Opinion ID: 2457072
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Defense's Peremptory Strikes of Female Jurors

Text: Mr. Knese asserts that his counsel used his peremptory strikes to exclude women from the jury on the basis of their gender, and defense counsel disclosed during argument on the motion for new trial that this had been his strategy. As a general matter, peremptory strikes may not be used to remove venirepersons based on their gender. [53] Even a criminal defendant may not exercise his or her peremptory challenges in a discriminatory manner. [54] Mr. Knese contends that he is entitled to a new trial because his attorney used his peremptory challenges in a discriminatory fashion. Mr. Knese has no standing to raise this claim. As this Court has held, a criminal defendant may not seek relief from a judgment based upon an error that was committed at his instance. [55] While Mr. Knese claims that his own equal protection rights were violated by this practice, he does not support this claim, and it is unclear how, even theoretically, a defendant can violate his own equal protection rights. Somewhat more plausible is the claim that Mr. Knese has violated the equal protection rights of the women excluded from the jury on the basis of their gender. [56] While Mr. Knese's actions may amount to a violation of the equal protection rights of the excluded venirepersons, he does not have standing to raise that violation to challenge his conviction. In order to raise such third-party standing, a litigant must demonstrate that he has suffered a concrete injury, that he has a close relation to the third party, and that there exists some hindrance to the third party's ability to protect its own interests. [57] Thus, the State has standing to object to the equal protection violation inherent in a criminal defendant's use of discriminatory peremptory strikes. [58] In contrast, Mr. Knese cannot claim to have suffered a concrete injury by his own exercise of peremptory strikes. The sole case Mr. Knese cites where a criminal defendant has been given a new trial due to his own discriminatory exercise of peremptory strikes is United States v. Huey . [59] In that case, two defendants, Mr. Garcia and Mr. Huey, were tried jointly and both the State and Mr. Garcia objected when Mr. Huey used all of his peremptory challenges to strike African-American jurors. [60] Despite the objections, Mr. Huey was not required to provide a race-neutral explanation for the strikes. In their joint appeal, the Fifth Circuit reversed both convictions, but explicitly found only that Mr. Garcia had standing to assert the equal protection violation of the venirepersons struck by Mr. Huey. We do not read Huey to hold that a criminal defendant has standing to complain of violations of venirepersons' equal protection rights he himself has caused. To the degree that that Huey stands for this principle, we are inclined to agree with the Seventh Circuit that Huey was wrongly decided. [61] Although [i]mportant social interests allow a judge to block the defense from taking certain action... [i]t does not follow that by violating these important social interests a defendant can help himself to a new trial. [62] Mr. Knese has no standing to challenge his conviction based on his own allegedly discriminatory conduct in the use of his peremptory strikes.