Opinion ID: 2118255
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Christine Riley Brown

Text: During voir dire, which was conducted by the trial court judge on April 23 and 24, 1984, Christine Riley (now Brown) stated that she graduated from Richard Vocational High School and had worked for six years as a directory assistance operator for Illinois Bell. With regard to her place of residence, she agreed with the judge when he stated that she lived in Hyde Park or Kenwood, which are two neighborhoods in the same vicinity on Chicago's south' side. Riley had a friend who was a lawyer. She had never spoken to this friend about her philosophies of law or law enforcement. Riley was separated from her husband, who had done auto body work during the time that they were together. Her nephew had been the victim of a crime. He was stabbed about three months ago in front of his house on the south side of Chicago. Riley said [i]t was a fight, and she did not know exactly what happened. The Batson hearing was conducted by the same judge who presided at trial. At this hearing, Daniel Franks, one of the prosecutors in the case, explained his reasons for excusing Brown. One of these reasons was that she lived in the Hyde Park area. Franks explained that, based on his experience, it was his belief that people who live in the Hyde Park and University of Chicago area have a certain attitude about themselves and that community. According to Franks, [t]hey are more interested in scholastic endeavors and maybe would be more open to new ideas and other types of ideas than people in the rest of the Chicago area. Franks stated that in selecting jurors, he looks for people who are going to listen to the evidence and make their findings of fact based on the evidence that they get in this courtroom, and not guess or attempt to go beyond the rulings of the court or the jury instructions. Defendant argues that the reasons given by the prosecutor for excusing Brown appear either pretextual or unsupported by the record. With regard to Brown's place of residence, defendant notes that Brown never stated that she was a resident of Hyde Park. Instead, she simply answered yes when the judge stated: You live in Hyde Park or Kenwood, did you say? In addition, defendant emphasizes that Brown graduated from a vocational high school and worked as a directory assistance operator. According to defendant, there is no evidence she possessed the characteristics of Hyde Parkers which Franks found objectionable. As defendant correctly notes, Brown did not state that she lived in Hyde Park. Her answer to the judge's question about her place of residence indicated that she lived either in Hyde Park or Kenwood. However, the prosecutor, in explaining why he excluded Brown, did not say that she lived in Hyde Park. His statement was that she lived in the Hyde Park area.  (Emphasis added.) This statement could apply to Brown whether she lived in Hyde Park or Kenwood. Defendant also contends, as noted, that Brown did not necessarily possess the characteristics that the prosecutor found objectionable in Hyde Parkers. Defendant raised this identical argument in Harris I regarding a different venire member. There, defendant challenged the prosecutor's explanation that a venire member was excluded in part because of her residence in Hyde Park. According to defendant, the State could not rely on such an explanation unless it could show that Hyde Park residents actually did tend to be scholarly, open to new ideas and not likely to base their findings of fact on evidence, and that the venireperson in question actually possessed these traits. Harris I, 129 Ill.2d at 176-77, 135 Ill.Dec. 861, 544 N.E.2d 357. We rejected defendant's argument. We determined in Harris I that the State's failure to show that a group actually possesses the undesirable traits attributed to it by the State, or that an excluded venire member also possesses these traits, is a factor that should be considered by the trial court in evaluating the legitimacy of the State's explanation. However, the State is not required, at the second stage of the Batson process, to make such a showing. At the second stage, it is not necessary that the State establish the empirical truth of the reason it cites in support of a challenge to a juror. Harris II, 164 Ill.2d at 338, 207 Ill.Dec. 400, 647 N.E.2d 893. All that is required of the State at the second stage is that the prosecutor's explanation be facially race-neutral. Hernandez, 500 U.S. at 360, 111 S.Ct. at 1866, 114 L.Ed.2d at 406. We conclude that, in the case at bar, the prosecutor's explanation that Brown was excluded because she lived in the Hyde Park area is race-neutral. As noted previously, at the conclusion of the Batson hearing, the trial court judge found that the challenges were used for neutral reasons[,] not for racial reasons. With regard to Brown, the judge specifically found that the explanation that she lived in the community of Hyde Park was race-neutral. We cannot say that the judge's determination here was clearly erroneous. Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 364-65, 369, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 1869, 1871, 114 L.Ed.2d 395, 409 (1991); Wiley, 165 Ill.2d at 274, 209 Ill.Dec. 261, 651 N.E.2d 189; Harris II, 164 Ill.2d at 333, 207 Ill.Dec. 400, 647 N.E.2d 893. We therefore reject defendant's Batson claim as to the exclusion of venire member Christine Riley Brown.