Opinion ID: 2599897
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: A Batson Challenge Must be Raised Before the Venire is Dismissed to be Timely Under Utah Law

Text: ¶ 39 While this court has not explicitly considered the implications of a Batson challenge raised after the remainder of the venire has been dismissed, the Utah Court of Appeals has. In Salt Lake County v. Carlston , the court of appeals stated that a Batson challenge, like other objections, must be  timely presented to the trial court in a manner sufficient to obtain a ruling thereon. 776 P.2d 653, 655 (Utah Ct.App.1989). In addressing timeliness standards, the court of appeals stated that a Batson challenge must be raised before the jury is sworn but also seemed to adopt a rule that a Batson challenge must be raised before the venire is dismissed. Id. at 655-56. The court stated that the Batson court envisioned a prompt motion to strike the jury panel, `probably before the venire was dismissed.' Id. at 656 (quoting United States v. Erwin, 793 F.2d 656, 667 (5th Cir.1986)). The court of appeals noted that this rule was based on two justifications: (1) prevent[ing] defendants from `sandbagging' the prosecution by waiting until trial has concluded unsatisfactorily before insisting on an explanation for jury strikes[;] and (2) remedying prosecutorial misconduct prior to commencement of trial simply by seating the wrongfully struck venireperson. Id. (quoting United States v. Forbes, 816 F.2d 1006, 1011 (5th Cir.1987)). ¶ 40 In State v. Harrison , the court of appeals considered a Batson challenge raised after the jury was sworn but before the venire was dismissed. 805 P.2d 769, 773 (Utah Ct.App.1991). The court cited Carlston to support its position that the defendant had raised his Batson challenge in a manner sufficient to obtain a ruling from the trial court. Id. at 776. While the court of appeals mistakenly applied the timeliness standards of rule 18(c)(2) of the Utah Rules of Criminal Procedure to the Batson challenge, it never contradicted its position in Carlston that a Batson challenge must be raised before the venire is dismissed. See id. Obviously, if a Batson violation is to be remedied by seating the wrongfully struck juror, as implied by Carlston, 776 P.2d at 656, a Batson challenge must be raised before the venire is dismissed if the trial court is to properly rule on it, id. at 655. Thus, the only logical reading of Harrison is that the court of appeals left intact the Carlston rule that a Batson challenge must be raised before the venire is dismissed. ¶ 41 Until the court of appeals' decision in State v. Valdez, 2004 UT App 214, ¶ 10, 95 P.3d 291, no Utah court had ever allowed a Batson challenge to proceed as timely after the venire had been dismissed. We hold that the court of appeals in Valdez erred by reading Harrison to mean that a Batson challenge can be raised after the dismissal of the venire. Rather, the rule established in Carlston that a Batson challenge must be raised before the venire is dismissed existed undisturbed until the court of appeals implicitly overruled it in Valdez. Id. Even if this were not the case, we would be compelled to adopt and apply this rule prospectively, for this rule logically flows from the rationale underlying a Batson challenge. ¶ 42 In Carlston, the Utah Court of Appeals correctly noted that the process mandated by Batson . . . rests on the premise that the trial court will hear the objection and make a factual finding of whether the [proponent] has used peremptory challenges in a discriminatory manner. Carlston, 776 P.2d at 656. The court noted that an untimely Batson objection impedes the ability of the trial judge to make a proper factual finding on the evidence presented and also deprives the proponent of the opportunity to present evidence of any constitutionally permissible reasons for challenges to the venire members. Id. Indeed, the three-step process of Batson would be severely impeded were a Batson challenge to be allowed after the jury selection process is complete. The burden-shifting framework of Batson is best implemented if it is litigated while the peremptory strikes are fresh in the minds of both the court and the litigants. See McCrory v. Henderson, 82 F.3d 1243, 1247-48 (2d Cir. 1996) (citing numerous decisions holding that the subjective nature of the peremptory challenge mandates that any objection to its use be raised and ruled upon promptly). ¶ 43 First, the party raising the Batson challenge will be better able to make out a prima facie case if he can discuss the proponent's use of peremptory strikes in relation to the characteristics of the individual jurors stricken as well any relevant voir dire. In other words, the opponent will be more equipped to demonstrate that the Batson challenge has merit if he raises it sooner rather than later. [21] See State v. Alvarez, 872 P.2d 450, 455 (Utah 1994) (noting that the purpose of the prima facie requirement is to separate meritless claims of discrimination from those that may have merit (citation and internal quotation marks omitted)). Second, the proponent of the peremptory strikes is more capable of presenting evidence to rebut a Batson challenge if the Batson challenge is promptly raised because both voir dire and the stricken jurors will be fresh in his mind. Finally, the trial judge must be able to weigh the evidence presented to determine whether the Batson standard has been met. This necessarily requires that the trial judge weigh the arguments and credibility of both litigants in light of the individual jurors' behavior, mannerisms, and responses to voir dire. This duty is likewise accomplished more effectively if a Batson challenge is promptly raised. The Batson framework is designed to produce actual answers to suspicions and inferences that discrimination may have infected the jury selection process. Johnson v. California, 545 U.S. 162, 125 S.Ct. 2410, 2418, 162 L.Ed.2d 129 (2005). In order to ensure that this framework produces actual answers, it is necessary that Batson challenges are promptly raised and that courts timely rule upon them. Id. The rule we set forth, which requires that a Batson challenge be raised both before the jury is sworn and before the venire is dismissed, efficiently allows the trial court to determine the issues the Batson test is designed to resolve. ¶ 44 In addition, a Batson challenge must be raised in such a manner that the trial court is able to fashion a remedy in the event a Batson violation has occurred. As the Johnson Court noted, the Batson test encourages prompt rulings on objections to peremptory challenges without substantial disruption of the jury selection process. Id. (citations and internal quotation marks omitted). A Batson violation can only be remedied without substantially disrupting the jury selection process if it is brought before the venire is dismissed. If a Batson violation is found before the venire is dismissed, the violation can be remedied simply by reinstating the stricken juror. Once the venire has been dismissed, however, a sustained Batson challenge will require the trial judge to, at minimum, call additional jurors, and may require the judge to call an entirely new venire from which to select a new jury. Also, if a Batson violation is found after the jury has been sworn and the venire excused, the only available remedy is a mistrial. [22] See McCrory, 82 F.3d at 1247. We see no legitimate reason to sanction such an inefficient use of judicial time and resources, or to allow such a burden to be imposed on the parties. Moreover, to allow a Batson challenge to proceed after the venire has been dismissed is only to sanction abuse. If such a result were allowed, a party would be able to delay raising a Batson challenge until it determined whether it approved of the selected jury. Such sandbagging is antithetical to notions of judicial economy and procedural fairness. ¶ 45 Finally, the rights that the Batson challenge is designed to protect cannot be fully vindicated if a Batson challenge is allowed after the dismissal of the venire. A Batson challenge is designed to remedy harm to the litigants, the community, and the individual jurors who are wrongfully excluded that occurs when discriminatory jury selection criteria are tolerated. J.E.B. v. Alabama, 511 U.S. 127, 140, 114 S.Ct. 1419, 128 L.Ed.2d 89 (1994). While the Court has held that individual jurors who are wrongfully excluded may bring suit, it has also noted that [a]s a practical matter . . . these challenges are rare. Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400, 414, 111 S.Ct. 1364, 113 L.Ed.2d 411 (1991). This is because [p]otential jurors are not parties . . . and have no opportunity to be heard at the time of their exclusion. Id. Moreover, a wrongfully stricken juror cannot easily obtain declaratory or injunctive relief when discrimination occurs. Id. Therefore, in the vast majority of cases in which an individual juror is wrongfully excluded, the discrimination against the juror goes unredressed if he remains excluded from jury service. The only logical way to ensure the possibility of redress is to require that a Batson objection be raised before the venire is dismissed. Under this rule, if a Batson challenge is found, the improperly excluded juror can then be reinstated. ¶ 46 In summary, we hold that a Batson challenge must be raised both before the jury is sworn and before the venire is dismissed in order to be timely under Utah law. We note that this rule is similar to the rule that was sanctioned by the Supreme Court in Ford v. Georgia. See 498 U.S. 411, 422, 111 S.Ct. 850, 112 L.Ed.2d 935 (1991) (The requirement that any Batson claim be raised not only before trial, but in the period between the selection of the jurors and the administration of their oaths, is a sensible rule.). We also note that the fact that the rule we adopt is widely followed by other jurisdictions  both federal and state  that have considered this issue. See, e.g., Morning v. Zapata Protein (USA), Inc., 128 F.3d 213, 216 (4th Cir.1997) (noting that most of the federal circuits have taken the cue from Ford and requir[ed] Batson challenges to be raised, at the latest, before the venire is excused); McCrory, 82 F.3d at 1247 (The Court's discussion in Batson, however, makes clear that it envisioned an objection raised during the jury selection process. (emphasis added)); State v. Ford, 2001 MT 230, ¶ 30, 306 Mont. 517, 39 P.3d 108 (holding that a Batson challenge is not timely if the jury has been sworn and the venire dismissed, and observing that [s]everal jurisdictions have closely analyzed Batson's language and concluded that the U.S. Supreme Court envisioned that a Batson challenge must be made before the jury is sworn, while citing numerous state decisions barring Batson objections after the jury is sworn and the venire is dismissed). We are aware of no case in any jurisdiction, aside from the court of appeals' decision in this case below, in which a court found a Batson challenge to be timely after both the jury was sworn and the remainder of the venire was dismissed  in other words, after the jury selection process was wholly complete. [23] Accordingly, we hold that Valdez's Batson challenge  raised after the jury was sworn and the venire dismissed  was untimely under Utah law.