Opinion ID: 1094109
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Guidance to Trial Courts

Text: Melbourne gave trial courts the following unambiguous and practical three-step procedure to use whenever a race-based objection to a peremptory challenge was made: Step One. A party objecting to the use of a peremptory challenge must: (a) make a timely objection on that basis, (b) show that the venireperson is a member of a distinct racial group, and (c) request that the court ask the striking party its reason for the strike. If the step one requirements are met, the trial court then asks the proponent of the strike to explain the reason for the strike. Step Two. The burden of production (not persuasion) then shifts to the proponent of the strike to come forward with a race-neutral explanation. The explanation will be deemed race-neutral for purposes of step two as long as no predominant discriminatory intent is apparent on its face. If the explanation is not facially neutral, the inquiry is over and the strike will be denied. Step Three. If the explanation in step two is facially race-neutral and the court believes that, given the totality of circumstances surrounding the strike, the explanation is not a pretext, the strike will be sustained. [13] The focus of the court in step three is not on the reasonableness of the explanation (as required before Melbourne ) but rather on its genuineness. Throughout this entire three-step process, the burden of persuasion never leaves the opponent of the strike to prove racial discrimination. See Melbourne, 679 So.2d at 764 (citing Purkett, 514 U.S. at 768, 115 S.Ct. 1769). The shift away from reasonableness to genuineness in step three was one of Melbourne's major departures from earlier case law. Trial courts were now instructed to refocus their discerning eyes from the objective reasonableness of the asserted nonracial motive to the subjective genuineness of the motive. Why did the Melbourne court make such a radical change? This change was prompted by the United States Supreme Court's statement in Purkett that [the] whole focus [is not] upon the reasonableness of the asserted nonracial motive ... [but] rather ... the genuineness of the motive ... [,] a finding which turn[s] primarily on an assessment of credibility. Purkett, 514 U.S. at 769, 115 S.Ct. 1769. The Melbourne Court also found that [t]he Florida Constitution does not require that an explanation be nonracial and reasonable, only that it be truly nonracial. Id. at 764 n. 9.