Opinion ID: 852080
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Examination of Approaches to Waiver of Batson Claims

Text: Although reaching differing results, because several federal courts have been confronted with this issue, we rely on their authority for this discussion. [3] A number of circuit courts require that the party opposing a peremptory strike on the basis of similar non-struck jurors must make an explicit side-by-side juror comparison to the trial court to preserve a Batson claim on appeal. For example, the Eighth Circuit will not consider claims of pretext based upon the failure to strike similarly situated jurors unless the point was raised in the district court. United States v. Walley, 567 F.3d 354, 358 (8th Cir.2009). See Swope v. Razzaq, 428 F.3d 1152, 1155 (8th Cir.2005) (noting that the opposing party failed . . . to make the district court aware of any similarly situated jurors who had not been struck); United States v. Hunt, 372 F.3d 1010, 1012 (8th Cir.2004) (Because Hunt did not identify any similarly situated jurors at trial, we do not consider the claim on appeal.). Similarly, the Eleventh Circuit has noted that the Batson burden-shifting framework mandates that [o]nce the prosecution has offered a legitimate, non-discriminatory reason for exercising its strikes, [ Batson's burden of proof] requires the party contesting the strike to demonstrate that the prosecution's stated reasons are pretextual. United States v. Houston, 456 F.3d 1328, 1338 (11th Cir.2006). The court rejected defendant's Batson claim on appeal where the defendant did not suggest to the trial judge that there were similarly situated white venire members whom the prosecution did not strike. Id. The Fourth and Fifth Circuits have reached similar results. See, e.g., Davis v. Baltimore Gas & Elec. Co., 160 F.3d 1023, 1028, 1027 (4th Cir.1998) (declaring that a plaintiff waived his Batson challenge where he stood mute after the prosecution presented a seemingly race-neutral justification); United States v. Arce, 997 F.2d 1123, 1127 (5th Cir.1993) (holding that [b]y failing to dispute the prosecutor's [race-neutral] explanation in the district court, defendants have waived their right to object to it on appeal). Several circuits examine on appeal otherwise waived Batson claims under either a plain error or a clear error standard of review. The First Circuit describes the difference this way: A preserved Batson claim is one in which contemporaneous objection was raised at trial; an unpreserved Batson claim is one in which no such objection was raised at trial. We review preserved Batson claims for clear error . . . . We will not find clear error unless, after reviewing all of the evidence, we are left with the definite and firm conviction that a mistake has been committed. We . . . apply plain error review to unpreserved Batson claims. In applying this standard of review, we have observed a Supreme Court ruling that, unless a discriminatory intent is inherent in the prosecutor's explanation, the reason offered will be deemed race neutral. United States v. Charlton, 600 F.3d 43, 50, 47 (1st Cir.2010) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted) (emphasis added) (performing a side-by-side juror comparison where the only objection to a particular strike was she's one of the two black jurors seated in the jury, and I think one of the few black jurors in the jury pool and finding neither clear error nor plain error). The Sixth Circuit examined a defendant's Batson claim on appeal for plain error where the defendant made no response when faced with the government's seemingly race-neutral explanation. United States v. Jackson, 347 F.3d 598, 605 (6th Cir.2003) (noting [i]f a defendant fails to rebut a race-neutral explanation at the time it was made, the district court's ruling on the objection is reviewed for plain error and after performing a comparative juror analysis, concluding no error occurred). The Ninth Circuit has taken the same approach. See United States v. Contreras-Contreras, 83 F.3d 1103, 1105 (9th Cir.1996) (declaring [w]e review for plain error because [defendant's] counsel not only failed to make an initial objection to the challenge, but also failed to object to the prosecution's volunteered explanation, and noting that `[p]lain error' is an actual error that is `clear' and `obvious' under current law which should be employed only in those cases `in which a miscarriage of justice would otherwise result' (quoting United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 734, 736, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993))). Similarly, addressing a trial court's denial of a defendant's Batson challenge, the District of Columbia Circuit reviewed for clear error those strikes to which the defendant objected at trial, and reviewed for plain error those strikes the defendant objected to only on appeal. United States v. Moore, 651 F.3d 30, 42, 43 (D.C.Cir. 2011). In both types of review, the court fully examined the voir dire record, made extensive juror comparisons, and quoted the jurors' voir dire statements from the trial transcript. See id. at 42-44. By contrast in United States v. Hendrix, the defense objected generally to the prosecutor's exercise of a peremptory challenge of the only two African Americans in the venire, however it offered no substantive rebuttal to the State's race-neutral explanation for the strikes. 509 F.3d 362, 367 (7th Cir.2007). The Seventh Circuit reviewed the defendant's Batson challenge on appeal for clear error rejecting the Government's argument that it should review the claim for plain error. Id. at 367 n. 3. The Court ultimately concluded the prosecutor's peremptory challenges did not violate defendant's right to equal protection. Id. at 372.