo. 02-4100 5

trial, and the prosecutors’ testimony was based in part on
their review of the voir diretranscript 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 twowitnesses 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 orde r denying Pruitt habeas relief
on the Batson-J.E.B. issue. Id. at 14. While the court found that Pruitt had established a prima faciecase ofgender 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 faciecase

. ” Id. at 6. The court went on tohold 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 challengeswere 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 timelyappealed 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 a6 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 invo lved 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 th e appearance bond guaranteeing Sims’s presence at his trial. The Supreme Court hasmade 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 pr osecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due processwhere 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 pros ecutors’ files after the trial has dis-No. 02-4100 7

closed evidence possibly useful to the defense but not likely to have changed the verd ict. 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 sensethat its suppression undermines confidence in the outcome of the trial.” 473 U.S. at 678. The Court went on to explain that “evidence is mate rial 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 wasboth favorable and material to his defense—and therefore should have been disclosed by the prosecution. Hecontends 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-bondagreement 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 ofthe 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 that8 No. 02-4100

2 The Illinois Code of Criminal Pr ocedure provides: “[T]he judge may require any material witne ss 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 thewitness does not appear at the trial. . . . Any witness who executes a recognizance and fails to comply with its terms shall, inaddition 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 I LL

. C OMP

. S TAT . 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 motiva tion 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 toindicate 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 appearancebond 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 thisissue 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 te stify and had full opportunity to question her about it at trial ( seeTr. 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 b een merely cumulative” (citations omitted)). We do not be lieve that giving Pruitt the opportunity to inform the jury that the prosecution hadinvoked 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 previouslystated that evidence of a habit of lying to police and judges could have a negativeimpact on a witness’s credibility, potentially undermining confidence in the outcome of a trial. See Crivens , 172F.3d at 999. But we, like the district court, are not convinced that Sims’s statement was necessarily false—the appearance bond may have b een 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, hadPruitt’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 Si ms’s presence at trial would have been the better course here (and may have avoided questions regarding the prosecution’s compliance withits 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 unreasonableapplication 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-lawgrounds. 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 strikeonly 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 ofwhom 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 threewomen, 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 thesepossible reasons, it went on to affirm the trial court’s ruling, holding that “the court’s decision that defendant did12 No. 02-4100

not establish a prima faciecase 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 faciecase 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 st rike potential jurors solely on the basis of their gender. 511 U.S. at 129.

Since the Batsonand J.E.B. decisions, this Court hason 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 faciecase 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 thisappeal, 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 challengeNo. 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 nota 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, theanalysis 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] motivationrests with, and never shifts from, the opponent of the strike.”).

Because, in the district court’s opinion, Pruitt had
established a prima facieshowing 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 elic it the prosecution’s actual reasons for exercising its peremptory challenges, rather than relying on hypothetical rationales. 4 See Pruitt , 199914 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. Evenso, Pruitt’s argument would not have prevailed.
In this case, the district cour t concluded, and the testimony at the evidentiary hearing confir med, that the passage of time
had not unduly impaired the ability of the court to fairly determine the prosecution’s intent. Th e prosecutors (after reviewing
the voir diretranscript 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 Pr uitt 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. AndNo. 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 Batsonanalysis: determining whether the proffered reasons were pretextual. “It is not until the third step that the persuasiveness of the justificationbecomes 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 (andprobably will) be found to be pretexts for purposeful discrimination.” Purkett , 514 U.S. at 768. Here, the district court found the proffered expl anations 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 ofboth 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’s16 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, th at 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
Batsonclaim). Coultermakes clear that, “the crucial and determinative inquiry in a Batson claim is whether the state has treated similarly si tuated 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 (onewas an alternate) with the six men stricken by the prosecution. While acknowledgin g that the women shared an undesirable characteristic (a s the prosecution saw it)No. 02-4100 17

with the men—that is, they lived in the suburbs—the
court also observed that th ey 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 menand 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 rejectionof any potential juror. Rather, it is a combination of factors that will determine whet her 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 withthe 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 challe nge 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 A FFIRMED

.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