Case Name: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Appellee, v. MURRAY HOOPER, Appellant
Court: Illinois Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Illinois
Decision Date: 1987-05-01
Citations: 118 Ill. 2d 244
Docket Number: No. 55660
Parties: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Appellee, v. MURRAY HOOPER, Appellant.
Judges: 
Reporter: Illinois Reports, Second Series
Volume: 118
Pages: 244–262

Head Matter:
(No. 55660
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Appellee, v. MURRAY HOOPER, Appellant.
Order entered May 1, 1987.

Opinion:
JUSTICE RYAN
specially concurring:
I join in the supervisory order entered herein; however, by reason of the comments of my dissenting colleagues, I am compelled to express in writing the reasons for my concurrence with the supervisory order remanding to the trial court the cases involving a Batson issue (Batson v. Kentucky (1986), 476 U.S. 79, 90 L. Ed. 2d 69,106 S. Ct. 1712).
At the trial of the cases which we now consider, the issue of the misuse of peremptory challenges to exclude blacks was considered under the law as announced in Swain v. Alabama (1965), 380 U.S. 202, 13 L. Ed. 2d 759, 85 S. Ct. 824. Under that law, of course, the burden the defendant had to meet to establish a prima facie case of discriminatory exclusion of blacks was much different, and much more difficult for the defendant to meet, than it is under Batson. I believe it would be manifestly unfair to a defendant if this court were to make a determination from a record made under Swain law whether or not a prima facie case has been established under Batson. The focus and the burden of the defendant's proof and the elements to be proved are different now than they were under Swain. If the defendant can present evidence of the discriminatory use of peremptory challenges under Batson law which was not disclosed by the record made under Swain guidelines, he should have an opportunity to present such evidence for the trial court's consideration. As the Chief Justice suggests in his dissent, it may well be that on remand the trial court will have to decide the prima facie question from a cold record, as this court could do now. But that will not necessarily be true in all cases. We should not preclude the defendant from making such an additional showing by deciding now in this court whether or not a prima facie case of discriminatory use of peremptory challenges has been made. I, too, am concerned with judicial economy. I, too, believe that "the public must understand that State courts will no longer tolerate the exclusion of black jurors because of their race." (Simon, J., dissenting at 258.) I, too, think that we must send "a clear signal of the vigor and determination with which the Supreme Court's mandate will be executed." (Simon, J., dissenting at 258.) I do not believe, however, that these laudable objectives should be achieved by cutting off a defendant's right to establish a record which will disclose a prima facie case of discrimination under the guidelines of Batson. Our supervisory order directs the trial court to conduct an expedited hearing "to permit the defendant to present evidence to substantiate his claim of unconstitutional discrimination in the exercise of peremptory challenges." I do not agree with my dissenting colleagues that we in this court, from a record made under Swain guidelines, should deny the defendant this right.
Contrary to Justice Simon's dissent, People v. Mack (1985), 105 Ill. 2d 103, does not characterize "claims of systematic racially discriminatory jury selection as 'emotional arguments.' " I authored the Mack opinion and find the language of the dissent to which I refer to be an unfair and incorrect construction of the language used in Mack. That opinion states:
"Regardless of the many emotional arguments on this question that have been raised in this court *." (105 Ill. 2d 103,122.)
The question referred to in the quoted language is the systematic exclusion of blacks through the use of peremptory challenges. The quoted language simply says that many emotional arguments on this question have been raised. That is a far cry from characterizing the question itself, that is, racially discriminatory jury selection, as emotional arguments. Emotional arguments can be made for or against almost any subject, but that does not mean that the subject itself should be characterized as an emotional argument. Since I authored Mack, the manner in which the reference to that opinion has been inserted in Justice Simon's dissent makes it apparent that the purpose for the reference to Mack, and for the incorrect construction of that language, is to detract from the sincerity of my profession of good intentions in this concurrence.
It is possible that in some cases the record before us made under Swain guidelines may appear to clearly disclose a prima fade case of discriminatory use of peremptory challenges. In People v. McDonald, Nos. 63204, 63240 cons., as Justice Simon's dissent indicates, the prosecutor challenged 16 eligible black jurors. As flagrant as this example may appear, the defendant should be permitted to bolster this showing of apparent discrimination with whatever other evidence he may have which, under Batson, is relevant. If, following a hearing in the trial court, this example is as flagrant as it appears to be, it is doubtful that the prima facie issue created by our supervisory order will cast the severe burden my dissenting colleagues fear on the judicial system at either the trial or appellate level.
We cannot, however, become involved in a numbers game. At what point and under what circumstances should this court draw an arbitrary line based on the number of blacks peremptorily excused? What if 16 blacks, as in People v. McDonald, were peremptorily excluded but 5 blacks were seated on the jury? Can we say from a cold record disclosing these numbers alone that a prima facie discriminatory use of challenges has been established? Or what if five, four, three or two blacks were peremptorily challenged? Do those numbers alone disclose a prima facie case? Or suppose that three blacks were peremptorily challenged and that three blacks were seated as jurors, does this disclose a prima facie case of discrimination? Consider further that the three blacks who were seated as jurors under the last example were seated only after the State had exhausted its peremptory challenges. We must avoid arbitrarily deciding the delicate question we now consider solely from the number of blacks peremptorily excused as disclosed by the record. This is in accord with the holding of the New York court in People v. Thompson (App. Div. 1981), 434 N.Y.S.2d 739, which refused to inquire into the reasons for
"a prosecutor's use of peremptory challenges merely because the prosecutor has used a particular. number of his peremptory challenges to exclude black potential jurors, for it may well be that the prosecutor's peremptory challenges were properly exercised, but for reasons that are not as readily apparent to those who were not in the position of the Judge who attended the voir dire. Thus, while exclusion of a significant number of black potential jurors will usually be part of the case of a defendant who seeks to have the trial court inquire into the prosecutor's use of peremptory challenges based upon alleged exclusion of blacks, such exclusion will be insufficient, in and of itself, to warrant reversal of a trial court's determination not to make inquiry." (People v. Thompson (App. Div. 1981), 435 N.Y.S.2d 739, 755.)
In Williams v. State (Tex. App. 1986), 712 S.W. 2d 835, the court stated:
"In Batson, the state struck all four Blacks from the panel. It is obvious from the majority's opinion that there is no quantitative formula with which to gauge peremptory challenges of minority panel members. Such determinations should be based on all the relevant circumstances in the particular case. The Court in Batson places wide discretion in trial judges to make these determinations, but requires that they undertake ' "a sensitive inquiry into such circumstantial and direct evidence of intent as may be available." ' 476 U.S. at 93, 106 S. Ct. at 1721 (quoting Village of Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corp., 429 U.S. 252, 266, 97 S. Ct. 555, 564, 50 L. Ed. 2d 450 (1977))." Williams v. State (Tex. App. 1986), 712 S.W. 2d 835, 841.
See also State v. Neil (Fla. 1984), 547 So. 2d 481, 487.
To avoid the drawing of arbitrary lines by this court based on a record made on rules not now applicable, these cases should be remanded to the trial court to make a determination not only from the number of blacks excluded but from all the circumstances of the case, whether or not a prima facie showing of discriminatory exclusion of blacks has been established. Then, if the defendant does make such a showing, either from the record as originally established or by that record plus any additional relevant evidence, the trial court must make the further determination whether the State has a racially neutral explanation for the challenges.
I do not understand the statement in the dissent that the recital of hypothetical situations in this concurrence does not clarify the court's stance in this sensitive issue. On the contrary, I feel these hypothetical situations emphasize the necessity of this court's holding that all cases on review in which the Batson issue is viable should be remanded to the trial court for a two-stage hearing, wherein the defendant will have the opportunity to make a prima facie showing of discriminatory use of peremptory challenges. After such a showing has been made, the prosecutor may then offer racially neutral explanations for the use of the challenges. I cannot understand why my dissenting colleagues want to deprive the defendant of that right. If we decide the prima facie question in this court, then the defendant is being deprived of the right to present evidence that is relevant under Batson. I cannot agree with my dissenting colleagues that "the evidence relevant to this question is already before us." (Simon, J., dissenting at 259.) A more accurate statement would be that some of the evidence relevant to this question may be before us. Sending the case back to the trial court is not a matter of passing "the buck to the trial judges." (Simon, J., dissenting at 259.) It is simply a matter of affording an opportunity for the trial court to make a determination from all of the relevant facts and circumstances that the defendant may wish to offer in order to establish that a prima facie showing has been made.
I am not certain as to what result my dissenting colleagues are now contending for. The Chief Justice clearly contends that this court should decide the prima facie question from the record before us. Justice Simon appears to agree with that contention. However, he then states, "if we feel that the evidence in a particular proceeding is insufficient to establish a prima facie case or that the defendant was unfairly precluded from making a record, we might deem it appropriate to give that defendant an opportunity to present additional facts." (Simon, J., dissenting at 259.) This does not even say that we are going to remand all cases in which we find that the record discloses no prima facie showing, but intimates that we may remand some cases in which no prima facie showing has been made, but not all. It appears he would have us pick and choose, deciding on an ad hoc basis whether the prima facie showing question should be decided in this court or by the trial court.
All of these objections to remanding these cases to the trial court strikes me as "much ado about nothing." Even if we were to decide in this court the prima facie showing question and find that the record discloses a prima facie case of discrimination, the case must still be remanded to the trial court for a hearing, at which the prosecutor would have an opportunity to offer racially neutral explanations for the use of the peremptory challenges. Following the procedure which the majority uses in the supervisory order is not going to substantially alter the nature of the trial court proceedings or appreciably lengthen the hearing. On the other hand, if we decide from the record before us that the defendant has not made the requisite prima facie showing, it is the defendant who will be hurt. As I have discussed herein, he will have been unfairly deprived of the right to make a showing under Batson law. This denial, in itself, may pose some constitutional problems. However, it now appears from Justice Simon's dissent that he would remand some, but not all, cases in which we determine from the record that a prima facie showing has not been made. Therefore, whether we proceed under the majority supervisory order or under the theory of the dissent, almost all of these cases will be remanded to the trial court for a hearing on one or both issues. Thus, "much ado about nothing."
Justice Simon's dissent seems to concentrate on the horribles of People v. McDonald, which I have acknowledged herein. He does not say, however, in playing the numbers game, at what point below 16 peremptory challenges this court should arbitrarily say, solely from the number of peremptory challenges used, that the court finds that a prima facie showing discrimination has or has not been made. I cannot understand the meaning of or the reason for the highly charged statement in the dissent that "our act of remanding this issue does nothing to show our determination to stamp out the grotesque misuse of peremptory challenges." (Simon, J., dis senting at 261.) In remanding McDonald we are doing exactly that which the Supreme Court did in Batson and we are handling McDonald in the same manner as all other cases involving this question are being handled by this court. The procedure does not disadvantage the defendant in People v. McDonald any more than the procedure disadvantaged the defendant in Batson. I think that our supervisory order shows "our determination to stamp out the grotesque misuse of peremptory challenges" in exactly the same manner that Batson showed the Supreme Court's determination to do so. If it is important that such a determination be shown, I would think it important that the showing be made by the Supreme Court of the United States.
In cases that are tried after the Batson decision, the trial court must indulge in this two-step determination of the issues. Courts of review will then have the opportunity to determine the correctness of the trial court's holdings from a record made under Batson guidelines. For sake of uniformity, indeed for sake of fairness to those defendants who were tried before Batson, the trial court in such cases should also make the determination whether a prima facie case of discrimination has been made under Batson rules.
Chief Justice Clark's dissent acknowledges that the Supreme Court, in Batson, remanded the case to the trial court for a determination of whether a prima facie showing of discrimination can be established. I cannot accept the Chief Justice's explanation for the need for a different procedure in our cases. His dissent notes that in Batson the record and presentation to the court had been made in support of a sixth amendment argument. The Supreme Court, instead, decided the case on fourteenth amendment grounds and remanded the case to the trial court for its determination of the fourteenth amendment question in light of the Batson decision. I would think the same rationale would apply in our case. As noted previously, the record in this case was made under the guidelines of Swain. The guidelines established in Batson for making a prima facie showing of discriminatory use of peremptory challenges are entirely different than those required in Swain. I am not prepared to say what differences in proof these different guidelines may dictate. I am also not willing to arbitrarily preclude a defendant from making whatever additional showing he feels he can make under Batson to bolster his prima facie showing of racially discriminatory exercise of peremptory challenges.
The procedure outlined in the supervisory order is in keeping not only with that used by the Supreme Court in Batson, but also with that followed by a substantial number, though not all, of the courts in other jurisdictions. For example, see Jackson v. State (Ala. Dec. 19, 1986), No. 84 — 1112, slip op.; Smith v. State (Ala. App. Feb. 10, 1987), No. 6, Div. 5, slip op.; State v. Antwine (Mo. March 17, 1987), No. 67720, slip op.; State v. Payton (Mo. App. March 17, 1987), No. 51542, slip op.; Saadiq v. State (Iowa 1986), 387 N.W. 2d 315; People v. Hockett (1986), 121 A.D. 2d 878, 503 N.Y.S.2d 995; United States, v. Allen (4th Cir. 1987), 814 F.2d 977; United States v. David (11th Cir. 1986), 803 F.2d 1567; and Fleming v. Kemp (11th Cir. 1986), 794 F.2d 1478. Our appellate court held similarly in People v. Johnson (1986), 148 Ill. App. 3d 163, and People v. Cannon (1986), 150 Ill. App. 3d 1009.
Lastly, Justice Simon's dissent expresses concern over this court's delay in resolving the Batson question in the cases before us. The supervisory order in this case was approved by a majority of this court during its March term and would have been entered no later than March 26, 1987, were it not for the time consumed in finalizing and responding to the language of the dissents. Now, some four weeks later, the supervisory order remanding these cases to the trial courts still has not been entered. The delay cannot be attributed to the manner of handling the Batson issue set forth in the supervisory order.
"WARD and MORAN, JJ., join in this special concurrence.